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Who Owns the Treasures of the Sea?

An interesting piece in The Economist regarding the rights of deep-sea treasure hunters…

[Odyssey Marine Exploration]’s business is based on the notion that the ocean floor is littered with valuable old stuff that, thanks to new deep-sea technology, can now be recovered…

Step forward the lawyers for Spain... “The owners of sunken ships have rights. Spain has not abandoned its sunken property and it does not permit unauthorised salvage.” If Odyssey is forced to hand over a large part of its Black Swan haul a cloud will fall over all commercial treasure-hunting. Who, after all, wants to invest large amounts of money looking for something only to see a government then claim full ownership?

My initial reaction is to be torn. On the one hand, the claims of Spain seem plainly to be lame. But as usual, I want to know exactly where the line is drawn.

If the crew has to abandon ship, but it doesn’t sink, the owners don't automatically give up legal rights to the ship or the cargo. To just take it because it is in international waters would be piracy. Even if the ship is left bobbing and unmanned for days, weeks, years – at what point would it not be piracy just to take it?

Wulf: So you are going to take the ship and its cargo?

Phaedrus: Yeah.

Wulf: That's not yours?

Phaedrus: Well it becomes ours.

Wulf: How is that not stealing?

And I also don’t see how the morality or legality of the situation suddenly changes when the ship goes under water. Now I’m no expert on international salvage law, and I’ve only ever perused the Law of the Sea Treaty. I’m not sure it would apply. But I’m hoping somebody reading this knows a thing or two about how this all works, and could try to explain it.

I agree with the conclusions laid out in the Economist article:

If private treasure-hunters do not seek out wrecks, nobody else will. Governments rarely take any initiative. One alternative may be to adopt a British model. The British government has just signed a deal with Odyssey to recover treasure, and then to split the proceeds, from HMS Sussex, which went down off Gibraltar in 1693, carrying a million pounds in coins. The deal also provides archaeological guarantees…

Until treasure-hunters and governments start working together, every find is liable to be followed by complex legal wrangling, in which the only certain winners will be the lawyers.

Posted by Wulf on August 3, 2007 at 01:49 PM

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Comments

I agree too. Ownership doesn't change, but the the treasure-hunters are certainly able to negotiate a salvage fee. If they are silly enough to salvage the wreck without negotiating first, they deserve the $0 fee they will get.

Posted by: Jeff Molby at August 4, 2007 10:50 AM

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