Can we talk about that sunken barge near the Sabine jetties and why nobody flags it on the charts

Reese Chen · 2026-09-20T12:35:04.449407+00:00

I did a survey job out of Port Arthur two weeks ago and we ran past the old wreck sitting in about 35 feet of water just off the Sabine jetties. The thing is broke in half and the top of the stern section comes up to maybe 18 feet at low tide, which is shallow enough that a loaded barge or a shrimper dragging nets could catch it on a bad day. What got me was our chart plotter showed nothing there, just clean blue water, so I asked the older diver on the boat and he said that wreck has been a known snag for years and it only shows up on the local notices, not on the regular chart. We were down there checking a pipeline crossing and I couldn't stop thinking about how many guys run that channel at night with no clue. I've worked the Gulf for 6 years now and I get that not every piece of junk in the water gets marked, but a 200 foot barge hull sitting at 18 feet feels like something somebody should be screaming about. If you run Sabine regularly, do you mark your own hazards on your plotter, or do you just trust the charts and keep your fingers crossed?

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Can we talk about that sunken barge near the Sabine jetties and why nobody flags it on the charts | Commercial Divers - Librear