A new expedition intends to reach and enter the remains of the Titanic. It is planned for May 2014 and his intention is to take pictures of the ship, including its interior. The company that is organizing the exploration has also said it wants to collect valuables. However, the US government seeks to prevent this, considering the wreck to be tantamount to a holy place.
The expedition is organized by RMS Titanic Inc., a Georgia-based company that owns the salvage rights to the wreck. A federal court authorized it in 1994 as the only company authorized to recover artifacts from the place where the remains of the Titanic are.
They have several exhibits in the US with the recovered artifacts. In them they exhibit cutlery, some jewelry, clothing and even a piece of the ship’s hull. The company says it has recovered and preserved thousands of objects in recent years. The new controversy occurs just two months after the Titan company submersible imploded near the area where the ocean liner is.
But the government’s complaint has nothing to do with this accident. The United States fears that the structure and historical artifacts will be damaged. He has also warned that there could still be human remains, a consequence of the accident that in 1912 killed about 1,500 people. The authorities also argue in their favor that altering the remains of the Titanic is regulated by an international agreement with Great Britain, apart from federal law.
A legal battle over the Titanic expedition
“RMST is not free to ignore validly enacted federal law, but that is its stated intent,” government lawyers noted in court documents filed last Friday, reported PA. The Titanic expedition, they added, would violate “the protections that Congress has afforded it.”
RMST said it would “work collaboratively” with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the government agency that represents the public’s interest in the wreck. However, the company clarified that you do not intend to wait for this office to grant you a permitaccording to a report he submitted last June.
The company said the deterioration in the wreckage has opened chasms so large that it would allow it to operate a vehicle inside without cutting through the structure. His main interest is to visit the Marconi room.
They want to extract the ship’s radio from this place: the wireless telegraph that transmitted desperate calls for help after the Titanic collided with the iceberg. Thanks to these distress signals, about 700 people were rescued from the shipwreck by other nearby boats. RMST said it wants to put the radio on display along with stories from the men who issued these alerts.
RMST and the US government had already fallen out in 2020, over another expedition that could have disturbed the remains of the Titanic. However, the pandemic thwarted both the mission and the judicial process.