Titanic artifacts to be auctioned in New York 100 years after ship's sinking
NEW YORK. January 6. KAZINFORM More than 5,500 artifacts from the world's most famous shipwreck Titanic are to be auctioned off in April, the auction organizer announced on Thursday in New York City, Kazinform refers to Xinhua.
The auction will comprise such artifacts as diamond bracelet, fine china, ship fittings and portions of hull recovered from the wreck site of Titanic, two and a half miles below the ocean's surface.
All of the artifacts will be auctioned as one single collection, which was appraised in 2007 at 189 million U.S. dollars, according to Premier Exhibitions Inc., parent of RMS Titanic Inc., Titanic's court-approved salvor.
The auction is scheduled for April 11 by Guernsey's, a New York City auction house, in New York's Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum, docked barely a mile from the very site Titanic was due to arrive had it completed its maiden voyage to NYC.
Arlan Ettinger, president of Guernsey's, told Xinhua that the purpose of keeping all the artifacts in one collection is to " preserve and not let these pieces disintegrate and deteriorate" and "allow future generations to understand about the Titanic, enjoy it and appreciated it."
Titanic's sinking in 1912 claimed the lives of more than 1,500 of the 2,228 passengers and crew. An international team led by oceanographer Robert Ballard located the wreckage in 1985, about 400 miles off Newfoundland, Canada.