The World’s Oldest Message in a Bottle

Captain Andrew Leaper was fishing off Scotland’s Shetland Islands when he found a glass bottle in his nets. There was a paper inside dated from 1914. The find has now been confirmed as the oldest known message in a bottle by the Guinness World Records. The bottle had survived at sea for nearly 98 years.

It turns out that the bottle was released in 1914 as part of a research project tracking sea currents around Scotland. The finder was asked to write down the date and location of its discovery and to send a postcard in return for a small reward. Of the 1,890 bottles released, 315 have since been found to date.

This new find eclipses the previous record-holder, which had been found in 2006. Oddly, that bottle was found by the same fishing boat. The fishing grounds where the bottle was found is very popular, with literally hundreds of boats plying the same waters. It appears that the boat, called Copious, is a lucky little vessel.

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