Note: we are republishing this story which originally made the news in May 2014.
In an extraordinary story of resilience and chance, a camera lost in a shipwreck off Vancouver Island’s west coast two years ago has finally been recovered—its memory card and treasured photos perfectly preserved, ready to be reunited with its owner.
The camera belonged to Vancouver artist Paul Burgoyne, who suffered a heartbreaking loss in 2012 when his boat, the Bootlegger, was shipwrecked during a 500-kilometer voyage from Vancouver to his summer retreat in Tahsis, B.C. Along with the vessel, the camera and its precious photos sank beneath the waves, leaving Burgoyne in stunned disbelief.
“That just shocked me,” Burgoyne shared. “Getting the camera or the photos back—that’s truly wonderful.”
Fast forward two years to May, when university students from the Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre—Tella Osler and Beau Doherty—along with BMSC Diving and Safety Officer Siobhan Gray, made a remarkable discovery during research dives off Aguilar Point, B.C. There, 12 meters below the surface, they found Burgoyne’s camera resting quietly on the ocean floor.
Marine Ecology expert Professor Isabelle M. Côté of Simon Fraser University revealed that the camera had become home to various marine species, a testament to the resilience of life in even the most unexpected places.
Miraculously, the Lexar Platinum II 8GB memory card inside the camera was still functional. Using the recovered images, Côté posted online a family portrait, hoping to reunite the photographs with their rightful owner.
Fortune truly smiled on the recovery effort when a member of the Bamfield Coast Guard Station—who had once rescued Burgoyne during the shipwreck—recognized him in one of the photos. This unexpected connection has set the stage for a heartwarming reunion between Burgoyne and his long-lost memories.
“I’ve gained a whole new respect for these electronics,” Burgoyne reflected. “You usually toss most of this stuff after a couple of years, but that little memory card is an incredible piece of technology.”
The news of the camera’s recovery unlocked a flood of memories from that fateful day. Burgoyne recalled the peaceful moment sitting at the back of the boat, the mistaken belief that the autopilot was engaged, and then the sudden, terrifying chaos that followed.
Burgoyne’s nine-meter trawler met its tragic end less than an hour after those final photos were taken, sending the camera—and with it, irreplaceable images—into the depths of the sea. Among the recovered treasures were poignant snapshots of a family gathering to scatter his parents’ ashes at Lake of the Woods in Ontario, alongside a gripping video capturing the turbulent seas that ultimately claimed his boat.
This extraordinary recovery not only underscores the remarkable resilience of modern technology but also celebrates the unpredictable twists of fate—transforming what seemed lost forever into a heartfelt reunion with memories salvaged from the ocean’s depths.