Hajósnép blog - a TIT HMHE blogja

This year, the president of our association joined an international project investigating the history of the Montenegrin royal yacht RUMIJA, which was sunk by units of the Austro-Hungarian Imperial and Royal Navy in 1915. Dr. Tamás Balogh - who, among the general international and Hungarian maritime history topics he had previously intensively researched (within them, topics concerning the Austro-Hungarian Navy in particular), is known in recent years primarily for his research related to the history of ocean liners - shares the results of his work within the framework of this project with those interested below.

Fig. 1: Cover of the book summarizing the results of the research.

Not an ocean liner, but....

.... a yacht. RUMIJA - ex-ZAZA (1905-1915) - was the yacht of William Beardmore (1856-1936), who built ocean liners, among others, and then belonged to the Turkish Sultan Abdul Hamid II (1842-1918), who bought it only so that he could give it to King Nikita I (1841-1921) of Montenegro as a gift.

As those who follow my activities may be used to, in addition to creating an encyclopedia of ocean liners, I regularly support the exploration and interpretation of various shipwrecks with my work. This is what happened with the shipwrecks of the Battle of Jutland, the remains of the cruiser HMS HAWKE and now, in 2025, the 110th anniversary of the sinking of the yacht RUMIJA, which was sent to the bottom of the sea by the Austro-Hungarian Imperial and Royal Navy during the First World War.

Princz Ágoston, Creative Producer of Alma Matters Production, contacted me in March 2025 with the request that the colleagues of Era creatıve GROUP DOO., registered in Montenegro, the Turkish director Ahmet Küçükkayalı and the Serbian producer Selma Babajic, were looking for a Hungarian expert for the appropriate representation of the Austro-Hungarian aspects of the ship's history for the documentary about the wrecks of RUMIJA, which will also present the work of Bengiz Özdereli, a Turkish researcher of the ship's history living in Turkey and Montenegro, under the main company of Turkish Umay Production.

This request led to the reconstruction of the yacht's plans, as the documentary makers wanted to use the 3D digital model of the ship in their film, but in order to build the model, a reliable - authentic - reconstruction of the ship's plans had to be made. Given that the original plans have not survived (or, if they have, they are still hidden), I carried out the reconstruction using analogies of similar products selected from the design materials of Scottish shipyards, as well as a thorough analysis of the wrecks and the surviving original photos.

In order to support the work of the filmmakers as much as possible, I prepared a book presenting the history of the ship. I was able to share the results of the historical research with those interested at a historical conference in Budapest this year. The following images present some pages of the volume, which has just come out of the press today, and the reconstructed plans.

Fig. 2: The cover.



Fig. 3: The table of contents.

Figs 4-8: Some pairs of pages of the inner arc - presented as a sample.

Figs. 9-10: The reconstructed profile and top view (above), as well as longitudinal section and general arrangement (below).

It would be great if you like the article and pictures shared. If you are interested in the works of the author, you can find more information about the author and his work on the Encyclopedia of Ocean Liners Fb-page.

If you would like to share the pictures, please do so by always mentioning the artist's name in a credit in your posts. Thank You!

The president of our association, the scientific vice-president of the Hungarian Diving Federation, Dr. Tamás Balogh, and his fellow researcher, Péter Könczöl, were able to join the expeditions in the Atlantic Ocean examining the remains of the sunken oceanliner LUSITANIA in 2022 and 2023. The researchers reported in detail on the results of the historical and on-site research on the website of the National Geographic Hungary magazine (more info about it here). The research, which has been ongoing since then, will be assisted by a new tool from 2025, the wreck map prepared by Dr. Tamás Balogh, summarizing the results of the 2022/23 research, and his earlier works for the visualization of the wrecks have been permanently exhibited at the Lusitania Museum in Kinsale.

Fig. 1: Dr. Tamás Balogh's drawings (above) and their handover to the museum (below).

Based on the results of the 2022 expedition, Dr. Tamás Balogh created images for visualisation of the wreck site and the original ship, which he donated in 2023 to the LUSITANIA Museum and Old Head Signal Tower in Kinsale, owner of the shipwreck, who permits the expeditions jointly with the Irish state, and has since arranged for presentation of them in the exhibition space.

