{"id":322644,"date":"2026-08-16T18:22:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-16T18:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/322644\/"},"modified":"2026-08-16T18:22:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-16T18:22:10","slug":"historic-vessels-that-sank-in-nyc-basin-to-be-scrapped-into-garbage-sources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/322644\/","title":{"rendered":"Historic vessels that sank in NYC basin to be scrapped into ‘garbage’: sources"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two historic vessels \u2014 including one featured on Maine\u2019s state quarter \u2014 have been sitting<\/a> at the bottom of the polluted Gowanus since mysteriously sinking in July and are now likely headed for the garbage heap.<\/p>\n

The restaurateurs who own the ships are not willing to shell out what could easily turn into millions of dollars to rescue the submerged Victory Chimes and the PILOT \u2014 a former research vessel once used by famed TV oceanographer Jacque Cousteau \u2014 from the murky Brooklyn waters and resurrect them to their former glory, sources told The Post.<\/p>\n

\u201cTotal demolition. Garbage,\u201d an insider said of the expected plans for the schooners, which have a collective 232 years of history between them.<\/p>\n

The historic PILOT ship mysteriously sank in a Gowanus Canal inlet in Brooklyn last month. Brad Vogel<\/p>\n

Alex and Miles Pincus \u2014 brothers and the owners of the company Crew that turns boats into trendy floating restaurant bars \u2014 moved their vessels into the Gowanus Canal inlet months earlier for repairs.<\/p>\n

But the two vessels sank within days of one another<\/a> in Red Hook\u2019s Henry Street Basin over the July 4 weekend.<\/p>\n

Now \u201cthere are three different scenarios,\u201d said Zdenek Ulman, the owner of Marine Diving Service who responded to the scene and secured the schooners when they sank.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt could be refloating the vessels and bringing them to the yard to have them fixed or they could be re-floated and be scheduled for total disposal. Or they can be disassembled right at the seafloor and the seafloor would be cleared out with the demolition in place.\u201d<\/p>\n

The brothers have not yet chosen a pathway \u2014 but an insider said the pair isn\u2019t willing to spend the cash, especially when just refloating the boats could cost a minimum of $500,000.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s 558% higher than the relatively bargain $75,900 Crew bought the Victory Chimes for in 2023.<\/p>\n

The PILOT now lies beneath Brooklyn\u2019s murky waters. Brigitte Stelzer for NY Post<\/p>\n

The 1924 PILOT \u2014 the longest-serving pilot, or guide, ship in US history and a former Cousteau research hub on its way to becoming a possible National Historic Landmark\u00a0\u2014 had already made a name for itself as a popular floating oyster bar<\/a> under the brothers\u2019 care. <\/p>\n

The 1900 Victory Chimes \u2014 the last surviving Chesapeake Ram schooner and already a US\u00a0National Historic Landmark whose image graced the Pine State\u2019s 2003 quarter \u2014 was being mapped out for a similar future.<\/p>\n

Since there is no shore power in the obscure basin, the situation has resulted in all but a death sentence for the vessels, since such wooden boats<\/a> easily fill with water and require frequent pumping and maintenance, experts said.<\/p>\n

Insurance will not pay for the damaged ships unless the brothers have a concrete plan for them after they are refloated.<\/p>\n

The Victory Chimes, seen here in 2001, also sank in the Gowanus. handout<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Victory Chimes is in worse condition than the other, and it may not be worth it to repair,\u201d the source said. \u201cEverything gets very pricey. The latest development is they might be leaning toward disposing both of these vessels.\u201d<\/p>\n

The brothers are reportedly so desperate to offload the Victory Chimes that they even begged its previous owner to take it back.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Pincus brothers called up the old captain and said, \u2018I\u2019ll pay to bring it back up there and give it to you,\u2019 because they don\u2019t want to f\u2013king deal with it,\u201d said Charlie Weidman of Charlie\u2019s Marine Service, who once shared a dock with the Victory Chimes, the official Windjammer of Maine, during its storied time in the state.<\/p>\n

The PILOT made a name for itself as a popular floating oyster bar. Crew<\/p>\n

\u201cThey wanted the oyster bar because they knew, \u2018Hey, this is going to make money.\u2019 \u2026 They got the Victory Chimes, years went by, and they didn\u2019t have a location to put it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The potential undignifed end for the ships is especially enraging to Mainers who already had suspicions about the brothers\u2019 plans to usurp the Victory Chimes into their popular floating restaurant chain.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody liked that it was going to be turned into a bar, but it was a better fate than having it be chainsawed into pieces,\u201d said Quinton Donleavy, a photographer who helped create the original website for the Victory Chimes during its final years in the Pine State.<\/p>\n

The boats had been sitting in the basin for months awaiting repairs. Brad Vogel<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are worse things \u2014 and then the worst thing happens.<\/p>\n

\u201cEspecially the way that it happened: the glorious boat of Maine that was on the 2003 state quarter. To go from that to it just sank in a bunch of back harbor filth along with some other boat that was hopeless, it\u2019s just sad.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crew did not respond to requests for comment by The Post, only saying an investigation into the sinkings is ongoing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two historic vessels \u2014 including one featured on Maine\u2019s state quarter \u2014 have been sitting at the bottom…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":322645,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[18565,98,464,20043,57,9,197,56,63,65,64,18392,109570,58],"class_list":["post-322644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-boats","tag-brooklyn","tag-gowanus","tag-gowanus-canal","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city-life","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-red-hook","tag-sinking","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322644"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322644\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/322645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}