George Town Harbour Shipwrecks

Photo Credit: Dennis Denton

George Town Harbour, also called Hog Sty Bay, is the main historic anchorage on Grand Cayman and has its share of shipwrecks. Balboawas a Jamaican freighter anchored in Grand Cayman for repairs when she wrecked in the infamous 1932 Storm. Her sunken hulk was dynamited in 1957 to reduce the threat to navigation. The captain of Cali, a four-masted barkentine, ran her ashore when she began to take on water in 1948. Her salvaged rice cargo provided food for many Caymanians, and some was even exported. The freighter Kirk Pride sank in a nor’wester in 1976 and now rests on the Cayman Wall in 800 feet of water; the local tourist submarine occasionally takes visitors to the wreck. The steel freighter Gamma ran aground on the reef in 1980, and the waves of a subsequent storm pushed her onto the beach where she still can be seen. These wrecks, like all wrecks in the Cayman Islands, are protected under law.

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