The photographs proving this – presented in the exhibition space together with the donation deed – were taken and sent to the artist by Patrick Valkenborghs, one of the participants in the research that will continue in 2025. Dr. Tamás Balogh created a complete map of the wrecks for the first time in the history of research on the wrecks since 1935, which can be seen here for the first time by those who are interested.

Fig. 2: Dr. Tamás Balogh’s drawings in the museum and the text of the donation deed (in Hungarian: here).

The special feature of the map is that it adapts the excavation grid used in terrestrial archaeology, stretched over the site, to the top view drawing of the wrecks based on the latest research, so that within each 5x5 meter square of the grid made with a 5 meter raster, the exact location of all objects identified on the wrecksite can be marked with an accuracy of 1 meter. The map thus not only identifies the exact location of the objects identified during the work carried out with the participation of Hungarian researchers in 2022 and 2023, but can also be used to plan the remaining research, which is especially important given that its owners would like to add new exhibition spaces to the museum and bring new finds to the surface from the sea for conservation and display.

Fig. 3: Dr. Wreck map prepared by Tamás Balogh with the areas explored in 2022 and 2023 and localized finds.

It is a great pleasure and honor that Hungarian experts were able to provide assistance with the work done and the preparation of the map.

It would be great if you like the article and pictures shared. If you are interested in the works of the author, you can find more information about the author and his work on the Encyclopedia of Ocean Liners Fb-page.

If you would like to share the pictures, please do so by always mentioning the artist's name in a credit in your posts. Thank You!

Today, 110 years ago, on October 15, 1914, the British cruiser HMS HAWKE sank as a result of an attack by the German submarine U-9. More than five hundred British sailors lost their lives in the disaster. The wrecks were found and explored in August this year by the Scottish diving team called Gasperados, led by Steve Mortimer, based on historical research by Kevin Heath, founder of the Lost in Waters Deep website. The results of the work done by the divers in the depths were summarized by the president of our association, dr. Tamás Balogh, who prepared the report of the expedition and the very first illustrative graphic representation of the wreckage, which National Geographic Hungary Magazin will present to the interested public in commemoration of the anniversary.

Figure 1: The sinking of HMS HAWKE in the second month of World War I. was as unexpected and sensitive loss for the British Navy as the loss of the cruiser SMS ZENTA was for the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in the prelude of the War. The search for her remains now marks the end of a long story by identifying the final resting place of the victims, which has been unknown for more than a hundred years.

The story can be read in Hungarian on the magazine's website: here.
The full text of the article is available in English: here.

Figure 2: SONAR recording of the wreckage of HMS HAWKE (above) and a digital drawing illustrating the position and condition of the wreck, created by Dr Tamás Balogh.

The remains of the British giant steamer LUSITANIA, resting in the Atlantic Ocean, were visited again between July 13-21, 2023 by the the international expedition, which began in 2022, and was the first which had that most important task is the internal research of the areas affected by the explosion of the torpedo that sank the ship, and which for the first time in the history of the research of the wreck, included Hungarian members. On this occasion, the president of our association Dr. Tamás Balogh, who participated in the expedition by evaluating the underwater photoes and footage made by the divers, wrote an article, which can now be read on the website of the Hungarian edition of the National Geographic Magazine.



Fig. 1: LUSITANIA is on the cover.

An article summarizing the latest research results is available
in Hungarian here
in English here.

By comparing all of this with a similar report on the 2022 research, readers can get a complete over-all picture of the wreckage of the LUSITANIA.

Below we share some drawings made by hand on site during the expedition, which show the state of the ship's bow section in 1915, immediately after the sinking of the wreck, and today, in 2023, which was in the focus of the 2023 expedition.



Fig. 2: The bow of the LUSITANIA on the seabed as seen from the bow deck in 1915 (above) and in 2023 (below). Created by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2023.



Fig. 3: The bow of the LUSITANIA on the seabed as seen from the bottom of the ship in 1915 (above) and in 2023 (below). Created by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2023.



Fig. 4: The hull-section of the boiler room No 1. of LUSITANIA viewed from the top of the wreck (covered by the plates of the former port side) in 2023 (above) and the boilsers inside, "looking in" under the plates (below). Created by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2023.



