Explorers given approval to retrieve Titanic’s Marconi telegraph | Hacker News Reader

Explorers given approval to retrieve Titanic’s Marconi telegraph

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41 pointswallflower26 comments

I guess I'm unsentimental, but I don't really see the point of restricting access to the wreck. People say it's a grave or memorial, but its not like it was built for that, its just the ship the people happened to be in when they died. We generally don't preserve crashed airplanes/trains/etc as memorials to the people that died in them. And its not like mourning family members or their descendants can visit it.

If I or one of my family members die in a shipwreck, I can't imagine I'd have any particular problem with people salvaging from the same. If some future salvager wants to go salvage an iphone or whatever from the ship, I can't see why I'd be upset by the fact that my corpse is now resting in a ship with one less random knicknack in it.

The radio seems like an interesting artifact that people will enjoy seeing, while at the bottom of the ocean it isn't doing anyone any good. If people want to bring it to the surface, let them have at it.

Think of it as a graveyard. It's typically not ok to desecrate it, even if no one visits it.

But it isn't a graveyard. And I think its a stretch to say that removing a radio is "desecration", which to my mind usually implies an intentional effort to disrespect the site.

It's the final resting place of the remains of something like 1,500 people. In what meaningful sense is it not a graveyard?

> People say it's a grave or memorial, but its not like it was built for that, its just the ship the people happened to be in when they died.

Obviously the shipbuilders never intended for the ship to become a grave, but that's exactly what it became and the intent of the shipbuilders hardly seems relevant.

As for plane and train crashes, the discrepancy in treatment is obviously a matter of tradition. Not all traditions are problematic relics of the past that need questioning though; particularly not traditions as harmless as respecting the deceased victims of ship wrecks. And if traditions are to be challenged, it should be for a better reason than profit. (Historic inquiry is a better reason to challenge this tradition, but doesn't seem to apply in this circumstance.)

I think that devaluing harmless traditions like respecting the dead in the name of utility and profit demeans our society.

Is there a tradition? Salvaging wrecks, with or without human remains, is a pretty old practice, the law generally seems to support it and I'm not really aware of any religious or other traditional prohibition against it. There's certainly efforts made to respect whatever human remains are present, but not to the extent of a defacto ban on salvage operations.

> Is there a tradition?

Obviously yes, otherwise it wouldn't be contentious.

There are many reasons to salvage shipwrecks, some better than others. Wrecks which pose navigational hazards are obviously removed. Wrecks which contain hazardous materials (oil, nuclear waste, explosives, etc) may also be salvaged. Wrecks which contain valuable materials are also sometimes salvaged, and in rare cases ships may be raised and refurbished to be used again (this happened to the confederate submarine Hunley twice.) There is no hard and fast tradition on salvaging ships, it exists on a continuum of necessity to reviled grave robbery.

Specific instances can be evaluated on that continuum. The K-141 Kursk was dismantled and partially raised, in large large part because it contained a nuclear reactor and several nuclear warheads; I think most would agree doing so was prudent. On the other end of that spectrum, numerous ships sank during the Battle of the Java Sea have been destroyed for scrap metal, which has been widely reviled as grave robbery. (The steel of those wrecks has some value because it dates prior to the nuclear era: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-background_steel) but "it's valuable tho.." isn't generally seen as an acceptable reason to molest these graves.

I think retrieving artifacts from the Titanic to put on display falls closer to the "grave robbery" end of this spectrum.

Sunken ships are vastly different from land convenyances, historically and in cultures everywhere. There's a gravity to the inaccessible, abyssal deep.

> People say it's a grave

The remains of the people that died on board are still there, so technically it is a grave.

For land or air-based accidents, the remains are easily gathered together and buried. Ships that sink are a little different. There’s even modern examples, like the ferry Estonia that sank in 1994, that has been declared a maritime grave and diving near the wreck is forbidden.

“Because of a backlog of personal messages, the wireless operators had ignored ice warnings from other ships.”

Actually no, ice warnings* were passed onto the Bridge, which the Captain choose to ignore, as he was endevouring to beat the record for the fastest crossing on a maiden voyage. The lesson being, don't go full steam ahead into an ice field, in the middle of the ice season, at night under a moonless night.

“On the 11th April, she received 6 warnings from ships stopped in, or passing through, heavy ice, 5 more on the 12th, 3 more on the 13th, and 7 on the 14th.”

http://www.titanic-titanic.com/the-ice-warnings-received-by-...

> The recovery project has been vociferously opposed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, whose representatives argued in court that the Titanic, sunk about 370 miles off the coast of Newfoundland, should be respected as a grave rather than mined as a museum supply.

Frankly I agree. This isn't a scientific mission, or any sort of fact-finding mission; it's just looting. The plan to make a "wonderful exhibit" sounds like a cynical business ploy to get the public into museums with sensational exhibitions. Perhaps getting the public into museums is not such a bad thing, but is it such a good thing that it justifies this sort of looting? I don't really see how.

