Galveston, Texas - An unmanned ghost ship named The Warwick, seen in the past only by men of the sea on the verge of death, has claimed another victim in the early morning fog-shrouded waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

Just as has happened so many times for over a century, a lone survivor was allowed to live only long enough to tell of his doomsday encounter with the evil four-masted messenger of death.

Ruben Alvaro was one of 12 crewmen aboard the salvage vessel Robin Thorn, on it’s way to help with the oil spill disaster off the coast of Louisiana. He told rescuers that he witnessed a sleek, old-fashioned clipper ship slip silently out of the mist with all sails set.

“We all saw it,” Alvaro said from his bed at the Galveston Medical Center. “It was big and black, I could hear the sails flapping in the wind, and other sounds like thunder from a far-off storm. The ship looked in perfect condition, but we saw no one aboard. It sailed only a few yards off our starboard beam for a few minutes, then it just moved ahead like we were standing still.”

That’s when Alvaro said he saw the name on the stern of the mysterious vessel - The Warwick.

Alvaro then told of the frightening events which followed: “All of a sudden the ship vanished. In an instant, the wind began to scream and the sea became like mountains.” he said.

“There was a thundering roar and a wall of water crashed down on us and our ship was smashed to bits. That’s all I remember.”

Just a day after relating his story to authorities, the 42-year-old deckhand succumbed to his injuries and joined his lost shipmates in death.

For over a century, fishermen and shrimpers along the Texas Gulf Coast have heard the same tale from the lips of doomed seaman from other ships that went to the bottom after sailing in The Warwick’s wake.

A log book dated 1879, found on Matagorda Island near the remains of an unknown sailor, told how his merchant ship exploded in flames minutes after its crew saw “a great black ship with sails of alabaster glowing in the night.”

At the bottom of the page, in large letters, the sailor had scrawled the word Warwick.