Any thoughts on wreck looting?

[USdiver1]

And thus it goes:

The world's biggest grave robbery: Asia’s disappearing WWII shipwrecks

Illegal salvage of WWII vessels from the South China Sea and other areas in the Pacific theatre.

 

[Rred]

I think the best "looting" I ever heard of was a Suffolk County (NY) man who retrieved a couple of 4" shells from the USS San Diego, back in the 80's when this was considered normal and proper. (Ignoring the fact that any military warship is sovereign property forever, perhaps lost but never abandoned.)

He used them as fireplace andirons. His neighbor was over one day and the man said "But, those are explosive" and the diver said "Nah, they've been under water over fifty years, they're harmless." The Suffolk County PD bomb squad detonated both at the bomb range shortly thereafter.

Oppsie. (The USCG put a picket boat on the wreck, there were no more dives that year.)

Just a reminder, if you're playing on warships? Yes, the munitions are designed to be very much alive after fifty years underwater.

Personally I have mixed feelings. I have bottles from the 1700's. And prohibition-era rum. Archaeology, yes, good thing. Letting wrecks go unseen and decaying into the bottom...totally a waste. But no one wants to ante up the funds to actively go out and document and preserve them, do they?

 

[NAM001]

I think that there is too much scamming in the salvage world. Yes a ship sinks, Yes it was insured, but then for 50 years there is no efforts to recover, a diver comes across it and salvages it and the ins co takes it and leaves the costs with he diver. Sunk reef sips are one thing burial site ships are another thing but a new discovery is for me different. You take a car and in 15 years yo have paid enough ins to fully re-buy the car. the ins co is out nothing. so a ship sinks in 1750 is found and the ins company wants to make claim to it. Seems a little greedy as they were never actively looking for a recovery any way and other than a title they never expected to ever see the ship again. For me its like buying 10 million acres of govt ground at 10c an acre in hopes that some day some body will find something on it and yo can get rich. If you buy land in most places there is a requirement that you enact continuous improvements to the land or it will be considered abandoned and ownership will be forfeited. so you put up some fencing or something each year to meet that criteria. Granted you cant improve a sunk wreck but you should be required to show proof that you are actively searching for the remains other than by no cost means. Such things as expeditions of waters in search of the wreck. Im sure that if Lloydes were to sell the business the sale price that taxes would be paid on would not include lost property value that the company has paid claims on. If that were true then if one ship alone had 10 thousand pounds of gold on it and sunk in the 1600's and it was worth a dollar an ounce they lose what 160k dollars and now its worth what 250 mill but no one is looking for it related to the ins co. Many times the ins company will refuse finders fees for its recovery.

 

[mainedvr]

I think it depends on the circumstances. I don't think they should be "looted" if a wreck has been dove over and over and its a "dive site" it should be left well enough alone unless there is a real reason to remove something, like research or whatever. A wreck that is just recently found and the proper salvage paper work or what ever is done then fine make your living. All in all the laws should be followed and graves respected. IMHO

 

[KenGordon]

In Australia all wrecks older than 75 years are totally protected. At times younger ones have been protected as well, but as far as I know, there are now none in this category.

What annoys me is that in some countries some warships are declared war graves and you cannot dive them at all. Why? You can go to France and Belgium and walk over the WWI battlefields in paddocks that contain thousands of dead Australians (and British), go to Gallipoli and walk on the beaches and hills where thousands of Australian, New Zealand and British soldiers were killed and still lie, sometimes bones still sticking up out of the ground. What is the difference with swimming through a wreck that contains bones of dead navy sailors? I do not understand this at all.

The difference is tourists are not generally thieving bastards, divers on the other hand...

 

[NAM001]

I dont know if i wold go along with divers being thieving B's but with all the response i think we have to come to some agreement whether we are talking about a ship sunk for reef. or a known ship that is deemed a grave site or something that the currents have just cleared the covering silt from. I would never harvest from something like the mighty O. or from the arizona (if even possible) , but artifacts are burried and uncovered all the time from storms. to see a mast exposed after a storm and artifacts on the ground whether it be coins or anything,,,,, that alone says no one knows about it. Had they known the booty would have been long gone.

