I'm a sucker for the stories about replica era ships making ocean voyages (witness my earlier Columbus run in) but, like a Nascar fan, my thoughts always turn dark and I wonder what are the horrible things that could happen. Sadly, a terrible fate befell the replica Chinese junk, Princess Taiping.

The ship was on a round trip voyage around the Pacific to demonstrate that Chinese sailors could have reached America before Columbus. Of course, that was before the days of container ships. The ship was in San Francisco last Fall, and I went to visit it. It was actually larger than the Nina, which surprised me.

The ship was so close to finishing it's 14,000 mile round trip, but a few hours out of Taiwan, it was hit by a freighter and chopped in half! Check out the picture of the wreckage below. Somehow all 11 crewmembers survived the hit, which borders on unbelievable.

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