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Lost at sea An estimated three million shipwrecks lie underwater around the world.–history.com

You read it first in this week’s The Factory in Guide magazine.

Many great ships and sailing vessels have sailed the seas over the years. But did you know that a rough estimate by the United Nations says that approximately 3 million ships lie wrecked at the bottom of the ocean? And this number doesn’t include the many that lie at the bottom of lakes the world over.

Among those lying in the ocean are some famous ones of which you may have heard, Queen Anne’s Revenge, the RMS Titanic, the USS Arizona just to name a few. Queen Anne’s Revenge was an 18th century warship mostly known for being the ship of legendary pirate Blackbeard (Edward Teach). First serving in the British Navy, the ship was later captured by the French and then by pirates from 1717 onwards. Although Blackbeard used the ship for less than a year, he achieved some of his greatest prizes during this time. In 1718 he grounded the ship and abandoned it, escaping capture by the British by boarding a smaller nearby ship.

In 1996, the remains of Queen Anne’s Revenge were discovered about one mile ashore from Atlantic Beach, North Carolina. So far thirty-one canons have been discovered and more than a quarter of a million artifacts have been recovered. As one of the few pirate ships to be discovered, it is now listed on the US National Register of Historic Places.

(The following facts are from Wikipedia) The famous RMS Titanic – put in the water on March 31, 1909, and buried at sea on April 15, 1912 after running into a massive iceberg mostly hidden underwater. She sank on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England to New York City, United States.

Then there was the brave USS Arizona, a battleship built of the Pennsylvania class for the United States Navy in the mid-1910s. Named in honor of the 48th state, she was sunk during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, which helped to start World War II. The shipwreck was declared a National Historic Landmark on 5 May 1989.

There are many ships that have gone down in the oceans, but there are also famous shipwrecks on the larger lakes. The PS Lady Elgin was a wooden-hulled side wheel steamship that sank in Lake Michigan off the fledgling town of Port Clinton, Illinois, whose geography is now divided between Highland Park and Highwood, Illinois, after she was rammed in a gale by the schooner Augusta in the early hours of September 8, 1860.

Many know the folk song that was written about the sinking of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald. This ship was an American Great Lakes freighter that sank in Lake Superior during a storm on November 10, 1975, with the loss of the entire crew of 29 men. When launched on June 7, 1958, she was the largest ship on North America’s Great Lakes and remains the largest to have sunk there.

This reminds me of the many storms of life we each have. Some of us may make choices that will prove unwise and our lives may crash like a shipwreck. Or, we may ask the best Pilot there ever was (Jesus) to take control of our lives and steer our ships safely to His heavenly harbor. Choose wisely.  James 3:4 “Look also at the ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires.” NKJV

Scripture taken from the New King James Version, Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.