HOT NEWS !

By Henri Samuel - Telegraph.co.uk

A British-led team has broken the world underwater salvage record after recovering almost 50 million dollars (£34 million) worth of silver coins from the wreck of a British steamship 17,000 feet under the sea, it emerged on Tuesday.

The SS City of Cairo was sunk by a German submarine 480 miles south of St. Helena on November 4 1942 en route from Bombay to England with 100 tons of silver coins on board housed in 2,000 rectangular black boxes.

The U-68 struck the slow-moving steamship with one torpedo but waited a further 20 minutes before inflicting the coup de grace, thus allowing all but six of the ship's 302 passengers and crew to escape on to lifeboats.

The German captain, Karl-Friedrich Merten, then approached the lifeboats and famously told the survivors in perfect English: "Goodnight, sorry for sinking you."

It took three weeks before the bulk of the crew were rescued, by which time 104 people on board the lifeboats had died.

The ship's vast treasure in silver rupees belonging to the UK Treasury was thought lost forever.

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From CBC News

Divers beneath the Arctic sea ice offered a live video tour at the wreck of the Franklin Expedition's HMS Erebus today.

Holes had been cut through the ice, which is now about two metres deep, to give Royal Canadian Navy divers and Parks Canada underwater archeologists a chance to continue exploration of the 19th-century wreck discovered late last summer in the Queen Maud Gulf off Nunavut.

Park Canada had initially said a pre-recorded video would be released at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, providing an "up-close-and-personal" look at the ship that was one half of the ill-fated polar expedition led by Sir John Franklin in the 1840s.

But instead, at the Toronto event on Thursday afternoon, divers Marc-Andre Bernier and Ryan Harris, with a live video connection, provided the show. Viewers were able to see the vivid remains of Erebus and, with several technical interruptions, hear descriptions by the underwater crew.

The divers were also able to answer questions from students gathered at the ROM.

A video of the live event was released later.

The earlier video, along with photos released Wednesday, were scheduled to provide the first public look at a complex operation that is being done in conjunction with Joint Task Force (North)'s annual high Arctic sovereignty operation, Nunalivut.

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By Tony Paterson - The Independent

From Shirlez Zhao - South China Morning Post

A group of amateur divers believe they might have discovered the remains of a sailing ship which sank off the city's southernmost island in 1944 - killing more than 50 people, according to historical records.

The group of 12 discovered a cannon, two anchors and several iron chains during a diving trip near the southern tip of Po Toi Island on March 29.

They suspect the relics belonged to the only recorded shipwreck in that area - a vessel carrying around 500 Hong Kong citizens exiled by Japanese invaders.

Jack Wu Ming-chuen, chairman of the Hong Kong Underwater Archaeological Association - to which the divers belong - said the two anchors, each about two metres long, appeared to be admiralty pattern anchors which were invented in around 1808 and not popularised until 1815.

He said the anchors were found about 50 metres off the coast in 15-metre-deep water.

The cannon - also about two metres long - was discovered around 100 metres off the coast in 11-metre-deep water. Wu said it was common for cargo ships around that time to be armed because pirate activities were rampant.

"When the ship was about to sink, people on board would want to get rid of some weight," Wu said. "I guess they might have thrown the cannon away first."


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From Dailymail

A museum in Hawaii is preparing to open a treasure-trove of artifacts from the shipwreck of a royal yacht sunk off the coast of Kauai 191 years ago.

Richard Rogers, a Hawaii shipwreck chaser, worked with scientists from the Smithsonian Institution to dredge up the findings from the ship owned by King Kamehameha II, aka Liholiho, the second king of Hawaii.

'We found gold, silver, Hawaiian poi pounders, gemstones, a boat whistle, knives, forks, mica, things from all over the world, high- and low-end European stuff. Every bit of it is royal treasure,' Rogers said.

Rogers volunteered his time aboard his research vessel, the Pilialoha, over a five year period in four-week intervals from 1995 to 2001 to pull up the treasures.

'It's all pickled and nice and ready to be displayed,' Rogers said. 'There are over a thousand artifacts. We did our homework and this find is invaluable because it all belonged to the king. It is a fabulous window into the 1820s.'

