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CNN Live At Daybreak

Workers Salvaging USS Monitor From Ocean Floor

Aired July 17, 2001 - 08:25   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN ANCHOR: Workers are trying to salvage another sunken submarine. The USS Monitor has been on the ocean floor since its last mission, more than 100 years ago.

As Lowell Melser from CNN affiliate WAVY, in Hampton, Virginia, tells us, the team raising the Civil War-era ship has taken a big step forward.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LOWELL MELSER, WAVY REPORTER (voice-over): It took 150 Navy divers, at depths up to 240 feet, close to four weeks to bring the 130-ton structure off the ocean floor. And once they did it, what a sight.

BOBBIE SCHOLLEY, COMMANDING OFFICER: Just a really big feeling of relief, accomplishment, and euphoria.

MELSER: It really is awesome when you think about it. The heartbeat of the Monitor, its unique steam engine lay lifeless on the ocean floor for almost 150 years.

CAPT. CHRISTOPHER MURRAY, ON-SCENE COMMANDER: The Navy's never had a concentration of divers or one platform like this. Then you add in that we're diving on Monitor. It's just a lifelong dream, putting something like this together.

MELSER: How did they do it? 'Round-the-clock divers; that means they slept underwater for 13 days at a time, constructed that 30-foot frame, which you see right there -- that's an engine-lifting frame -- and then they straddled the engine to it.

Despite some bad weather along the way, researchers are ecstatic about the archaeological feat when they say things went off without a hitch.

JEFF JOHNSTON, NOAA RESEARCH ASSISTANT: This is a virtually intact example of a steam engine that was used in naval ships very early on. It was just when the Navy was just beginning to appreciate the importance of steam power versus sail power.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MCEDWARDS: That was Lowell Melser from CNN affiliate WAVY. It is expected to take about 10 years to finish the conservation work on the Monitor's engine.

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