Explorers find wreck of 19th-century steamship in Seneca Lake

GENEVA, N.Y. (AP) - Two shipwreck enthusiasts from the Rochester area say they have found a Civil War-era steamship that was intentionally sunk in spectacular fashion in one of New York's Finger Lakes more than a century ago.

Jim Kennard and Roger Pawlowski said Tuesday that they recently confirmed that the wreckage at the bottom of Seneca Lake is that of the Onondaga, a 175-foot paddle-wheeler that hauled freight and passengers.

In Sept. 1898, the 38-year-old ship had outlived its usefulness and its owners decided to blow it up as a public spectacle. Thousands of people lined the shore as the stripped-down hull was scuttled with the explosion of 500 pounds of dynamite and 300 pounds of blasting powder.

The wreck lies in 400 feet of water eight miles south of Geneva.