page_title: RMS Empress of Ireland
section_title: Salvage operation
hierarchical_section_title: RMS Empress of Ireland / Wreck site / Salvage operation
caption_attribution_description: English: The wreck of RMS EMPRESS OF IRELAND Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada Commemorative Plaque Français&#160;: L'épave du RMS EMPRESS OF IRELAND La Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada Plaque commémorative
context_page_description: RMS Empress of Ireland was an ocean liner that sank near the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River following a collision in thick fog with the Norwegian collier SS Storstad in the early hours of 29 May 1914. Although the ship was equipped with watertight compartments and, in the aftermath of the Titanic disaster two years earlier, carried more than enough lifeboats for all onboard, she foundered in only 14 minutes. Of the 1,477 people on board, 1,012 died, making it the worst peacetime marine disaster in Canadian history.
  Empress of Ireland and her sister ship, Empress of Britain, were built by Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering at Govan on the Clyde in Scotland. The liners were commissioned by Canadian Pacific Steamships for the North Atlantic route between Liverpool and Quebec City. Empress of Ireland had just begun her 96th voyage when she sank.
  The wreck lies in 40 metres of water, making it accessible to advanced divers. Many artifacts from the wreckage have been retrieved, some of which are on display in the Empress of Ireland Pavilion at the Site historique maritime de la Pointe-au-Père in Rimouski, Quebec and at the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21.
context_section_description: Shortly after the disaster, a salvage operation began on Empress of Ireland to recover the purser's safe and the mail. This was deemed a plausible effort due to the wreck's relatively shallow depth at 130 feet, shallow enough so that in the aftermath of the sinking, the mainmast and funnels of the Empress were still visible just beneath the surface. The salvers recovered bodies and valuables inside the ship. They were faced with limited visibility and strong currents from the St. Lawrence River. One of the hard-hat divers, Edward Cossaboom, was killed when, it is assumed, he slipped from the hull of the wreck plummeting another 20 m (65 ft) to the riverbed below, closing or rupturing his air hose as he fell. He was found lying unconscious on his lifeline, and all attempts to revive him after he was brought to the surface failed. It was later reported, implausibly, that the sudden increase in water pressure had so compressed the diver's body that all that remained was a "jellyfish with a copper mantle and dangling canvas tentacles."
  The salvage crew resumed their operations and recovered 318 bags of mail and 212 bars of silver (silver bullion) worth about $150,000 ($1,099,000 in 2013 when adjusted for inflation).
  In 1964, the wreck was revisited by a group of Canadian divers who recovered a brass bell. In the 1970s, another group of divers recovered a stern telemeter, pieces of Marconi radio equipment, a brass porthole and a compass. Robert Ballard, the oceanographer and maritime archaeologist  who discovered the wreck of Titanic and the German battleship Bismarck, visited the wreck of Empress of Ireland and found that she was being covered by silt. He also discovered that certain artefacts from fixtures to human remains continued to be taken out by "treasure hunters".
caption: Commemorative plaque in Pointe-au-Père
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