Search for U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear: Have We Found It?

“Limit personal gear” was the message received from Brad Barr, Ph.D., chief scientist and expedition leader in one of his pre-cruise emails to members in search of the missing U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear. He knew this rule did not apply to work equipment. After all, “packing light” is subjective when it comes to transporting a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) rated to dive to 305 meters (1,000 feet) along with 6 underwater camera housings, a lighting chandelier, tethers, and all topside supporting equipment. Five fully loaded d-containers—sounds about right?

Ships with long careers are somewhat of a novelty for maritime archaeologists. Often, seafaring vessels are built with a specific purpose in mind—cargo carrier, military craft, scientific platform. The vessel may be adapted or refit over time, but at some point in its career, reconfiguring a vessel’s form for a new function becomes too costly. Only under special circumstances do vessels experience a second, third, or fourth career. In first seeing these vessels, their construction characteristics—the arrangement of internal compartments, technologies from different eras, and the materials used—all contribute to understanding the many iterations of their working lives.

Piloting a small remotely operated vehicle (ROV) at sea on a large vessel in prevailing ocean currents can be “exciting” in the best conditions. Our ability to safely navigate the wreck with our ROV, Pixel, is entirely dependent on the ability of the ship and crew to keep station - which is accomplished through dynamic positioning (DP). After our last big ship experience where the ship lost its DP and pulled Pixel off the wreck, causing significant damage, we are always a little concerned when putting a tether-operated vehicle in the water on an unknown ship.

It’s a beautiful day. Warm, sunny, and the ocean is relatively peaceful. “Peaceful” defined from the deck of a 240-foot vessel is of a different scale than when watching a 4-foot remotely operated vehicle (ROV) next to the ship being tossed around like a toy. As I stand on the buoy deck of the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Sycamore, eight feet below me is the remotely operated camera platform, Pixel. We’re out in the Atlantic Ocean surveying a shipwreck, hoping that when we finish, the wreck will be identified and the ending of her chapter will be written.

After transit to the wreck site, preparations began for launch. The USBL (Ultra Short Baseline Positioning System), used to calculate a subsea position, was lowered into the water. With the help of Sycamore’s deck crew and crane, the chandelier was lowered, and Pixel slipped beneath the waves.

Just before what looks to be a beautiful sunrise, we are closing in on the location of the “unidentified wreck.” The past two days have been spent loading and installing the highly sophisticated remotely operated vehicle (ROV) system and making final preparations for the operations to begin today.

Over the years, our team has been asked to survey wrecks all over the world. Our practice is to employ the best tools that budget and platforms allow for all aspects of the job, whether it be diver, robot, or even submersible. More and more often, the primary tool for initial exploration and planning has become a remotely operated vehicle (ROV). ROVs are certainly not new, but their size and drop in price is making them a much more integrated part of the survey process, even in shallower SCUBA-accessible depth waters.

If you are subjected to miserable discomforts, or even if you suffer, it must be regarded as all right and simply a part of life; like sailors, you must never dwell too much on the dangers or sufferings, lest others question your courage.

One of the more colorful lives of Bear, however, was her brief service as a “movie star.” The use of the ship (at the time re-named Bear of Oakland) as an at-sea film location for the 1930 adaptation of the Jack London novel, The Sea Wolf, was, at best, fleeting stardom, but a notable chapter in the long history of the ship.

The Arctic is a place that sparks the imagination. Its history is told in epic stories, compelling narratives of adventure and disaster in a landscape of ice and snow. The enduring Inuit people call the Arctic “home.” But for most of us, the Arctic is the setting for stories of daring exploits of explorers who confronted the challenges of a hostile and unforgiving environment, sometimes never to return, and the hunt for Bowhead whales in the golden age of Yankee whaling. Our perceptions of the Arctic are largely based on this rich history, but no longer is it the place it once was. Now warming two-times faster than any other place on the planet, the Arctic is facing its own challenges of warmer temperatures and receding ice. It is now more aptly described as a “new ocean” rather than the “kingdom of ice” it once was. This new “Arctic reality” not only has given rise to new management challenges as accessibility to its rich resources expands, but also makes the need to remember and preserve its rich history even more urgent.

For nearly two decades, the NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries’ Maritime Heritage Program, the U.S. Coast Guard, and a number of academic research partners have been engaged in a search for the final resting place of U.S. Revenue Cutter Bear.

Commodore Bertholf served the United States in its Revenue Cutter and Coast Guard Service from early manhood, never failing a call to duty, no matter what the danger, always acting in a notably distinguished and at times heroic manner, as evidenced in the especial award to him by Congress of its Gold Medal of Honor. He finally reached the highest command in the Coast Guard and retained to the last his vital interest in the cause of that service.

The “Honorable and Ancient” Cutter Bear: A History

As the world returned to some normalcy following World War I, the United States Coast Guard was readjusting to its peacetime duties. The service remained under Navy control until 28 August 1919, when all Coast Guard cutters were returned to the Treasury Department. For cutters assigned to the Bering Sea Patrol in Alaska and its regions, normal duties included checking vessel cargo for illegal fur trade, counting fish cannery employees for the 1920 census, providing medical assistance to the population, including Alaskan natives, and acting as representatives of the government.

The Bear is more than just a famous ship; she is a symbol for all the service represents—for steadfastness, for courage, and for constant readiness to help men and vessels in distress.

The Bear’s story did not end with the sinking of the cutter. Instead, a new chapter of the cutter’s history had begun and, within about 15 years of its sinking, the search for Bear was on.