Edit: I should say that I'm not categorically opposed to retrieving items from shipwrecks, if it's being done respectfully. But this plan with the Titanic doesn't seem very respectful to me. An example of what I'd consider reasonably respectful was the retrieval of the bell from the SS Edmund Fitzgerald:

> The ship's bell was recovered from the wreck on July 4, 1995. A replica engraved with the names of the 29 sailors who lost their lives replaced the original on the wreck.[190] A legal document signed by 46 relatives of the deceased, officials of the Mariners' Church of Detroit and the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historic Society (GLSHS) "donated the custodian and conservatorship" of the bell to the GLSHS "to be incorporated in a permanent memorial at Whitefish Point, Michigan, to honor the memory of the 29 men of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald."[191] The terms of the legal agreement made the GLSHS responsible for maintaining the bell, and forbade it from selling or moving the bell or using it for commercial purposes. It provided for transferring the bell to the Mariners' Church of Detroit if the terms were violated.[191]

Even this though caused some controversy.

> This isn't a scientific mission, or any sort of fact-finding mission; it's just looting

I have the same feeling. Initially I though it was to retrieve something that would provide insight or new information. For example retrieving a journal etc., but this really sounds like an artifact grab.

I know what you're saying. That is a very respectful way of honoring a wreck. And the treasure hunting that goes on in shipwrecks usually seems like well-financed looting.

At the same time, in 50 years when most of Titanic has been consumed by metal-eating bacteria, we'll regret not doing more to preserve it. And preserving it means bringing items to the surface. The environment down there is going to degrade everything until it's a pile of rubble. Is that a superior remembrance or tribute? I can see why people would disagree, but for me I'd prefer to have stuff in a museum. Put together a group of curators and descendants and hash out a plan for what level of recovery and how it would be exhibited. It's a huge ship, you could bring back several room's worth and still leave the vast majority of it undisturbed as the tomb it is.

Thousands of artifacts have already been looted from the Titanic wreck. Another commenter brings up the excavation/looting of ancient Egyptian tombs, which seems oddly fitting since the Luxor casino in Las Vegas (the ancient Egypt themed one) has hundreds of artifacts from the Titanic, and there are many more elsewhere as well. How much is enough? Will the looting continue until nothing is left? What is wrong with letting the rest of it rust away in dignity, rather than being gawked at by bored gamblers?

With respect to the excavation/looting of Egyptian tombs, I consider this somewhat distasteful too, but at least in that case it provides unique opportunities to learn about a distant largely forgotten culture. The rediscovery of the Rosetta stone facilitated the decipherment of hieroglyphics, and it's my impression that King Tutankhamun's tomb revealed much about ancient Egyptian society and technology (I'm not sure what exactly, it's not something I've read up on.) The people involved in those cases may have been cynical profit-seekers too, but at least the artifacts they removed actually taught us things about the past. I don't think there is much to learn from the telegraph from the Titanic though; I expect there are probably extant examples of contemporary radio technology in better condition in museums already.

How many generations must pass before such a site passes into being able to be scavenged for items of interest? There have never been remains found. In some waters you could find bodies but not where the Titanic sits.

Has it aged enough to fall into the same category we assign Egyptian artifacts? We have dug up remains of many societies and some are within a few hundred years of age. So it really comes down to, what is the rule?

To me it should be allowed to retrieve items from the site and if no national government wants to sponsor it then why not a private organization? if placed under proper restrictions but not outright confiscation they should be able to operate as a museum type organization taking their historical artifacts on tour so others may enjoy them

About a century and a half. We're almost there.

Is “standard off-the-shelf” equipment of the time that has little value outside the ship truly an item of interest?

A terrible idea.

   "... it is conceivable that it could be restored to operable condition,” RMST said"

It was a spark-gap transmitter? Which broadcasts noise across the entire radio spectrum. It would be illegal anywhere in the world to operate it today.

Nonsense like that confirms that this effort is some circus act put together by a money-making shill of some kind. Not a sincere effort to preserve history.

Couldn't you build a Faraday cage to operate it inside?

What is the point of putting a transmitter in a Faraday cage?

Then it's not illegal to operate.

Because you can have a recurving antenna in there with it? Better still, a £20 software defined radio so you can see the spectrum

Depends on the size of the cage, and what else is in it.

For a nice museum exhibit.

Somewhat contradicted by the Youtube videos of demonstrations of identical spark-gap transmitters in museums around the world.

Minimal power, no antenna, etc.

The Grimeton (SAQ) transmitter is based on an Alexanderson alternator and, hence, supplies orders of magnitude less harmonic energy than a spark gap transmitter, yet it still falls woefully short of current spectral purity standards.

It still goes live a couple of times a year, though - on Christmas Eve and on the inventor's birthday.

It is not inconceivable that a spark gap transmitter could operate under similar constraints - limited duration, schedule published well in advance &C.

However, I believe it would be a mistake to restore it to working condition - at that point it is no longer the wireless set from the Titanic, but a replica built using some original parts. Meh.

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