The Insider writes that before construction divers examined magnetic anomalies on the seabed about 3 km north of Lubmin, where they were looking for unexploded ordnance and metal debris. Instead, they began lifting fragments of wooden blocks, pieces of rigging, leather shoe soles, and a large anchor, after which the work was stopped and the find was reported to the state office for monument protection.
Since dredging work was soon to begin at this site, the archaeologists were given very little time. In early July 2023, over 12 days they made 22 dives.
The ship lay at a depth of 7.5 m and was almost entirely buried under a layer of seabed sediments up to a meter thick. Only a fragment of the hull about 7.5 by 1 m in size from the stern section of the starboard side survived, and individual planks were scattered around it.
The vessel was built mainly of oak, and the planking boards were fastened lapstrake. Tree-ring analysis showed that the trees for the ship were cut down between 1626 and 1639. One wood sample is linked to northeastern Germany, another to southern Norway, from where timber was exported, so it was not possible to determine where the vessel was built.
Comparison with other Baltic ships suggests that its length was 19–22 m and its width 6–7 m. In total, more than 60 items were recovered from the seabed, including a 3.6-meter bilge-pump pipe hollowed out from a single oak trunk, two iron anchors with wooden stocks, a pine buoy marking the anchor position, rigging blocks, and casks with spare nails about 45 cm long.
A grinding wheel and carpentry tools indicate that there was a well-equipped workshop on board, which the author of the study considers characteristic of ships designed for long sea voyages. The most mysterious find was a fragment of clay brick with four conical holes, tightly inserted into the oak hull; no direct analogues to this object could be found, so the researcher suggests that it may have been a homemade device for sharpening drills or chisels.
Almost no personal belongings of the crew have survived — only two soles from different pairs of shoes and a piece of leather strap. Bones of pigs, and also sheep or goats, were also found at the site, likely leftovers from the ship’s food supplies.
The reasons for the vessel’s loss are still unclear, but traces of fire on some of the wooden parts may point to dramatic events. The two anchors and the buoy found nearby suggest that before the wreck the ship may have been deliberately anchored. The authors also compared the site with a 18th-century sea chart by the Dutch cartographer Gerard van Keulen: an anchorage is marked nearby, and 7 km to the east is the entrance to the Peenestrom, which until the end of the 18th century was the main route from the mouth of the Oder into the Baltic Sea.
The gas pipeline route was eventually shifted 26 m to the southwest, and the ship remains were covered with sandbags. At the same time, the seabed section east of the find has not yet been investigated, and other parts of the vessel may still remain there.
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