Fig. 5: An overview of the wreckage of the LUSITANIA seen from the bow in 2023. Created by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2023.



Fig. 6: Tamás Balogh presents his images made of the LUSITANIA ocean liner and its wrecks to Shannon Forde, director of the Lusitania Museum & Old Head Signal Tower (owner o the wreck), in the company of the expedition leader, Stef Teuwen (left), and the ceremonial handing over of the images together with the members of the expedition in front of the ticket office of the Museum (right).


It would be great if you like the article and pictures shared. If you are interested in the works of the author, you can find more information about the author and his work on the Encyclopedia of Ocean Liners Fb-page.

If you would like to share the pictures, please do so by always mentioning the artist's name in a credit in your posts. Thank You!

I had a pleasant surprise this week when Danish diver and underwater photographer René B. Andersen sent me some photos showing a few pages of his new book. The photos shows pages with the wreck drawings I made of the shipwrecks visited by the 2016 Jutland Centenary Expedition in which we were both participated. The drawings provide an overview of the shipwrecks presented by René's stunning underwater photographs in the new two-volume book on the shipwrecks of Scandinavia

The book, titled "Legends Beneath the Waves - Scandinavia I. II." was published in November 2022. Its authors are the Danish underwater photographer René B. Andersen and the American Andrew Marriott, the editor of DivePhotoGuide, a portal specializing in underwater films and photos, himself a diver.

The two-volume work is full of the most amazing underwater wreck photos, taken in seven major regions of Scandinavia and showing 60 shipwrecks: 1) 5 shipwrecks in the Åland Islands, 2) 8 shipwrecks on the island of Gotland, 3) 12 shipwrecks in Skåne and Rügen, 4 ) 7 shipwrecks in the Skagerrak and Kattegat regions, 5) 5 shipwrecks in Jutland, 6) 15 shipwrecks in southern Norway (in the region of Kristiansand, Bergen and the Sognefjord), and 7) 8 shipwrecks in Central Norway (in the region of Alesund and Midtgulen).

The underwater shots is complemented by stories and background information based upon the results of thorough historical research. The wrecks presented in the book lie at a rather great depth, and their approach was possible with use of rebreathers and at the cost of many hours of decompression.

The books are in A4 format, full of color pictures and both have 272 pages, so they weigh 4.5 kg. It's a heavy but all the more beautiful read... I'm glad I could contribute to its creation.

Big congratulations to the creators!

More information about the book:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccKUuWwznik

The remains of the British giant steamer LUSITANIA, resting in the Atlantic Ocean, were visited by the first expedition, which included both German and Hungarian members between July 6-14, 2022, of which members for the first time managed to get into the No. 1. boiler room of the ship and explore it thoroughly. On this occasion, the president of our association Dr. Tamás Balogh, who participated in the expedition by evaluating the underwater photoes and footage made by the divers, wrote an article, which can now be read on the website of the Hungarian edition of the National Geographic Magazine.

Fig. 1: LUSITANIA is on the cover.

An article summarizing the latest research results is available
in Hungarian here
in English here.


Below we share some drawings made by hand on site during the expedition, which show the state of the wreck in 1915 immediately after the sinking, and today, 2022, of the stern of the ship, which was the research area of ​​the first half of the 7-day expedition.

Fig. 2: The stern of the LUSITANIA on the seabed as seen from the boat deck in 1915 (above) and 2022 (below). Drawing by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2022.

Fig. 3: The stern of the LUSITANIA on the seabed as seen from the bottom of the ship in 1915 (above) and 2022 (below). Drawing by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2022.

Fig. 4: An overview of the wreckage of the LUSITANIA seen from the bow in 2022. Drawing by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2022.

Fig. 5: The points visited by the expedition on the wrecks of the LUSITANIA. Drawing by Dr. Tamás Balogh © 2022.

It would be great if you like the article and pictures shared. If you are interested in the works of the author, you can find more information about the author and his work on the Encyclopedia of Ocean Liners Fb-page.

If you would like to share the pictures, please do so by always mentioning the artist's name in a credit in your posts. Thank You!