Dark Descent: Diving and the Deadly Allure of the Empress of Ireland

The author of 2001's Deep Descent recounts the sinking of the Canadian ocean liner Empress of Ireland and documents its subsequent romantic history as a lure for scuba divers in this well-researched but narrowly focused book. Early on the morning of May 29, 1914, the Empress was caught in a thick fog in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and was hit by a Norwegian collier that tore open the hull around its boiler room. The ship went down in about 14 minutes, killing two-thirds of its 1,475 travelers. Many of them were lost in the darkness below deck; some tried to squeeze out of portholes only to get stuck; others died of hypothermia in the freezing water. Like the Titanic, the Empress was a luxury liner, with first class cabins decorated with cherry wood and mahogany. And the combination of its dramatic sinking, its rich construction and its location just a few hundred feet below the surface made it a tantalizing destination for""extreme divers"" willing to brave the strong currents and frigid temperatures of the area. McMurray himself made his first dive to the wreck in 1971, and his book focuses primarily on the equipment, techniques and dangers of diving to the ship's remains. His history of the 1914 crash takes little more than 30 pages--probably a good choice since his prose tends to get duller the further away he moves from blow-by-blow explanations of underwater expeditions. The book is impressively researched, however, and, for those who love the lure of the deep water and the mysteries of shipwrecks, this specialized history will be a pleasure. 75 photos and illus.