During the Pacific War, many U.S., European and Japanese warships were sunk during the fighting and buried at the bottom of the sea with their officers and men. And the British newspaper "Guardian" said, these shipwrecks have fallen into the hotbed of illegal salvage, they pretend to be fishermen, diving to the bottom of the sea will be the wreckage of the wreckage of the bombing, looting of precious metals and steel, some of the ship hull of 6 to 7% disappeared, and some were completely destroyed. The report describes this as the world's largest case of grave robbing, interested can look at the world's top ten tomb secret.
Located in the Java Sea between Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia, World War II was the battlefield of the British, American and Dutch Allied Forces and the Japanese Navy, dozens of warships and about 4,500 crew members lay dormant on the seabed. The Guardian revealed last year that some of the battleships had been illegally salvaged, causing strong resentment among retired military personnel and history scholars, who considered the move disrespectful to history and disturbing the dead, and demanded that the British authorities follow up and prosecute the offenders. However, the latest investigation by naval history scholars and diving experts found that the warships have become more and more serious damage, and many have been completely disfigured.
Uncontaminated steel can be built nuclear station
Australian Naval Museum dive expert Hunt said that in the past, divers often steal the wreckage of firearms and parts, or the remains of the fallen officers and soldiers, but in the past year, the dive community rumors of the destruction of the entire warship. He said he had been involved in the conservation of naval heritage for nearly 20 years, but had never heard of the disappearance of an entire 8,000-ton steel warship and found it hard to believe. Later, he dived to the bottom of the sea and witnessed illegal salvagers prying the Perth apart "from end to end". The British and American militaries have made representations to Indonesia to protect the remains of the warship. The salvors usually sell the hull of the wreck as scrap metal, but they may also look for valuable metals such as copper wire and phosphor bronze. Hunter questioned the cost of salvage, and metal parts have long been rusted, salvors should be difficult to return the money.
Manders, an expert in the cultural heritage sector in the Netherlands, tried to explain the mystery by suggesting that the salvors were targeting low-background-radiation steel, which was produced before the atomic bombings of the 1940s. After the world entered the nuclear age, the amount of background nuclear radiation in the atmosphere increased, so modern steel production is contaminated with radioactive elements. As a result, warships sunk before the nuclear age became the last repositories of uncontaminated steel. Low background radiation steel is ideal for precision space instruments and medical equipment, and some shipwrecked metals from as far back as the Roman era can be used to build nuclear power plants.
Corrosion is still worth 10 million per shipManders continued, even if the shipwreck's low background radiation steel has corroded, it can still be sold for a considerable price, it is estimated that a ship will be able to sell nearly 1 million pounds (about 10.27 million Hong Kong dollars), especially in the ship brass pipeline, worth 2,000 pounds (about 21,000 Hong Kong dollars) per ton, the copper wire is worth 5,000 pounds (about 51,000 Hong Kong dollars) per ton.