Product Description

This book take readers donw into the frigid depths to explore the controversies of the Empress of Ireland's fatal night and the many attempts to salvage her contents.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #236206 in Books
• Published on: 2005-12-25
• Formats: Abridged, Audiobook
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 4
• Binding: Audio CD

From Publishers Weekly
The author of 2001’s Deep Descent recounts the sinking of the Canadian ocean liner Empress of Ireland and documents its subsequent romantic history as a lure for scuba divers in this well-researched but narrowly focused book. Early on the morning of May 29, 1914, the Empress was caught in a thick fog in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and was hit by a Norwegian collier that tore open the hull around its boiler room. The ship went down in about 14 minutes, killing two-thirds of its 1,475 travelers. Many of them were lost in the darkness below deck; some tried to squeeze out of portholes only to get stuck; others died of hypothermia in the freezing water. Like the Titanic, the Empress was a luxury liner, with first class cabins decorated with cherry wood and mahogany. And the combination of its dramatic sinking, its rich construction and its location just a few hundred feet below the surface made it a tantalizing destination for "extreme divers" willing to brave the strong currents and frigid temperatures of the area. McMurray himself made his first dive to the wreck in 1971, and his book focuses primarily on the equipment, techniques and dangers of diving to the ship’s remains. His history of the 1914 crash takes little more than 30 pages—probably a good choice since his prose tends to get duller the further away he moves from blow-by-blow explanations of underwater expeditions. The book is impressively researched, however, and, for those who love the lure of the deep water and the mysteries of shipwrecks, this specialized history will be a pleasure. 75 photos and illus.
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Review
"Dark Descent is a spellbinding read that perfectly describes the nightmarish conditions of diving on the wreck that remains a tomb of its victims." - Clive Cussler, author, Raise the Titanic!, The Sea Hunters, and Trojan Odyssey."

From the Inside Flap
"Many people in extreme sports do not recognize their limitations, and when they do, they're about to die."--Gary Gentile, wreck diver

The passenger liner Empress of Ireland departed Quebec City on May 28, 1914, bound for Liverpool, England, with 1,477 passengers and crew. That night the Empress encountered dense fog in the frigid Gulf of St. Lawrence, and at 1:55 a.m., May 29, the liner was struck and split open by the collier Storstad. In less than 15 minutes the great ship plunged to the bottom with more than 1,000 victims--one of the largest losses of life ever in a North American maritime accident. Shocking though the tragedy was, however, it was swept from public consciousness by the gathering cloud of World War I and the torpedoing of the Lusitania a year later.

But the story of the Empress did not end there. Soon after the ship settled into the muddy bottom, deep-water salvage divers were sent down in an attempt to recover the hundreds of bodies still trapped aboard. Operating in the dark and frigid depths in an unstable, obstacle-strewn wreck, these pioneer "hard hat" divers were one misstep from disaster, and one lost his life that summer. When Edward Cossaboom was finally recovered by fellow divers, nothing remained of him but "a jellyfish with a copper mantle and dangling canvas tentacles."

For almost half a century after Cossaboom's death, the Empress lay untouched by human hands and largely forgotten. But thanks to Jacques Cousteau and others, scuba diving became a popular sport after World War II. Beginning in the 1960s, the Empress lured divers, including Cousteau himself, to brave the icy St. Lawrence for the chance to see and touch a piece of history. Generations after her sinking, the Empress was in remarkable condition--a great but deadly wreck to dive.

Despite continuing advancements in diving equipment and techniques, including exotic mixed-gas breathing systems, more lives have been lost on the Empress in the past forty years--most recently in the summer of 2002. Considered a "pinnacle dive" by adventure seekers and a historic wreck by the likes of Robert Ballard (the discoverer of the Titanic), who filmed a documentary on the Empress in 1999, the beckoning call of the Empress is simply too powerful to resist. Those who have seen her once almost always go back.

In Dark Descent, Kevin McMurray gives us two great stories--the loss of a mighty ship with a human toll as terrible as the Titanic, and the birth and development of "deep-penetration" wreck diving, one of the most hazardous pursuits in the world. He re-creates not only some of the more successful dives on the Empress but also, in chilling detail, the fatal expeditions. McMurray, a veteran deepwater diver, has dived on the wreck multiple times, drawn to it for reasons the reader of this book will come to understand.

McMurray guides us along claustrophobic corridors, the inky darkness beyond our attenuated lights haunted by human remains and historic treasures. One miscalculation, one unseen hazard, one equipment malfunction or moment of panic could be fatal. He plunges us 150 feet deep to the once-proud Empress of Ireland and into a strange, romantic obsession, and at times we want to dash to the surface, lungs bursting, praying for one more breath of clean, fresh air.

Kevin F. McMurray is an award-winning journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Outside, Sunday Times (London), and Men's Journal. He is an experienced scuba diver who has visited the wreck of the Empress of Ireland on multiple occasions. McMurray is the author of Deep Descent: Adventure and Death Diving the Andrea Doria.

