Thanks txhurl.
Posted on 04/15/2015 7:38:36 PM PDT by Citizen Zed
The SS City of Cairo was torpedoed 772km south of St Helena by a German U-boat and sank to 5,150m.
The 100 tonnes of coins, recovered in the deepest salvage operation in history, belonged to HM Treasury.
The silver rupees had been called in by London to help fund the war effort.
But they never made it. The steamship's tall plume of smoke was spotted by a U-boat on 6 November 1942 and it was torpedoed.
Ten minutes later, amid efforts to abandon ship, the City of Cairo was hit with a second torpedo which sealed its fate.
The ship and its cargo was presumed lost until 2011, when a team led by British salvage expert John Kingsford located an unnatural object among the ridges and canyons of their South Atlantic search area.
Under a contract with the UK government, underwater salvagers Deep Ocean Search worked for several weeks searching a "jumbled up sea floor" twice the size of London, Mr Kingsford told the BBC.
"We weren't convinced at first," he said. "But you have to give your team their head if they say they've found something, so we looked."
The object was indeed the City of Cairo, and the team recovered a "large percentage" of its £34 million treasure chest. "There was a lot a relief all round," Mr Kingsford said.
The coins have now been melted down in the UK and sold, with the undisclosed sum divided between the treasury - which technically owns the coins - and the salvagers, who take a percentage of the sale.
The salvage was completed in September 2013, but DOS has only now been given permission by the Ministry of Transport to announce it.
As well as the coins, the team brought up the propeller belonging to the second, fatal torpedo.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
Thanks txhurl.
http://i01.i.aliimg.com/wsphoto/v0/1762430297_2/Mr-J-1901-India-Coin-90-Silver-British-Victoria-Empress-One-Rupee-India-Copy-Coins-Rare.jpg
Government writes the rules and gets its cut.
Uhm, that photo belongs to Mr. Jun Chao!
Do I need ask the moderators to remove the post?
It’s up to you, but I was just kidding. I believe it falls into fair use and you do attribute it to him.
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