Work in Progress - 2001 Campaign

- The SOA 2000 campaign-

The SOA project - 2001
August - September 2001
July 2001 - August 15th
 July and the first half of August have been a slow time for the project since all the members of SOA are at the moment participating in other projects. The actual plan is that every one will meet at INA headquarters in Bodrum around the 10th of August in order to make final preparations and leave for the Cakıl burnu area on the 15th.
 June 2001
Although most of the SOA database system was already designed, the whole month of June went into polishing it up, usually the hardest part. Bridget Buxton arrived in Turkey from the University of California at Berkeley and started working with Berta Lledo. Bridget managed to read (sometimes decipher) all the hand-written notebooks from the INA surveys, and entered all the shipwrecks into the SOA database system.  Additional information, and references for many of the shipwrecks, was obtained from our own INA-Turkey library and the ARIT library in Ankara (American Research Institute in Turkey) to create a work-in-progress version of the database. By that I mean that, although all the shipwrecks we know of are entered, the database is far from being complete.  We still need to go and visit all of these shipwrecks again to take measurements and make a visual record, and gather as much information as possible in the time our fieldwork permits.

At the same time Berta prepared the main body of the web site, while Tufan Turanli took care of preparations and planning for the field project.

Kerem Tüfekci spent 10 days in Bodrum preparing our computers to be in top shape for the summer work.  This was a very important task, since all the data collected during our dives will be entered into our computer system as soon as it reaches the surface, including dive logs, digital images, and possibly also some short videos for the database.
 May 2001
After the first campaign of the SOA project in July 2000, Tufan Turanli and Berta Lledo continued preparing and planning for the 2001 field campaign. The serious preparation work did not start until May, when the design of the database and the recording system we wished to use finally took shape. 

The main goal during the spring was establishing a list of goals and priorities for SOA 2001.  Choosing an area in which to work was not easy: there are many technical aspects to consider besides archaeology, such as what vessels to use, the availability of machinery and other equipment, and how to combine our project with the other projects INA is undertaking in Turkey.  Finally our goals started to take a more definite shape in May, when the main part of the SOA 2001 team was confirmed. Our dates were finally decided after plans for INA's excavation of a 5th century BC wreck at Tektas Burnu were finalized, and a start date August 15th was proposed for SOA.

The fact that INA already had full diving equipment and camp facilities at Tektas Burnu was an important factor in choosing that region for the SOA 2001 field season: Cakıl burnu. The richness of the shipwrecks in this area, which is very close to Tektas, and the convenience of living in a previously constructed base camp, made Cakıl burnu a very desirable option.

       

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