"Kevin McMurray has revealed the secrets of the Empress of Ireland in a spellbinding read that perfectly describes the nightmarish conditions of diving on the wreck that remains a tomb of its victims."--Clive Cussler, author of Night Probe! and Trojan Odyssey

"Kevin has a remarkable knack of adding life and realism. A great job."--R. W. Hamilton, Chairman of the Board, Divers Alert Network

Dark Descent tells two dramatic stories--the loss of a mighty ocean liner ninety years ago with a human toll as terrible as that of the Titanic, and the birth and development of extreme, deepwater wreck diving, one of the most hazardous pursuits in the world. Kevin McMurray takes us deep into the bowels of the Empress of Ireland, first to relive her tragic death and then to join the divers who have probed the wreck's secrets. At more than a hundred feet deep in frigid water, diving the Empress is like trying to find your way through an unfamiliar sixty-story building lying on its side at a forty-five degree angle, in pitch blackness with only a flashlight. It's an adventure from which some divers don't return.

What reviewers said about Kevin McMurray's Deep Descent: Adventure and Death Diving the Andrea Doria:

This is a book you will have a hard time putting down. Page after page leads you through adventure, mystery, suspense, and acts of heroism."--The Philadelphia Enquirer

"Exciting and powerful."--Library Journal

"McMurray knows his stuff. . . . Compelling. . . . Full of high drama in low places."--Kirkus Reviews

Customer Reviews

A FASCINATING READ!
Dark Descent: Diving and the Deadly Allure of the Empress of Ireland is a book for everyone! I am definitely not a member of the diving community, though if I were I would love the book as a guide to equipment and techniques. I am, in fact, alternately revolted and fascinated by extreme sports and the people who practice them, a combination of feelings that compels me to seek understanding in books like Dark Descent. This page-turner of a book goes a long way towards providing enlightenment and does it in a most interesting way. Deep wreck divers are tourists! McMurray's abbreviated yet complete rendering of the Canadian ocean liner Empress of Ireland's history and the tragedy of her 1914 sinking on a routine voyage from Quebec City to Liverpool reads like a Michelin guide to an exciting
historical site. Immediately one feels that reading about it isn't enough. One is compelled to visit. The bulk of the book is a history of tourism, a very difficult kind of tourism, to one of these sites. In tightly written, chronological chapters, McMurray describes all the expeditions to the Empress, as they illuminate the technical progress of diving and, more importantly to this reader, the motivations of the divers and the rivalries and sportsmanlike competition between them. Though the retrieval of artifacts provides a financial incentive
for early explorers of the wreck, diving continues after the government of Canada declares the wreck off limits to salvage. Why? All tourism involves a certain amount of discomfort and risk, and it is really these that make the tourist feel as if he or she has a special connection to the past, somehow more real than the experience of reading a book or watching a program on the History Channel. In such moments of actively reaching for connection, we feel most alive. That is why we travel, why we climb mountains. The chapters of this book describe this feeling of being fully alive, fully connected to the past, as it is experienced in a unique way by each of a series of explorers over the last ninety years. As the author says so well, in describing one of his own dives on the Empress, "I told myself I was really here. It was touching a powerful story, bearing witness to a profound and heart-wrenching tragedy." For a reader not yet ready to make that ultimate trip to the bottom of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, this book provides the next best thing to actually touching this story. Dark Descent is a great read!

The Fascination of the Empress
I first learned about the "Empress of Ireland" disaster through Clive Cussler's book "Night Probe!" I eventually found out more about the vessel and her untimely end.

The history is well-documented here by McMurray. Outbound in the St. Lawrence River, the Empress is badly holed by a fully-loaded collier and sinks within 15 minutes, killing more than a thousand.

This disaster was generally overshadowed by the outbreak of World War I and the ship was largely forgotten. But once she was found, she became a magnet for the curious and those with ulterior motives.

Much like what happened to the Titanic, the Empress has been stripped of much of her gear, her inner treasures, and sadly some of her bodies. A section of the "boneyard" has reportedly been plundered by some rather morbid and sick-minded individuals.

McMurray goes into great detail on the many expeditions and dives, the work by some to protect the wreck and what has been found, as well as those who've lost their lives diving on her.

While the Empress may be in the St. Lawrence, it's a dive for only the best, as this book carefully explains.

This is probably the most comprehensive history of the Empress of Ireland and updates all that has happened since she went down in May 1914. It is at times dense and a slow read, but you can't take away its entertaining, yet sobering qualities.

GOOD READ FOR DIVERS ON EMPRESS OF IRELAND SINKING
The sinking of the Empress of Ireland after a collision in the St. Lawrence Seaway is one of the most tragic shipwreck stories of all time. The author does a fine job of chronicling the numerous expeditions to this wreck, the dangers of diving it ( not for beginners) and the actual story of the 1914 tragedy. Mr. McMurray himself has dived this wreck and his first hand knowlege is evident in this well researched and equally well written book. This is a must have for the historian and the diver.