The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) Navy hospital ship "Silk Road Ark" arrived in the port of Bridgetown, Barbados, on Saturday for a seven-day friendly visit and humanitarian medical service mission.
This is the second visit by a Chinese Navy hospital ship to Barbados since its hospital ship "Peace Ark" arrived in 2015.
Military and political officials from Barbados, staff members of the Chinese Embassy in Barbados, representatives of Chinese institutions in the Latin American country welcomed the ship at the pier.
The hospital ship "Silk Road Ark" departed from Quanzhou City of east China's Fujian Province on September 5 for the humanitarian medical service mission, known as Mission Harmony-2025, to the South Pacific and Latin America.
Mission Harmony-2025 marks the 11th iteration of Mission Harmony since 2010 and the first overseas mission for "Silk Road Ark," China's second domestically designed and constructed 10,000-ton-class standard ocean-going hospital ship.
The 220-day mission, the longest in the series, was scheduled to see the ship visit around a dozen nations, including Nauru, Fiji, Tonga, Mexico, Jamaica, Barbados, Brazil, Peru, Chile, and Papua New Guinea, to provide humanitarian medical services.
Chinese Naval hospital ship arrives in Barbados for friendly visit, medical aid
About 400 cultural relics from two Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) shipwrecks are on display at the Grand Canal Museum in Beijing for the first time.
Loaned from South China Sea Museum in south China's Hainan Province, the 370 pieces are from shipwrecks on the northwest slope of the South China Sea. The first ship's artifacts are mainly ceramics, while the second's include logs, snail shells and antlers.
Xin Lixue, director of the China (Hainan) Museum of the South China Sea, said this is the first time these cultural relics have been displayed outside the South China Sea Museum.
"I'm also very excited that these cultural relics can be displayed in the capital, Beijing. I think this is to present to everyone the best things we have salvaged so far, so they can fully understand the splendid culture of our ancient Maritime Silk Road. Today's people can also expand international exchanges and jointly promote the development of all our ethnic groups," said Xin.
Dating back approximately 500 years, these merchant ships sank to a depth of about 1,500 meters during a voyage along the Maritime Silk Road. This marks the first discovery of merchant vessels from the early sixteenth century that had set sail and were returning.
In addition to the abundant relics, the exhibition uses dynamic lighting and sound to recreate a virtual underwater world, showcasing the deep-sea environment and the advanced technology behind deep-sea archaeology.
The exhibition will run through March 15 next year.
Deep-sea archaeological exhibition in Beijing displays relics recovered from shipwreck
