Abandoned Shipwreck Graveyard | Green Jacket Shoal | Rhode Island

You might be surprised to learn that the largest shipwreck graveyard in Rhode Island is sitting just outside of Providence, the state’s capital. Unfortunately, unless you value old Narragansett Beer bottles, there is NO treasure here.
Filmed/Edited/Narrated by Jason Allard
My website: www.UncomSenseMedia.com
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Drone: DJI Mini 3 Pro | Fly More Plus
Secondary Camera: GoPro Hero8 Black
Editing: Final Cut Pro w/ custom plugins
Sources:
2016 Marine Archaeological Survey | rb.gy/ddz8u3
Alina Spatz Ship Graveyard Visualizer | rb.gy/31vell
Music By:
Dexter Yu | rb.gy/exmuzo
Ayoji | rb.gy/xp4yxq
TheSkyBeats | rb.gy/5kbzr8
HeyRickBeats | rb.gy/o4lf2n
ProdbyONE | rb.gy/jw31p1
ProdVCYN | rb.gy/8y68zc
This is Green Jacket Shoal, home of Rhode Island’s largest ship graveyard, containing twenty nine vessels. If this looks familiar, it’s because it’s right off RT 195, on the coast of Bold Point Park, and most of it is visible at low tide. Those pieces of wood you see sticking up when you drive by or walk in India Point Park? Yeah, SHIPWRECKS… mostly. There’s also docks, pilings, and barges chilling here. Don’t worry, I’ll show you everything.
Welcome to Rhode Island’s largest abandoned ship graveyard.
In order to understand why this spot is home to so many sunken ships, we have to go back in time. Let’s get into it.
The shoreline here was once filled with oyster beds and was a major fishery until the mid-1800s. After the Industrial Revolution started upriver at Slater Mill, the area transitioned into an industrial waterfront with railways running along the water.
By the late 1800s, Providence had developed into a major port and the site had become a shipyard where people brought their boats to be repaired. The Providence Dry Dock and Railway Company acted as the service station for all the ships coming in and out of port. It was the main ship repair facility in Providence and Green Jacket Shoal was its parking lot. Ships were built and serviced here from 1884 to 1919.
The vessels off Bold Point were abandoned here “at the end of their working lives.’’ Many were transported to the company’s yard from within Providence Harbor, stripped of their valuable machinery and hardware- things like engines, boilers, navigational instruments and rigging gear, -and then moved a short distance to Green Jacket Shoal to rest in peace.
There are so many historic vessels here that the Providence Journal labeled this 33 acre site as “where ships go to die.” And they’ve had a hard time dying - the water here was so polluted over the years that bacteria that would normally eat these vessels couldn’t survive.
Since most of these ships were left here over 100 years ago, they were slowly forgotten over the years. But thanks to the efforts of Marine Archaeologist David Robinson they have pretty much all been accounted for. During his research David highlighted their importance, saying “This site captures the maritime focus that Providence had during its ‘Golden Era,’ at the peak of its history as an industrial port city.” The graveyard is not junk, but "an archaeological site of some significance”. David conducted an archaeological reconnaissance survey in 2016 that goes in-depth on everything you could ever want to know about Green Jacket Shoal, and is where I got the majority of my information. I highly recommend reading it.
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