 

[KenGordon]

But no one wants to ante up the funds to actively go out and document and preserve them, do they?

Actually things are changing:

Marine heritage

And there are a few sites in England which have been extensively studied. Oh, and there is this of course...

The Mary Rose. 500 years. A heartbeat away

And to demonstrate where being a thieving bastard goes...

Three cannons (cannons for f***s sake, cannons!)

Diver jailed for fraudulently selling three cannon found in UK waters

£250k in random rubbish...

http://www.pbo.co.uk/news/divers-made-to-pay-63500-for-undeclared-shipwreck-raids-737

This last example is actually quite like typical diver thieving except for the scale.

I am not against taking bells which end up in pubs, dive shops and museums, but all the little bits and pieces than make up a wreck ough to stay there to be seen. This is especially true of brass parts. There are still wrecks with telegraphs, pipe junctions and portholes. Would we rather those got lifted and put in a shed when some diver’s otherhalf has a sense of humour failure over a pile of junk in the house?

The Ord is a great example. The bottom is covered in bullets. Apparently it also used to have piles of rifles. None to be seen now. Is that better or worse? How many museums need a 20s IRA rifle?

It turns out that the industrial heritage represented by, at least British, shipwrecks has been very badly preserved. Want to see a typical 1880 to 1950s cargo vessel? Where are you going to look? Old, cars, motorcycles, lorries, water pumps, coal mines and so forth you can see pretty easily. Even the odd old naval ship.

Ps The answer is The Project opening soon maybe...

 

[Jared0425]

Things in the UK, Australia, and Europe in general are far more restrictive than they are over here. If I found some cannons in a muddy river, you can bet your a$$ I'm going to salvage them. That man-o-war found in the Thames was left for centuries to rot and then all of sudden the government cares when divers find it and want some awesome keepsakes?

I've heard about people tearing apart wrecks for the wood to use as furniture. Now if the wreck is a busted up pile of wood that has no historic value to it, then by all means go to town. However if we're talking about a warship from one of our wars (only 4 major ones were fought on our soil), that may require some deliberation. If it's a wargrave were we have remains on it, then that's the line that should be drawn.

 

[Rred]

KWS, aside from ignoring admiralty law and such, you're not looking at the economics of insurance status. In an insurer paid out for a wreck in 1830, when simply trying to locate the wreck would have cost a fortune, and trying to reach the wreck and salvage it might not have been technically possible, there was and is every good reason for the insurer to let it lie there, until someone can say "Oh hey, there's our ship, and we can actually get down to it now". Without spending a fortune trying to locate it. So yes, it still belongs to the folks who took over the title to it--the insurer or otherwise. And the million pounds or dollars that they paid out in 1830 otherwise would have been INVESTED for all these years. Simple compound interest over the last 200 years would turn pennies into fortunes, so every year that goes by without the insurer making a salvage operation, they are actually PAYING OUT large amounts of money, tied up in their "investment" that cannot be redeemed. Yet.

 

[oldschoolto]

KWS, aside from ignoring admiralty law and such, you're not looking at the economics of insurance status. In an insurer paid out for a wreck in 1830, when simply trying to locate the wreck would have cost a fortune, and trying to reach the wreck and salvage it might not have been technically possible, there was and is every good reason for the insurer to let it lie there, until someone can say "Oh hey, there's our ship, and we can actually get down to it now". Without spending a fortune trying to locate it. So yes, it still belongs to the folks who took over the title to it--the insurer or otherwise. And the million pounds or dollars that they paid out in 1830 otherwise would have been INVESTED for all these years. Simple compound interest over the last 200 years would turn pennies into fortunes, so every year that goes by without the insurer making a salvage operation, they are actually PAYING OUT large amounts of money, tied up in their "investment" that cannot be redeemed. Yet.

You must work for a insurance company or are a lawyer... LOL...

Jim....