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Shipwreck

The Torrey Canyon

Seven Stones reef, off Land's End, Cornwall

Britain's worst oil spill, and the day the RAF bombed a wreck.

In March 1967 the supertanker Torrey Canyon ran onto the Seven Stones reef between Land's End and Scilly. Around 100,000 tonnes of crude oil poured into the sea, coating beaches in Cornwall and France.

Read the full story, see it on the map, get directions and find what else is nearby in the free Hidden Britain Atlas map.

When
18 March 1967
Where
50.0400, -6.0800
Group
Shipwrecks

Visiting

The reef lies far out to sea. Look out from Land's End on a clear day.

Cover of Blood and Gold by Cale Mills
Read the full story in the book

Blood and Gold

Sixteen true stories of mutiny, mercy, treasure and the gallows from the Golden Age of Piracy: Henry Every, Bartholomew “Black Bart” Roberts, Edward England, Howell Davis, Christopher Moody, Anne Bonny, Mary Read, Charles Vane, Benjamin Hornigold, Blackbeard, Stede Bonnet, Israel Hands, Calico Jack, Edward Low, Captain William Kidd and Samuel “Black Sam” Bellamy. Where the record is uncertain, the book says so.

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