€365m treasure taken from Atlantic

DEEP-SEA explorers from the US have recovered €365 million worth of colonial-era silver and gold coins from a 400-year-old wreck in the Atlantic Ocean — but are refusing to confirm if it is from a British vessel.

A jet chartered by Tampa-based Odyssey Marine Exploration landed in Florida recently with hundreds of plastic containers brimming with 17 tons of coins raised from the ocean floor, Odyssey co-chairman Greg Stemm said.

More than 500,000 pieces are expected to fetch an average of €740 each from collectors and investors.

“For this colonial era, I think (the find) is unprecedented,” said rare coin expert Nick Bruyer, who examined a batch of coins from the wreck. “I don’t know of anything equal or comparable to it.”

Citing security concerns, the company declined to release any details about the ship or the wreck site. Stemm said a formal announcement would come later, but court records indicate the coins might come from a 400-year-old ship found off the UK.

Because the shipwreck was found in a lane where many colonial-era vessels went down, there is still some uncertainty about its nationality, size and age, Stemm said, although evidence points to a specific known shipwreck. The site is beyond the territorial waters or legal jurisdiction of any country, he said.

He wouldn’t say if the loot was taken from the same wreck site near the English Channel that Odyssey recently petitioned a federal court for permission to salvage.

In seeking exclusive rights to that site, an Odyssey attorney told a federal judge last autumn that the company likely had found the remains of a 17th-century merchant vessel that sank with valuable cargo aboard, about 40 miles off the south-western tip of England. A judge signed an order granting those rights last month.

In keeping with the secretive nature of the project dubbed “Black Swan”, Odyssey also isn’t talking yet about the types, denominations and country of origin of the coins.

Bruyer said he observed a wide range of varieties and dates of likely uncirculated currency in much better condition than artefacts yielded by most shipwrecks of a similar age.

The Black Swan coins — mostly silver pieces — will likely fetch several hundred euro to several thousand euro each, with some possibly commanding much more.

The richest ever shipwreck haul was yielded by the Spanish galleon Nuestra Senora de Atocha, which sank in 1622.

Treasure-hunter Mel Fisher found it in 1985, and retrieved €296m in coins.
Source : http://www.irishexaminer.com