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The oldest message in a bottle ever found (1886)

This bottle was part of a scientific experiment, and it took 132 years to report back.

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The real story

In June 1886 the German ship Paula was crossing the Indian Ocean. Her captain threw a bottle overboard on purpose: the German Naval Observatory was tracking ocean currents by having ships drop thousands of message bottles. Each slip asked the finder to write where and when it was found and send it back to Hamburg.

This one washed up on Wedge Island, Western Australia, in January 2018. Experts matched the handwriting and the date to the captain's own logbook in the German archives. The previous record for the oldest message in a bottle was 108 years.

What the narrator says

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The facts we checked

  • A German ship, the Paula, threw the bottle overboard in June 1886 as part of an ocean-current experiment
  • It was found in 2018 in the dunes of a beach in Western Australia, 132 years later
  • The finders dried the damp note in their oven; it's the oldest message in a bottle known
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