Tonya Illman found the world’s oldest message in a bottle while he walking across Perth beach’s dunes. Gin bottle was thrown overboard 132 years later.
The oldest message in a bottled dated to 12 June 1886, that time it was thrown from the German ship before ending up on a beach in Western Australia. 132 years later the message was finally received by the Australian woman Tonya Illman who was just walking across sand dunes just north of Wedge Island. Tonya and her husband were walking down the beach when she noticed something sticking out of the sand.
“It just looked like a lovely old bottle, so I picked it up thinking it might look good in my bookcase,”
Tonya said.
Each message in a gin bottle was marked with the ship’s coordinates, the date, and the name of the ship, which Anderson used to verify the message. According to the scientists, the message includes important data. In fact, it was part of an experiment by the German Naval Observatory to better understand global ocean currents.
The oldest message in a bottle
Earlier, the experts from the German Naval Observatory have already registered similar findings, the previous record for oldest message in a bottle was 108 years. Illman’s bottle is 132 years old, which is more interesting for the science.
Kym Illman said that after bringing it home the damp and ancient paper was put in the oven for five minutes to dry it out.
“I have a basic understanding of German and it said could the finder please plot the coordinates it was found, and the date it was found, and send it back,”
he added after Illmans took their find to the Western Australian Museum, where assistant curator of maritime archaeology Ross Anderson conducted a series of investigations.
