Spooky stories Are these ships haunted?

There are many legends surrounding the sea voyage. There are repeated sightings of ghost ships. And even on land, stranded wrecks come up with spooky stories. Five spooky ships.

Not only in the past, but even today, sailors still report sightings of ghost ships. Abandoned ships drifting on the open sea, no captain at the helm, no crew on deck. With tattered sails, bottles rolling through the corridors, untouched food on the tables. Lonely and abandoned, they struggle through the waves without any hope that their crew will ever return.

Legends surround such sightings. One of the most famous is the "Flying Dutchman", a cursed captain who is said to be doomed to wander the seven seas forever with his ghost ship.

In addition to all the legends, there are also documented horror stories that tell of entire crews meeting their deaths on the ship or a storm plunging the ship to its doom.

In some cases, only those people who were on board know what really happened. But often they can no longer report - and legends have arisen.

blue News presents five ships that have experienced the uncanny, some of which can be visited today or have since found peace.

So-called lost places exert a certain attraction on people. They are abandoned places and ruins that have been forgotten or are slowly fading away.

This is also the case with the former hotel ship The Galaxy on the Thai island of Koh Chang. The former cruise liner was part of the Koh Chang Grand Lagoona Resort in Bang Bao Bay and offered guests 70 rooms on seven decks. Google says the hotel is "permanently closed", but a few travelers reported staying there until recently.

Nobody really knows why the resort had to close. There are no confirmed reports. Blogger Courtney Lambert writes on her website that a local told her on her trip: "People have died there. Someone jumped off the roof and the hotel was closed. It only opens in high season when all the other hotels on the island are fully booked."

The people who live on the island avoid the shipwreck, believing it brings bad luck. And then another disaster struck The Galaxy in December 2024: the former tourist attraction burned down. Since then, it has been completely destroyed - and has become an even creepier haunted place.

When the Queen Mary was at sea in the 1930s, it was considered the largest ocean liner of its time. A ship that stood for luxury and modernity and was happy to carry prominent guests.

However, since 1967, the Queen Mary has no longer been at sea, but has been anchored in the port of Long Beach in the US state of California, where it can be visited or stayed overnight.

According to various reports, the Queen Mary is allegedly haunted. There is talk of lights switching themselves on, unexplained knocking on doors and dancing ghosts in the ballroom. One woman is even said to have had the covers pulled off her bed by ghosts during the night.

Suite B340 is said to be particularly frequently haunted by ghosts. A man is said to have lost his life there in 1948. Is that why the hotel room is cursed?

What is clear is that the luxury liner was converted into a troop ship for the British Navy during the Second World War and renamed the Grey Ghost. After a collision with the HMS Curacoa, which was supposed to be escorting the Queen Mary, a terrible incident occurred: the HMS Curacoa broke in two, sank and hundreds of crew members drowned. Again, superstition has it that the victims haunt the halls of the Queen Mary to this day.

The SS Maheno is already badly affected by decay. The shipwreck is rusting away on the Australian island of K'gari - previously known as Fraser Island - and has become a popular destination for tourists.

The ship was originally built at the beginning of the 20th century to transport passengers between New Zealand and Australia. During the war, like many of its kind, it was repurposed and used as a hospital ship for New Zealand soldiers.

After the end of the war, the SS Maheno returned to its original service, but was later retired. She was then supposed to be taken to Japan.

A tugboat set off with the former passenger ship, but got caught in a storm, which separated the two ships. The SS Maheno was lost for days, but then ran aground on the island of K'gari, where it has been lying in the sand ever since. The crew members survived, but the ship was never touched again.

A different kind of horror awaits visitors on the SS City of Milwaukee. It is not the past that has cursed the ship's corridors. In October, the historic car ferry becomes a creepy ship as part of a series of events. Each deck will be dedicated to a different theme, designed to scare guests to the bone. The organizers use actors to create a cinematic chamber of horrors on the water.

Because the former car ferry has become such a popular excursion destination, the operators have also turned it into a so-called boatel. So if you want, you can also spend the night on it. But without the creepy factor.

The Baychimo was a cargo steamer that supplied the remote coasts of Alaska and Canada in the 1920s - and later became the famous ghost ship.

In October 1931, the ship was caught in a storm and froze in pack ice off the coast of Alaska. The crew was eventually flown out and left the Baychimo behind, as it was assumed that it would be crushed by the ice and sink.

But the ship did not sink. A few weeks later, it unexpectedly broke free from the ice - empty and rudderless.

In the years that followed, the Baychimo appeared again and again: it was sighted in 1932 and 1933, then again several times in the 1930s and 1940s, drifting through Arctic waters as a ghost ship. The last confirmed sighting was allegedly in 1969 - an incredible 38 years after she was abandoned.

Rescue attempts were unsuccessful as the ship usually disappeared into the ice before it could be reached. In 2006, the US state of Alaska decided to search for the ghost ship again. However, all attempts have so far been unsuccessful.

It is unclear whether the Baychimo sank at some point, was crushed by the ice or is still wandering around somewhere.

The editor wrote this article with the help of AI.

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