The Star-Ledger wins Pulitzer Prize for 'The Wreck of the Lady Mary'

aen.jpgThe Star-Ledger's Amy Ellis Nutt today was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing for 'The Wreck of the Lady Mary,' which ran as a 20-page special section in November.

The Star-Ledger's Amy Ellis Nutt today was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing.

Nutt's story, "The Wreck of the Lady Mary," ran as a 20-page special section in November 2010. Nutt and videographer/graphic artist Andre Malok investigated the mysterious sinking of a fishing boat off the coast of New Jersey in 2009. The pair spent more than seven months reporting the project and, in addition to the newspaper stories, Malok produced a 24-minute documentary.

"We are honored and grateful," Star-Ledger editor Kevin Whitmer said. "Amy had a passion for this project from the beginning, and I'd like to think the judges recognized her relentless reporting just as much as the writing.

“And in Andre, she had a partner who pushed her, challenged her and helped her deliver a landmark set of stories.”

Publisher Richard Vezza called it "a great day for The Star-Ledger and all the people who work here. The Pulitzer prize is something every newspaper dreams of winning. It's an honor for me to be associated with such a talented and committed group of journalists."

The Wreck of the Lady Mary


The Star-Ledger spent months investigating the sinking of a Cape May-based scallop boat that left six dead and spared just one crew member. This five-chapter series was printed in a 20-page special Sunday Star-Ledger section and was presented over four days on NJ.com. Read more about how this story was researched.

Story by

Amy Ellis Nutt

Photos and Video by Andre Malok

Chapter 1 -- Mystery shrouds fatal scallop boat sinking

Chapter 2 -- Costly clerical mistake stalls rescue efforts

Chapter 3 -- Worst fears are realized, six men lost at sea

Chapter 4 -- A behemoth enters the fishing grounds

Chapter 5 -- A case of high seas hit-and-run?

Read the transcript of a live chat with 'The Wreck of the Lady Mary' authors Amy Nutt, Andre Malok

The prizes were announced today at Columbia University in New York, and winners will be recognized at a luncheon next month.

The Pulitzer is the first for Nutt, a finalist in 2009 – also for feature writing. It is the third Pulitzer for The Star-Ledger. In 2001, Matt Rainey won for feature photography and in 2005 the staff won in the breaking news category for its coverage of former Gov. James E. McGreevey's resignation.

Nutt, who has been at The Star-Ledger since 1997, is a graduate of Smith College, and holds master's degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (philosophy) and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She also was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University in 2004-05.

The Pulitzer is journalism's highest honor and the latest in a string of professional awards for The Star-Ledger.

Mark Mueller and Amy Brittain won the 2010 George Polk Award in Journalism for Metropolitan Reporting. Their "Strong at Any Cost" series of stories, according to judges, "blew the lid off the hidden world of steroid use and fraud among law enforcement officers across New Jersey."

In addition, The Star-Ledger won the General Excellence Award for large daily newspapers in the 2010 Better Newspaper contest sponsored by the New Jersey Press Association. Overall, the newsroom staff won nine NJPA first-place awards for reporting and writing, four first-place awards for photography, and one first-place in the online category.

The Star-Ledger also was recognized with four writing awards in the Associated Press Sports Editors contest, the most ever for the paper.

And just two weeks ago, The Star-Ledger won four New York Emmy Awards, bringing to seven the number of Emmys the paper has won in two years. The prizes recognize outstanding achievement in the New York area and the competition is open to broadcast television, cable and online entries.

Amy Ellis NuttStar-Ledger writer Amy Ellis Nutt reacts to being awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing for her story "The Wreck of the Lady Mary" about the sinking of the Lady Mary scallop vessel

"This has been a remarkable year for journalists in every corner of this newsroom," Whitmer said. "This group has come together and done things no one could have imagined."

The Lady Mary and its seven crewmen left Cape May in March of 2009 on a routine scallop fishing trip. Some time after 5 a.m. on March 24, the boat sank and six of seven crewmen were killed. Results of a U.S. Coast Guard investigation still have not been announced, but several experts interviewed by Nutt and Malok suspect the boat was either swamped in rough seas or forced under by a passing container ship.

Read the complete story and see the documentary video at nj.com/ladymary. And for the full list of winners: pulitzer.org.

ABOUT THE WRECK OF THE LADY MARY SERIES
The Wreck of the Lady Mary: Chapter 1 (gallery)The Lady Mary scallop boat in an undated photo. The Lady Mary sank 66 miles off the coast of Cape May in 211 feet of water. There is speculation that the Lady Mary may have been swamped or hit by a container ship passing through the busy scallop fishing grounds known as the Elephant Trunk. Photo Courtesy Royal "Fuzzy" Smith

Reporting began in January 2010 after the U.S. Coast Guard finished its investigative hearings.

For the next seven months, Amy Ellis Nutt and Andre Malok made dozens of trips, to Cape May, Philadelphia, Atlantic City and North Carolina. Those interviewed included: the co-owner of the Lady Mary; the boat’s sole survivor; family members and friends of the six men who died in the sinking; scallop fishermen, especially those working within six miles of the Lady Mary the night she disappeared; the divers who explored the sunken wreck; officials from the Coast Guard and the rescue crew who saved José Arias; and the dock manager for Hamburg Sud, the shipping company that leases the container ship Cap Beatrice.

Some 800 pages of testimony from Coast Guard hearings were reviewed, navigation and vessel tracking records studied, and nearly two dozen marine experts interviewed, a number of whom had specific training in shipwreck forensics. Two sources with direct access to the investigation also provided documents the Coast Guard refused to make public because it has not yet released its report.

In addition to evidence from the sinking of the Lady Mary, The Star-Ledger also combed through more than 2,500 Coast Guard incident reports from 2002 through 2007.

In May, Nutt and Malok took two trips aboard the working New Jersey scalloper Kathy Ann. One of those trips was in conditions nearly identical to those encountered by the Lady Mary in the early morning hours of March 24, 2009. Immersion suits similar to those used by Arias and two other crew members were tested twice in the chilly water off Cape May to understand how they function when they are worn both properly and improperly.

The Star-Ledger twice visited the Packer Avenue terminal in Philadelphia when the Cap Beatrice was in port. The first time, Hamburg Sud allowed Nutt and Malok onto the ship, where they interviewed the captain and some of the crew, none of whom was working on the Cap Beatrice in March 2009. On a visit by The Star-Ledger three months later, Hamburg Sud allowed photos and video to be taken of the Cap Beatrice from the dock, but would not grant permission to board and declined to make available Vasyl Stenderchuk, the captain in charge of the ship in March 2009, or any of the crew for interviews.

Numerous attempts were made to speak with the European head of Reederei Thomas Schulte, the owner of the Cap Beatrice, but phone and e-mail requests for interviews, including those e-mailed in German, were refused.

Amy Ellis Nutt (left) has won numerous national honors for her writing and reporting, including the American Society of Newspaper Editors' Distinguished Writing Award. Her 2008 series "The Accidental Artist" was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. A graduate of Smith College, she holds master's degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (philosophy) and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. She also was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University in 2004-05. Contact Amy Ellis Nutt: (973) 392-1794 or anutt@starledger.com.

Andre Malok (right) is a videographer and graphic artist who has worked as a professional artist for 20 years. He joined The Star-Ledger in 1996 and has received a number of graphic and illustration awards from the Society for News Design and the New Jersey Press Association. In 2009, he won an Emmy Award from the New York Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for an online video documentary. Contact Andre Malok: (973) 392-4172 or amalok@starledger.com.

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.