Scouring the deep for old steel

Prized metal: Huge chunks of metal taken from a Japanese warship that sank in the South China Sea are being pulled by a barge in the open seas. (Inset) A copper plaque from a navy phone circuit onboard British battleship ‘HMS Prince of Wales’ was among the steel stolen from the sunken wreck.

EXCLUSIVE PETALING JAYA: Some Malaysian salvage firms are working with an international syndicate to plunder sunken wartime wrecks in a hunt for rare and highly-sought low-background steel, used in sensitive medical and scientific equipment. 

Evidence emerged at an Australa­sian Institute for Maritime Archaeo­logy conference in Australia recently, indicating that the syndicate plundered the wrecks of 48 naval ships across South-East Asia, mainly around Malaysia and Indonesia.