A Florida deep-ocean exploration company has recovered around 28kg of gold, worth £770,000 at current prices, during an exploratory dive on an Atlantic shipwreck.
Odyssey Marine Exploration recovered the gold from the wreck of the SS Central America, which sunk in 1857 off the coast of the Carolinas in a Category 2 hurricane whilst carrying an estimated 19 tonnes of gold.
When the ship sank on 10 September 1857 it took with her 425 souls and 14 tonnes of gold worth $2 million, which contributed to the country-wide financial panic.
The shipwreck was previously explored by a team led by Ohio engineer Tommy Thompson in 1988, who managed to recover gold worth $40 million before trouble between investors caused the effort to stall, and Thompson to go on the run.
Odyssey won the right to re-explore the site after a court battle over the proceeds from Thompson’s efforts two decades ago, and managed to recover their haul of gold during the two-hour exploratory dive in their underwater Odyssey Explorer vessel, according to Reuters. They now plan to return to perform a more thorough exploration of the site, and hopefully recover more of the lost treasure.