What's it like to find treasure under the sea full of temptations?

"There is no place in the depths of the ocean that humans can't reach. Even if you want to find a lost basketball at the bottom of the sea, you can find it as long as you have enough money. " This is the creed of undersea treasure hunters.

1in the summer of 973, the treasure of the ship "Akalan Dan" sunk in the bay of Lund Island on the west coast of Norway was salvaged by divers. This is part of the cargo on the sailboat of the Dutch East India Company that sank 250 years ago. The ship carried the salaries of Governor Ba Tabbia and his employees and 300,000 guilders in cash for the purchase of spices. In order to avoid pirate attacks, the ship failed to bypass the North Sea and sank near Lund Island. Then, these huge funds were salvaged, but not all of them were recovered. In the future, because gold and silver coins are often salvaged with fishing nets, they are called "the treasure of the wheel belt" in the local area, and almost the whole world knows that the treasure of the shipwreck can be obtained here. At that time, the spice ship of the Dutch East India Company surpassed the Arab merchants and British merchant fleet in the European market, because the company chose a fast route from the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sailed eastward around the Cape of Good Hope, and then went north along the east coast of Africa to India, Myanmar, Malay Peninsula and Malacca Strait. It is said that the above incident was a tragedy that happened unexpectedly on an unfamiliar route.

The successful divers who found the treasure were two Swedes and a Norwegian who went out to play. By chance, they salvaged and divided the treasure, and it took only 10 days to salvage the gold and silver coins equivalent to 200 million yen. It is said that among these currencies, there are many valuable17th century Dutch silver coins and Spanish silver coins. The news of the nouveau riche spread quickly to all corners of the world. Therefore, the Japanese diving club's adventure treasure-hunting craze is also rising, and even bookstores have many treasure-hunting books.

It is estimated that there are about 1 million sunken ships hidden around the world, from canoes in prehistoric times to small submarines made in Germany during World War II, attracting undersea gold diggers with dreams of making a fortune. Almost every year, exciting new discoveries are made, such as the recently discovered Japanese submarine 1-52, which sank during World War II, and its 4409 pounds of gold bars are still being salvaged.

The development of air diving technology enables human beings to move freely on the seabed like fish, which on the one hand promotes the rapid development of academic investigation and exploration activities, on the other hand, we should also see that activities aimed at robbing legendary treasure ships and treasures, which are quite different from scientific research all over the world, have revived.

For those adventurers who dream of grabbing a thousand dollars, the treasure in the wrecked ship and the goods at the bottom of the sea are of great temptation. This is not just a romantic story about treasure ship exploration and treasure island exploration. Once the location of the sunken ship is found, it is easy to find the object even with light air diving equipment. Because the goods contain many treasures with high economic value, they can stimulate these adventurers' endless greed.

In recent ten years, foreign powers have published countless reports about this kind of situation, especially the ships that sank in American waters in the 17 and 18 centuries, which became their hunting targets. Legend has it that/kloc-pirates in the 0 th and 7 th centuries often sank their plundered treasures into the deep sea floor and temporarily hid them. No matter whether it is true or not, in August of 197 1, local divers found about 9,000 gold, silver and copper coins on the seabed in the Bahamas, southeast of Florida Peninsula, 0/6 km away from the bathing beach/kloc-. It is said that this coin was sunk by Peter Hein, a famous Dutch pirate, when he robbed Ian Spanishu Main in 1628.

1 971121gold coin was found at the bottom of Preston Point on the east coast of Canada, and was sold at an auction in a new york gallery for 1000 USD. It is said that this is one of the gold and silver coins that Louis XV of France delivered to Quebec immigrants in France on the French ship Lugamo, which sank in Cape Preston in 1765. Lake Sturm, a Canadian-Dutch cartographer, and three divers from a civil construction company explored the wreck site. It is said that the ship also left a treasure worth 2 million dollars. Known as the Canadian "Golden Man", Sturm fished out 4,000 silver coins and 500 gold coins from the seabed.

Canada, now an independent country of the Commonwealth, was French Canada before the beginning of the18th century. Many ration ships carrying supplies for French troops and garrison soldiers often seem to be wrecked in Preston waters. Among them, "Xiamao" was discovered in June 1967. The ship sailed out of Brest Port on June 1724, and was about to turn around and cross the Atlantic Ocean. When it was hit by a storm, it hit a rock and sank into Preston's waters. It was also the Sturm diving team that salvaged 1000 gold coins and 12000 silver coins from the ship. He consulted the records of the French navy and found out the location of the sunken ship at the bottom of the sea. He learned that the wooden ship was 400 meters long and 9 meters wide and could carry 600 tons of goods. It only took three months to get the treasure. From this perspective, he is a speculator worthy of the title of "Golden Man".

The biggest salvage operation in Canadian history is over, and the Sturm diving team has certainly become a veritable millionaire.

