Hogsty Reef is an uninhabited coral

atoll An atoll () is a ring-shaped island, including a coral rim that encircles a lagoon partially or completely. There may be coral islands or cays on the rim. Atolls are located in warm tropical or subtropical oceans and seas where corals can gr ...

located in the southern

Bahamas The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...

. It is located between

Great Inagua Inagua is the southernmost district of the Bahamas, comprising the islands of Great Inagua and Little Inagua. The headquarters for the district council are in Matthew Town. History The original settlers were the Lucayan people, who arrived some ...

(to the South) and

Acklins Island Acklins is an island and district of the Bahamas. It is one of a group of islands arranged along a large, shallow lagoon called the Bight of Acklins, of which the largest are Crooked Island () in the north and Acklins () in the southeast, and ...

(to the North).

Geography and navigation

It is a 5×3 mile coral

rising up from 6,000 ft deep surrounding waters.

Atolls An atoll () is a ring-shaped island, including a coral rim that encircles a lagoon partially or completely. There may be coral islands or cays on the rim. Atolls are located in warm tropical or subtropical oceans and seas where corals can grow ...

are presumed to form from extinct volcanoes – in a process whereby the volcano creates the sea mount which rises from the ocean depths, then subsides leaving a coral atoll. There are just a handful of these geological formations in the Atlantic, whereas there are hundreds in the Pacific. Hogsty is uninhabited and hardly anyone ever visits. There are just two tiny islands – hardly larger than sandbars – not enough to offer any real lee anchorage. The islands are small enough to walk/circumnavigate in 5–10 minutes. They do offer good shelling. Most charts and guides call out an anchorage in the lee of NW Cay. It is also possible to anchor at the head of the lagoon. The lagoon is mostly 20–30 ft deep with scattered coral heads. Good light is needed to navigate it. Once at the head of the lagoon, there is a large field of 10 ft sand to anchor in. The charts indicate areas of the reef dry at low water, which suggests good protection from surge at low tide, but as of 2009, little of the reef actually dries.

Shipwrecks

There are two shipwrecks on the reef. Ss-richmond-p-hobson-shipwreck

One is a

Liberty ship Liberty ships were a class of cargo ship built in the United States during World War II under the Emergency Shipbuilding Program. Though British in concept, the design was adopted by the United States for its simple, low-cost construction. Mass ...

named ''Trebišnjica'' (ex SS ''Richmond P. Hobson''), wrecked on the northern part of the reef 17 July 1963. As of 2009, this Liberty ship is well on its way to being reduced to dust. The superstructure is caving in and the hull is broken. The second shipwreck is on the southern part of the reef. It is much smaller than the Liberty ship – and looks like a small inter-island freight boat – around 120 feet long. The wreck appears to be much more recent and is in much better condition. The name is still plainly visible: ''Lady Eagle''. The

slave ship Slave ships were large cargo ships specially built or converted from the 17th to the 19th century for transporting slaves. Such ships were also known as "Guineamen" because the trade involved human trafficking to and from the Guinea coast ...

, wrecked on Hogsty Reef on 9 December 1802 while returning to London after having delivered slaves from West Africa to Jamaica. The crew were saved, as was a great part of her cargo.

References

External links

The Geomorphology and History of Hogsty Reef, a Bahamian Atoll
Milliman, John D., Bulletin of Marine Science, Volume 17, Number 3, September 1967, pp. 519–543.
Picture of Hogsty Reef Lighthouse
Uninhabited islands of the Bahamas Lighthouses in the Bahamas Atolls of the Bahamas {{bahamas-geo-stub

Geography and navigation

Shipwrecks

See also

References

External links