Pinta
Freighter · Netherlands · Lost 1963 · The New Jersey Coast
A small Dutch freighter, nearly empty after a lumber run, sunk in a puzzling clear-weather collision off Shark River in 1963.
Become Captain of RecordSee Shipwreck on Map
The Vessel and Her Loss
Pinta was a small Dutch freighter returning to New York after discharging most of her Central American lumber cargo in Norfolk when the larger British freighter City of Perth rammed her amidships in clear weather off the New Jersey coast in May 1963. All twelve crew, including the ship's only woman, escaped safely. The cause of the collision was never publicly explained, and the wreck today is one of New Jersey's most popular and easily toured dive sites.
Vessel
- 1959
- N.V. Bodewes
- Netherlands (built as a Danish-designed sister ship)
- Steel
- 194 ft
- 31 ft
- 1000
- Oil engine, single screw
- Dammers & van der Heide's Shipping and Trading Company
Loss
- May 7, 1963
- Collision
- About 15 miles south of the entrance to New York Harbor, off Shark River, New Jersey
- Atlantic Ocean
- Norfolk, Virginia → New York
- Nearly empty after discharging most of a cargo of Central American lumber
- 12
- 0
- Alie Korpelshoek
The Wreck Today
- 55-85
- Lies on its port side; bow relatively intact, though the hull has increasingly collapsed over time
- Not established
- Not established
- Not established
Position
- 40.23° N 73.84° W
- Approximate position
- Shark River, New Jersey
Position from AWOIS 1988 as reported by a recreational dive-site atlas (40°13.827'N, 73°50.625'W).
Evidence
Overall confidence: Documented (78/100)
The precise cause of the collision was not established even in contemporary press accounts and remains undocumented in the sources reviewed.
Build data, collision narrative, wreck condition.
Red Bank Register (Associated Press, May 8, 1963), reprinted on NJScuba.net
Collision date, casualty outcome, eyewitness account.
