a r c h a e o l og y
Surgery, Disappearing Wrecks and Big Money Text and photos MACIEJ SZCZEPAŃSKI
Whenever a surgeon reaches for a scalpel or a patient undergoes an MRI scan, there is a high probability that both of these tools were made from steel that dates back more than 70 years.
I
t all connects to the late period of WWII, when the Americans used an atomic bomb for military purposes for the first time. Steel manufacturing has not changed much from
that period, the Bessemer process was replaced with the BOS (basic oxygen steelmaking) process, although the air (oxygen in case of BOS) in both is obtained from the atmosphere. However, unlike today, air used in pre-war steel was not saturated with radioactive particles. For this reason such steel, which possesses better properties and durability, is desired all over the world for manufacturing such products as specialist surgical equipment or novelty items, like Böker knives manufactured from steel sourced from the wreck of the German battleship
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KMS Tirpitz. Another sought metal is phosphor bronze1, which
to the fact that the law prohibits salvaging wrecks designated
was used for propellers, among other things.
as war graves.
Growing value of “old” steel is responsible for the increasing
However, there are also companies that do not care for
problem of marine looting. Companies with legal approvals for
these laws and salvage steel from the bottom of the seas and
salvaging wrecks comply with all legal standards. They salvage
oceans all over the world. In recent years many fishermen and
steel from wrecks specified in their contracts – mainly from
sailors on the Java Sea and the Pacific have been reporting un-
vessels deliberately sunk by their crew or destroyed through
marked vessels with rusting pieces of metal on board. In 2017
scuttling at Scapa Flow, shortly after World War I. This is due
the combined forces of the Indonesian and Malaysian author-
