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By *A shark-bitten loggerhead sea turtle that washed up on a Fripp Island sandbar in July returned home Friday *Mayor wants bed tax funds for dredging *Gold discovered at site of sunken ship SS Republic off Savannah's coast *Meeting for shrimpers put off, distribution of federal funding at issue *Escambia County Civil Service Board has upheld the suspension of a Pensacola Beach senior lifeguard
Gold discovered at site of sunken ship off Savannah's coast But this week, in deep water 100 miles east of Savannah, marine explorers found gold at the site of a Civil War-era shipwreck. After searching the ocean for more than 10 years, archeologists and technicians from a Tampa firm, Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc., on Thursday found 80 gold coins and at least two wooden crates of gold coins buried in the sediment, said Laura Lionetti Barton, the company's director of corporate public relations. The gold's worth is not yet known, she said. And the old coins must still be lifted, very carefully, from the ocean floor. "We don't want to scratch them," she said. After that, numismatic experts will study the coins and determine their value. Though Barton declined specific estimates Friday, last month she suggested that coins from this shipwreck could be worth $120 million or more. In August, Odyssey's salvage crews found what they believed was the site where the side-wheel steamer SS Republic sank during a hurricane in 1865, Barton said. Reportedly, this ship left New York and was heading for New Orleans when it foundered. Newspaper accounts at the time differ but from 59 to 81 passengers were on board, Barton said. As the ship sank, its passengers scrambled into life rafts. In all, from 13 to 17 people died after fleeing the ship, she said. But the gold went down with the ship, Barton said.
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