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© 2007 Atocha Treasure Company LLC All Rights Reserved
Toll Free 800-650-9030 International 239-437-1052
Order By Fax 239-437-2455
© 2007 Atocha Treasure Company LLC All Rights Reserved
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SHIP
WRECK SALVAGE IS FINDERS, KEEPERS Often,
laying claim to a site a simple case of ‘arresting’ wreck The Associated Press Richard Steinmietz
knew exactly what the federal marshals wanted when they pounded on his
door: his nicotine-stained shipwreck treasure, the Alabama bell. For year’s the bell, a relic of the notorious Confederate raider, the
CSS Alabama, sat in his antiques store in New York. In 1990, strapped for
cash and facing heart surgery, Steinmetz put it up for auction. Then the feds came
calling. |
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Wrong, lie was told.
The Navy doesn’t abandon warships. All of them, even rusting
confederate ones, belong to the United States government. Today it sits in a
Washington Navy museum, still black from years of pub smoke. Steinmetz, who fought
his claim in rout unsuccessfully for years, wasn’t the only one left
shaking his head at the peculiar brand of justice that rules the high
seas. There are thousands of shipwrecks around the world and thousands of
treasure hunters searching for them, spinning dreams of gold as they scour
the ocean blue. Opportunity at hand These days, something
strange is happening. Technology
is making those dreams come true. Little underwater robots that roam the deep, plucking pieces-of-eight from Spanish galleons; deep diving submersibles that ferry tourists to the North Atlantic to view the ghostly remains of Titanic; mixed-gas scuba gear that lets divers glimpse bones in German U-boats at depths unheard of a couple of decades ago. Titanic. Lusitania. Andrea Doria. Britannic. |
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In recent years divers have explored them all and more, hauling up all sorts of booty. The discoveries bringing lawsuits and questions: Who are the rightful owners of tile wrecks and their belongings: descendants, the state, salvors? And a trickier
question. Who has the power to decide, particularly when a wreck lies in
international waters far from the jurisdiction of any one country? |
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Busy on the ocean floor In the emerging
world of the deep ocean, wrecks are being discovered all the time. Just last year, Ballard discovered the remains of the USS
Yorktown, which sank during the Battle of Midway in World War II. Divers
in Egypt pulled up a 2,000-year-old
Sphinx. Trolling the Mediterranean for a gold-laden British warship.
Florida treasure hunters stumbled on a 5th century Phoenician wreck. “‘Technology is taking us to Pyramids of the deep,” said Ballard, president of the Institute for Exploration in Mystic, Conn., who discovered Titanic with a French team in 1985. ‘The question, is do we use technology to plunder or to ponder.” Those on the side of pondering -— archaeologists and historians — are desperately pushing for measures to halt the plunder. Maritime museums now refuse to display treasures from “looted” sites -- those salvaged by for-profit ventures States include underwater resources in their historic preservation plans. There are 2 National Marine Sanctuaries and hundreds of underwater sites listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Internationally, UNESCO, the cultural arm of the United Nations, is pushing for protection of the world’s underwater heritage by declaring most shipwrecks to be the property of the world’s governments. |
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But archaeological
ethics are having a hard time keeping up with technology. And
conflicting national interests and cultures make agreements difficult,
Is a wreck historic if it is 50 years old, or 500? War tombs, like a
Japanese submarine bombed in the mid-Atlantic in 1944, pose more
questions. Three years ago, an American group beat a rival British team in
a race to find the sub, the 1-52, which sank in international waters
about halfway between the Cape Verde Islands and Barbados. Can Japan claim the
remains of 109 bodies or the two tons of gold? What about policing? Now do countries enforce ‘no trespassing” when the waves are 10 feet high, the salvage ships are circling and gold gleams seductively in the depths below? Eventually, Ballard
and others suggest, rules and laws will be developed similar to those
that protect archaeological sites on land. Meanwhile, he says, “I feel
like I’ve walked into a bar fight.” Today Ballard cannot
return to ‘titanic site without the permission of the man who owns it —
a wealthy car dealer from
Connecticut. How do you own the
Titanic? You drop 2½ miles to the bottom of the ocean, scoop up a wine
decanter from the site, haul it into a Virginia court and in legal jargon —
“arrest” the wreck. |
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If no one else
claims jurisdiction over the site, then any admiralty court — which,
in the United States means a federal court —
can assume jurisdiction
and make decisions for the world. Never mind that the
Titanic Maritime Memorial Act of 1985 speaks in lofty terms about respecting
the integrity of the wreck In maritime
tradition, whoever arrests a wreck has the right — with court restrictions
— to
dispose of it. The tradition
endures because it works, say those who risk life, limb and bankruptcy to
find sunken ships. The profit motive, they argue, has always been part of
deep sea exploration. |
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