oceanic currents and drifting ships in Dawnshard

[king of nowhere]

Rereading dawnshard, I noticed a detail that's hard to explain. The book opens with yalb finding the first dreams, the ship that tried to reach akinah and had her crew murdered five months prior.

The ship has been adrift for months, so it should have followed the oceanic currents. Meanwhile, while Yalb's position is not specified, as a scouting ship he should be somewhere in the southern depths, or in longbrow strait. it doesn't make sense for him to be further west, in seas that are firmly controlled by the enemies. So, the first dreams must have been found there, east of aimia.

the problem with that is that, as far as I know, it is ascertained that the oceanic currents are circling the continent of roshar clockwise. It fits with the climate, with warm water coming down from the steamwater ocean and making taylenah mild for its latitude, then getting cooler and becoming a cold current by the time it reaches aimia, justifying the difference between the two lands that are at the same latitude. furthermore, by the coriolis effect, storms in the southern emisphere rotate clockwise.

So, the currents should have pushed the first dreams north, up past the coast of shinovar and iri, and into the steamwater ocean. All territories controlled by the singers. unless it made a full cycle and returned to longbrow straits, but five months seem a bit low for that. Maybe?

So, where did the first dreams drift when yalb found it? did it return all the way to longbrow strait after circling the entire continent? was it pushed by highstorms all the way across the endless ocean until it fully sailed around the world (but how did it survive highstorms in this case?)? Was it maybe in the reshi isles north of jah keved, near human-controlled lands?

I'm probably overthinking this

[Treamayne]

Nice post and it makes a lot of sense.

I had always thought that the Sleepless kept it inside the storm barrier of Akinah for a period of time - long enough that search craft from Steen and Liafor to stop searching the waters around Aimia.

So, at the time Yalb finds the ship, it has only recently been set adrift by the swarms, far from Aimia in the Southern Depths. Which is why the scout ship found it while patrolling contested territory near the archipelago west-southwest of Tukur.

[king of nowhere]

9 hours ago, Treamayne said:

 

I had always thought that the Sleepless kept it inside the storm barrier of Akinah for a period of time - long enough that search craft from Steen and Liafor to stop searching the waters around Aimia.

 

actually, it was stated that they tried to scuttle it. made a couple holes in the hull, left it to sink. except that modern taylen shipbuilding is better than that.

modern taylen shipbuilding is migthily impressive, when you think of it: a ship adrift for five months, with no crew to care for it, with the storms and everything, and with some holes in the hull, and still it didn't sink.

[Treamayne]

2 hours ago, king of nowhere said:

actually, it was stated that they tried to scuttle it.

Thanks, I'd forgotten that. Did it say if it as right after the incident, cause I still had the impressions it was kept hidden until the searchers gave up?

[king of nowhere]

21 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Thanks, I'd forgotten that. Did it say if it as right after the incident, cause I still had the impressions it was kept hidden until the searchers gave up?

nothing more detailed was stated