Rogers said the king's belongings were buried in 10 feet of water and 10 feet of sand. His favorite discovery was a trumpet shell.

'I found it under a bunch of sand and carried it onto the deck. This was in 1999. I blew it and it made the most beautiful sound going out over Hanalei Bay,' Rogers recalled. 'I thought about how it hadn't been blown in over 170 years.'

Kamehameha II purchased the yacht from George Crowninshield II, who named it 'Cleopatra's Barge' in 1816. According to historian and Kauai Museum volunteer Zenon Wong, it cost $50,000 to build the 192 ton yacht. Rogers said it was the first luxury ocean-going yacht built in the United States.

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By Dan Bloom - Mirror

A treasure hunter who seized gold worth up to £260million from a shipwreck is facing jail after three years on the run. Tommy Thompson led a 1988 expedition to the SS Central America, the so-called Ship of Gold which sank laden with 21 tons of the precious metal off the Carolina coast in 1857.

But instead of the would-be Indiana Jones sharing the wealth, he allegedly ran off with the profits - leaving scores of angry investors. He reportedly sold much of the haul for around £36million in 2000, but investors claimed the gold was worth up to £260million in a civil court case.

Now Thompson, 62, is facing jail rather than spilling the shipwreck's secrets by testifying in the case - including exactly how much the gold was worth. As the pressure mounted Thompson and his girlfriend-assistant Alison Antekeier, 47, started using fake names and paying only in cash from 2005, prosecutors claim.

Then, in 2012, they became fugitives after failing to appear at a court case brought by the investors. The pair fled their multi-million dollar house in Vero Beach, Florida, after being confronted over unpaid rent by handyman James Kennedy.

He later went into the house and found several $10,000 cash wads hidden in pipes buried underground, the prosecutors claimed.

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By Ed Carty - Belfast Telegraph

The owner of the RMS Lusitania has accused the Irish government of abandoning the shipwreck to pirates and treasure hunters after stringent rules on diving scuppered his plans for recovery.

Gregg Bemis, an 87-year-old US entrepreneur, said tough conditions imposed on his lifelong quest to save valuable and historically important artefacts from the sinking ground 11 miles off the Old Head of Kinsale were "spiteful".

The Cunard vessel was torpedoed on May 7, 1915 by a German U-boat en route from New York to Liverpool and sank with the loss of 1,201 lives.

Mr Bemis has spent decades trying to confirm a theory that the sinking - 18 minutes compared to two hours and 40 minutes for the Titanic - was hastened by a second explosion caused by a secret cache of munitions destined for Britain's war effort.

"The Government officials are so glib and innocent sounding like they walk on water, but they add all these restrictions on and throw them at me so they interfere and impede," he said.

One of the conditions ordered Mr Bemis to indemnify the Irish state against any incidents or injury if he organises a dive on the veritable Aladdin's Cave.

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From Associated Press

A treasure hunter’s effort to salvage what he calls $3 billion in platinum from a World War II shipwreck off Cape Cod has been ended by a federal judge.

Greg Brooks’ company Sea Hunters LP is no longer allowed to salvage additional items from the S.S. Port Nicholson, which was sunk by a Nazi U-boat in 1942, U.S. District Judge George Singal ruled on Wednesday.

Brooks said he believed the Port Nicholson carried platinum bars from the Soviet Union that were payment to the U.S. for war supplies. His treasure hunt had led to a criminal investigation and legal action by investors who paid him millions of dollars.

The judge also denied an attempt by a group of investors to win recovery rights, claims to what’s on the ship if anything is found. The judge wrote that evidence suggests there’s nothing valuable to salvage.

The record, the judge wrote, suggests that all that remains is “70-year-old truck tires, fenders and miscellaneous other parts and military supplies.”

The judge essentially ended Sea Hunters’ rights to any claim to potential treasure. He cited Sea Hunters’ actions “including the filing of falsified documents on this court’s docket and its inability to salvage any items of substantial value.”

He issued the ruling with prejudice, meaning it’s permanent.