A World War II landing craft known as a Higgins boat has been exposed by the receding waters of northern California’s Shasta Lake, which has been hit by climate change and drought, dropping water levels to previously-unseen levels, The Guardian writes.
Designed by a New Orleans boat manufacturer, Higgins boats were shallow-draft barge-like boats made of wood, typically with a landing ramp in the front. Numbers on the boat’s ramp show that it was part of Attack Transport USS Monrovia, which served as George Patton’s command ship during the occupation of Sicily in 1943. Monrovia was soon after reassigned to the Pacific, where it participated in six D-Day invasions during the US military’s island-hopping campaign.
However, there are no records about how the landing craft made it from Monrovia to a lake 150 miles inland from the Pacific Ocean. The boat does not have registration tags from the state, nor do any locals have a memory of seeing a similar vessel on the lake.