Portsmouth's Worst Naval Tragedy

The Royal George in happier times

Usually (or unusually) when this topic does come into conversation, it's the loss of the Mary Rose that is the most well known and famous. However, on an August morning in 1782, a different and more tremendous calamity occurred.

HMS Royal George, Launched in 1756 and was the largest warship of its time, carrying over 100 cannon across four decks. The design and appearance would have been very similar to that of the preserved HMS Victory which can still be visited in Portsmouth's Historic Dockyard.  The ship was immediately set into action, fighting the French in several key battles of the period. Then seeing much use over the following 20 years across the world, defending the colonies in the American war of independence and again further battles against the Spanish fleet in European waters, where they were attempting to recapture Gibraltar in 1780.

During the peacetime after this war, the Royal George was part of the channel fleet and it was whilst carrying out routine maintenance on the ship that the catastrophe happened.  The ship was being resupplied with barrels of rum while at the same time, the ships heavy cannons were repositioned inside the ship so that it would learn to one side and the underwater part of the hull could be repaired.  During this operation, the guns were moved too far and while they were being moved back again, water entered through the unsecured gun ports where the barrels were being loaded and flooded the ship.

Sinking of the Royal George

The Royal George listed onto its side and crushed the loading vessel, forcing it underwater which temporarily halted the instant sinking.  The ship however, continued to take on water rapidly and took with it over 900 sailors, wives and families who were visiting and a great many 'ladies of the night'.  Some 255 people managed to escape by climbing the rigging of the ship or jumping into the water, including the Captain.  Many of those who perished were washed ashore on the Isle of Wight by Ryde beach over the next days and weeks and were buried in a mass grave, now located under the esplanade there. 

Divers work on the wreck

As the wreck was full of valuable bronze and lead cannon, attempts were made to salvage them. Charles Spalding, a pioneer of diving bells was able to recover several of these and was rewarded £400 for his effort.   No further work happened on the wreck  for 52 years when in 1834, the Deane brothers attempted to recover more cannons using a new type of diving helmet that had air pumped into it.  During this operation, the Mary Rose wreck was re-discovered after fishermen told the divers to investigate another area near the wreck.

 A few years later in 1839, Colonel Charles Pasley of the Royal Engineers was asked to clear the wreck site as it was causing a nautical obstruction.  The wreck was blown up in a huge 'controlled' explosion which shattered windows for miles around.  After this, the timbers were removed, (some turned into a billiard table) and the site was declared clear.  Some of the salvaged bronze cannons were melted down to form the foundation of Nelsons Column Trafalgar Square, London.

Starquakes

In 1979, some Russian satellites were heading off to Venus and beyond when their sensors 

became overwhelmed and shut down by a unknown burst of energy, more than 200,000 times stronger than the usual reading in open space.  Within a few seconds, this energy burst reached Earth and disrupted many other satellites.  Given that the energy was detected from several different locations, it was possible to determine that the source was a then unknown type of object in the distant Large Magellanic cloud over 165,000 light years away.  Since this event, it has been found that the source of the energy was most likely a rarely occurring and newly discovered celestial object known as a magnetar.

The Crab Nebula has a neutron star at its centre after a supernova

Magnetars are a type of neutron star formed occasionally as a result more regular stars 10-50 times larger than our own sun reaching the end of their life and going supernova. Much of the stars remnants falls back under gravity to form a neutron star (or even a black hole) which are roughly 10 kilometers in diameter and a spoonful of its material could weigh 5 billion tonnes on Earth.  Neutron stars usually spin extremely quickly, multiple times each second, and of which there are several other varieties with other unusual effects.  The magnetar variety has the difference where the spin is much slower by comparison, maybe once every 2-10 seconds.  This results in the creation of a magnetic force that is unmatched by anything else in the known universe.

Artists Impression of a Magnetars appearance

This force is so strong that by example, standing within 1000km of its centre would strip the electrons from the atoms in your body and render life impossible.
To maybe make a different illustration, the magnetic field is 100 billion times stronger than the magnet you may be familiar with from school.  Every now and then, as a result of the spinning forces and energy released, the surface of the star has to adjust itself to remain round.
This adjustment results in vast amounts of energy being kicked into the cosmos in under a millionth of a second, a starquake.  The energy, in the force of x-rays and gamma rays travels across the cosmos for eternity, until some of it hits a Russian satellite and knocks its sensors offline.  In 2004, the most powerful starquake yet was detected some 50,000 light years away, on the other side of the galaxy, and released enough energy that if it had occurred just 10 light years from Earth, it would have burnt through the atmosphere and triggered a mass extinction.

There are currently 21 magnetars that have been observed and measured in the universe and the nearest being at a distance of 9,000 light years away. So it's fortunate that our corner of the galaxy just happens to be relatively safe!