Mirlo
Tanker · United Kingdom · Lost 1918 · The Outer Banks
A tanker destroyed off the Outer Banks in August 1918, remembered for the Coast Guard rescue through burning water.
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The Vessel and Her Loss
Mirlo was a British tanker carrying petroleum along the American coast in the last summer of the First World War. On 16 August 1918 she was destroyed off Chicamacomico on the Outer Banks and her cargo burned across the sea. The Coast Guard crew from the Chicamacomico station pulled their surfboat repeatedly through the flames and brought forty-two men ashore. The rescue earned the surfmen the Gold Lifesaving Medal and is still commemorated on the Banks.
Vessel
- 1908
- Not established
- Not established
- Steel
- Not established
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- Steam, single screw
- Not established
Loss
- August 16, 1918
- Enemy action
- Off Chicamacomico, Outer Banks, North Carolina
- Atlantic Ocean off the Outer Banks
- Not established
- Petroleum
- 51
- Accounts of the number lost differ slightly.
- Not established
The Wreck Today
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
Position
- 35.60° N 75.42° W
- Reported, unconfirmed
- Rodanthe, North Carolina
Position given for the reported loss area off Chicamacomico; the wreck site is not surveyed in the sources reviewed.
Evidence
Overall confidence: Partially documented (72/100)
The number of lives lost and the position of the wreck are not settled in the sources reviewed.
United States Coast Guard Historian's Office
Loss date and circumstances, the Chicamacomico rescue, number of men saved.
Chicamacomico Life-Saving Station Historic Site
Details of the rescue and its commemoration.
