wreck diving

[turnerjd]

Originally posted by bradymsu
I've read about the situation in the UK and it's hard to blame the families or the government for their position on this issue given the strong evidence of wrecking that takes place.

Divers who steal from wrecks should have their gear confiscated. I feel the same about charter boat captains who allow wreckers to use their boats. If these rules are enforced by law on all sport divers and boat captains no one captain's business will suffer. Maybe it's time to draft a new international treaty to rewrite the Admiralty & Salvage laws.

The problem is that a minority of the overall divers are very active, and very active in removing things. The majority of divers I know don't take things, never have, and never will. Equally, they are not so keen on diving war graves (apart from the fact its illegal!). It is a vocal 'nightmare' few that have caused the problems, together with the tacit approval over 50 years of their activities from other divers - they didn't do anything to stop them did they?

The problem with changeing admiralty and salvage law is that too many people especially those in power have vested interests in making sure things don't overly change.

A good example is the UK government with HMS Edinburgh. They were more than happy to receive £40Million in gold from the wreck when it came up, but afterwards are more than happy to do nasty things to the divers that got it for them.

Jon T