Coins commemorating 1941 sinking of SS Gairsoppa are part of 100-tonne haul recovered from North Atlantic
Commemorative silver coins are being struck from shipwrecked bullion that arrived at the Royal Mint more than 70 years late, after a German torpedo sent the ship carrying it to the bottom of the North Atlantic during the second world war.
The coins, intended for collectors, are made from part of a haul of almost 100 tonnes of silver recovered from a wreck lying three miles down, deeper than the Titanic. The silver is valued at up to £150m, the largest quantity of precious metal ever recovered from such a depth.
The coins show the doomed ship SS Gairsoppa, which sank on 17 February 1941 off the Irish coast after it was hit by a single German torpedo fired by U-boat U-101 weighed down by 7,000 tonnes of cargo including thousands of tons of pig iron.
Silver bullion from sunken WWII ship makes it to the Mint at last | Science | theguardian.com
Commemorative silver coins are being struck from shipwrecked bullion that arrived at the Royal Mint more than 70 years late, after a German torpedo sent the ship carrying it to the bottom of the North Atlantic during the second world war.
The coins, intended for collectors, are made from part of a haul of almost 100 tonnes of silver recovered from a wreck lying three miles down, deeper than the Titanic. The silver is valued at up to £150m, the largest quantity of precious metal ever recovered from such a depth.
The coins show the doomed ship SS Gairsoppa, which sank on 17 February 1941 off the Irish coast after it was hit by a single German torpedo fired by U-boat U-101 weighed down by 7,000 tonnes of cargo including thousands of tons of pig iron.
Silver bullion from sunken WWII ship makes it to the Mint at last | Science | theguardian.com