The equipment of the undersea gold digger can definitely be called the top technology. When working in shallow water, they mainly rely on the instrument of geomagnetism to find the characteristic signs of sunken ships such as guns, anchors and propellers through the interference of metal objects on the earth's magnetic field. Geomagnetic instrument was developed during World War II, which is mainly used to detect submarines. Now its sensitivity is increasing day by day, and small objects buried under the sand layer can be found. A geomagnetic instrument costs only $ 65438+6000 today, and the price is only half that of 10 years ago. When engaged in large-scale deep-water exploration, treasure hunters use side-scan sonar, which is like a slender torpedo and can find prominent objects on the seabed beach, such as masts or hulls.

The new side-scan sonar can scan 100 square miles of sea every day, and can find small objects 3 miles below sea level, such as oil drums. The detection results can also be directly input into the ship-borne computer system to accurately locate the sunken ship with reference to the global positioning system, thus avoiding the time-consuming and laborious and inaccurate buoy positioning method. The most advanced equipment of underwater gold diggers belongs to the "remote control underwater detector", which has more comprehensive functions and more accurate positioning. Although the price of each set ranges from 654.38 million to 2 million dollars, salvage companies are still scrambling to order. 1998, this underwater robot discovered the steamboat "Central America" which sank off the coast of North Carolina in 1875, carrying 3 tons of gold.

Phil masters has been a history lover since he was a child. He has always dreamed of finding treasures under the sea. After several years of ideological struggle, 1977, at the age of 40, he finally quit his job, moved his family to Florida in the southern United States, and began to learn how to find underwater treasures.

Masters has set up an "international salvage company". First, a sunken British frigate 17 1 1 was found near Nova Scotia, and some shillings were fished out. Later, he found a ship regarded as "revenge of Queen Anne", which was the flagship of the famous "Blackbeard" pirate fleet. This sea demon king once ran amok in the18th century. After drifting at sea for more than ten years, masters thought he was about to reach the peak of his career: he discovered the Spanish galleon El Salvador. The ship disappeared off the coast of North Carolina at 1750. It was loaded with 89,200 pounds of cocoa, 240,000 pounds of silver coins and gold pesos.

"I want El Salvador to be as famous as Titanic!" This is the driving force that drives the master and hundreds of gold diggers to go to sea.

It is not enough to find the treasure on the seabed with advanced detection equipment. Treasure hunters also need to fully investigate and study historical materials. Jack haskins, a gold digger in Florida, often goes to the state archives to consult historical documents, focusing on the letters and cargo lists of the shipwrecked captain. He is currently tracking down the whereabouts of a Spanish fleet that crashed in Cuba in 17 1 1. Spain is a very bureaucratic country, and the captain should record all the big events and small feelings that happen every day in triplicate and report them to the king. Haskins hopes to find some evidence and finally determine a treasure map.

Masters found the "Revenge of Queen Anne" through the court records of 17 19: Blackbeard's men mentioned in court that the ship had docked in Beffort, North Carolina before sinking. So, with the help of the US Army Engineering Brigade, masters carefully inspected the changes of waterways near Beffort in the past century. Masters claimed that he was "only a second-rate diver, but he was an excellent scholar." He prefers to be called a "marine historian" because what he salvaged is a glittering shipwreck history.

Underwater gold customers not only salvage "sunken wealth", but also make full use of the historical value of sunken ships to make money. RMS Titanic Company, the legal fisherman of Titanic, has sold the exclusive exhibition right of the items on board to SFX Entertainment Company for 8.5 million dollars per year. Masters thinks he can also make money from Revenge of Queen Anne, although there is nothing valuable on it.

"The name' Black Beard' is a big selling point in itself. Few people in history can make people so afraid. " Masters also plans to produce a four-part TV series about pirates and sell copies of the goods on board, including a syringe, which is said to be used by Blackbeard's men to inject themselves with mercury to treat syphilis. From this point of view, the right to shoot and the physical exhibition are the best ways to make profits from sunken ships. The salvage company claimed: "The movie box office and video revenue of Titanic earned more money than salvaging any sunken ship." In addition, some companies also use the Internet to sell sunken ship souvenirs. "Melf House Treasure Search Website" advertised "You can have a history" and sold the silver toothpicks on the sunken ship at a price of 45 dollars each.

However, archaeologists are saddened by the "piracy" behavior of these undersea gold diggers. They believe that fishing for the purpose of money alone is a serious damage to the earth's cultural heritage. A typical example is the British warship Debrack, which sank in Delaville in 1798. 1995 was discovered by a salvage company. They dug several big holes in the hull and took away all valuable things, including guns and nautical charts, which made historians lose an important basis for studying the strength of the British navy at that time.

The salvage company retorted that the brutal treatment of the sunken ship has long been a thing of the past, and now they all pay great attention to protecting its archaeological value. "Every fisherman is an archaeologist." In order to obtain the government's salvage license, the company must ensure that the seabed cultural relics are properly handled and the integrity of the sunken ship is protected. For example, in Florida, salvage companies are required to submit archaeological reports regularly, and all "worthless" things, that is, items made of non-rare metals and jewels, are handed over to the state government for study, and the state government has the right to share 20% of the sunken treasure.

UNESCO is planning to ban commercial salvage of sunken ships over 100 years worldwide. However, this proposed law was strongly opposed by salvage companies on the grounds that many major archaeological discoveries were made by private institutions. In fact, it is impossible to establish order in the ocean which covers 70% of the earth's area.