Underwater Egyptian Museum Underway:

A team from the European Underwater Archeology Institute is carrying out a study to determine the best way to build Egypt’s first underwater antiquities museum, an official source said.

According to a press release from Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), experts are studying the best way to build the museum, which will treasure underwater relics on Alexandria’s Mediterranean coast.

SCA Secretary General Zahi Hawass explained that the research is being carried out under supervision from UNESCO authorities, who have already chosen the museum’s design, created by French architect Jacques Rougerie.

SCA sources noted that the underwater structure would consist of a network of Plexiglas tunnels to resist the water’s pressure and winds, so that visitors can observe the antiquities in their original sites.

Among the objects to be exhibited at the museum are artifacts from the Pharaonic and Greco-Roman periods (341 BC-395 AC), as well as the remains of warships, including some used by Napoleon Bonaparte.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has given its backing to ambitious plans to create an underwater archaeological museum near the remains of Cleopatra’s palace in the port of Alexandria on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast.