Odyssey Marine Exploration Notes cases in point

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Abandonment occurs “by an express or implied act of leaving or deserting property 4 without hope of recovering it and without the intention of returning to it.”Columbus-
America Discovery Group, Inc. v. The Unidentified, Wreck and Abandoned Sailing Vessel,
742 F. Supp. 1327, 1335 (E.D. Va. 1990), rev’d on other grounds by Columbus-America
Discovery Group, Inc. v. Atlantic Mut. Ins. Co., 974 F.2d 450 (4th Cir. 1992).Abandonment
may be inferred from all the relevant facts and circumstances.Id.
Some recovery has already occurred and the Plaintiff has deposited with this court a 5 portion of a bottle recovered from the wreckage. A marine peril “includes more than the threat of storm, fire, or piracy to a vessel in 6 navigation.Thus, a marine peril existed in a wrecked and abandoned vessel, which sank in
1622 . . . , and whose location was unknown for over 300 years.”Platoro Ltd., Inc. v.
Unidentified Remains of a Vessel, 614 F.2d 1051, 1055 (5th Cir. 1980) (citing Treasures
Salvors, Inc., 569 F.2d at 337.)
Quoting from Treasure Salvors, Inc. v. The Unidentified Wrecked & Abandoned
Sailing Vessel, 640 F.2d 560, 567 (5th Cir. 1981), Plaintiff urges that, “[a] salvor . . . has a
valuable interest in his salvage operations which the law protects by vesting in the salvor
certain rights....[including] the right to exclude others from participating in the salvage
operation . . .”
I have included the case as pdfView attachment odyssey marine.pdf