Last Updated on April 21, 2024 by Art
A Guest Post by Thomas Quarry…
Treasure hunt technology takes one of humanity’s oldest dreams – sudden wealth – and pursues it with modern science and technology. Are you tempted by the get-something-for-nothing bug? Then let this guest post by Thomas Quarry show you how familiar and unfamiliar technologies might carry you forward. You may find it interesting, or even useful!
Mind-Boggling Riches
Have you ever imagined walking up to treasure hunt clues that may lead you to the discovery of eye-popping nuggets of gold buried in your innocently purchased land? Think about this for a moment: 1 ton of gold is worth $64.3 Million at $2000/oz. The Pink Diamond gemstone costs $1.19 million per carat. And in May 2018, a shipwreck with over $22 billion worth of gold was discovered at the bottom of the Caribbean off the coast of Columbia. The ship, tagged ‘Holy Grail of Shipwrecks,’ is considered the most valuable deep-sea treasure haulage of all time. Probably, your mind is saying it’s all a fantasy. But in fact, some pretty impressive finds have already been discovered.
Geolocation as a Treasure Hunt Technology
It’s disheartening to think that most buried riches from ancient times do not come with a treasure map. But there’s no call for alarm! Today, treasure hunt technology uses drones, planes and satellites providing high definition images of the search area, including supporting data such as elevation and terrain. The use of aircraft and satellites has become more efficient and effective with the incorporation of remote sensing features that can detect metals and classify objects within range.
In addition, technology has advanced casual treasure hunting into a sport, geocaching, in which teams compete to find purposely hidden objects. For example, a typical article describes the adventure of treasure hunt technology enabled by GPS geolocation.
Mobile 3D Scanners
Sometimes hidden treasure comes with clues for potential scavengers or explorers, but those clues come in the form of glyphs, carved inscriptions or symbols. Ancient treasure hunters over the years only kept records of those symbols by documentation or sketching them in a diary. In contrast, today there’s a shift in paradigm as hunters now record digital data using a 3D scanner in new commercial devices such as Deep Seeker, TITAN GER- 1000, Gold Seeker, Gold Hunter and Easy Plus, among others.
A History Channel series features explorations carried out by the Lagina brothers on Oak Island. They adapted a Creaform Go!SCAN 50 scanner to search for a clue discovered a long time ago. It consists of a coded message inscribed on a rock.
Metal Detection – an Old Treasure Hunt Technology
Treasure-hunting with a metal detector is an oldie tech system that has become indispensable for the Lagina brothers and others in the process of searching for treasure. In a comment credited to Marty Lagina, a metal detector is a piece of well-known equipment that can classify objects as medium depth, shallow, or deep. Moreover, the user-friendly device detects metal at different depths and distances, within a cornerstone or underground chamber where treasure might be found. For example, a Minelab model 3030 metal detector helped the Lagina brothers locate precious metals, including a three-hundred-year-old Spanish coin.
Radar to Showcase the Underground
Penetrating through the ground using radar is especially powerful for revealing metals. As a result, a device the size of a lawnmower measures depth from a few inches to thousands of feet down the soil, with the aid of a radar unit. The radar bounces electromagnetic energy off hidden objects and interprets the return signals. And the receiver generates an image display of underground features.
Sonar for Detection of Non-Metals
Would you like to make those pictures better? Then sonar may be a good choice for uncovering things that may lie under the ground, to determine whether they are worth your exploration. As a result, treasure hunt technology has embraced this device, which transmits and receives acoustic energy signals and renders a high definition view of hidden areas. Marty and Rick Lagina, at the concluding part of the second History Channel series, used this sophisticated device to scan a hidden chamber underground. Consequently, approximately 235 feet below ground level sonar revealed what may be a human-made chest together with two tunnels and a possible human body.
Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV) and Snake Cameras
Why not carry out a preliminary treasure hunt with the use of these devices before digging, and get some assurance of treasure in areas you intend to explore? The snake camera is a waterproof endoscope system, with magnetic pickup attachment and LED lights. Conveniently, it needs an access hole only a few centimeters wide, and can explore closed underground areas.
In addition, remotely operated vehicles can carry cameras and capture video recordings of tight and unreachable areas. Moreover, these devices have some ability to record and retrieve items.
Exploration Through Excavation and Digging
Improved tools have also advanced the lowly act of digging. As a result, they have ignited and fostered a better interest in treasure hunting among scavengers. A modern treasure hunt can benefit from a variety of technologies, including digging implements.
Modern excavation approaches now attain depths and heights previously thought to be impractical. Digging and excavation of the soil has become much easier! That sounds incredible, right? You only need to use the appropriate device to fulfill your exploration desire. Specialized digging tools include the Lesche Digging tool and Predator Tools Rapture model 31.
Conclusions on Treasure Hunt Technology
Treasure hunting in the modern-day world has evolved from its traditional system of exploration and excavation. Therefore, it now employs new technologies that yield high quality sensor data with easy operation. Why not sit back and allow a device to lead you to those hidden fortunes? The time to utilize those opportunities is now. Tell us what you think!
Guest Author Credit
Thomas Quarry is an American geologist and researcher who has traveled far and wide, exploring and discovering different treasures. He has written and published several articles and blog posts both at the local and international scene. Moreover, he is a staunch lover of video games and an enthusiast of quadcopter piloting.
Image Credits:
– Coin photo courtesy of Thomas Quarry
– Fablab lille 3d simulation, wireless inspection camera, metal detector from flickr
In UK, metal detectors have been very much used in the last four or five decades, for searching for buried hoards of Gold, silver and other artefacts, not that I have ever attempted it. The treasure Act 1996 requires finders of objects defined by law as treasure, to report their find to a coroner, whereafter the latter determines whether it is treasure or not. If it is then the finder must offer it to a museum at a price set by board of independent experts. Fortunes can and have been made in such findings which seems very often to date back to times of the Viking invasions and resulting hoards when valuables were buried for safe keeping.
Such a hoard was discovered from about 870 AD within a couple of miles of my home in village of Watlington in 2015 and bought by the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford for £1.35 million which would have been split by prior agreement with the finder and the landowner, whose permission must first be sought before the detecting can start.
The content was silver but with historical interest because it was from the time that King Alfred defeated the Danish king Guthruum’s great heathen army, and the coins showed two kings’ heads: Alfred and Ceowulf, about whom little was previously known.
One further thing; about three years ago on BBC, probably channel 4 from memory, there was a comedy series called ‘The Detectorists’ which was one of the best and most charming programmes I have seen for a long time, directed by Mackenzie Crook, who also played the lead role with Toby Jones. It won a BAFTA award.
I do not know if it is easy to bring up such TV shows on the internet on American TV but it would be well worth the attempt. Ah yes, having checked on wikipedia, it was released in the USA, and earned comments as follows: “distinctive creation – not for everyone, but bound to be fiercely loved by those who fall into its rhythms”.[42] Robert Lloyd of the Los Angeles Times “can’t recommend it enough”, saying: “Like the ordinary lives it magnifies, Detectorists has the air of seeming to be small and immense at once, to be about hardly anything and almost everything. It is full of space and packed with life.”[38]
Quite so and well wort checking out.
Many thanks for your comment, Nick. And for your tip about The Detectorists – I see that BBC offers their entire series on iPlayer (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06l51nr) but when I click on a series they display an error banner reading “BBC iPlayer only works in the UK. Sorry, it’s due to rights issues.” I believe that Public Television in the US has similar, even more restrictive, issues. However, I find that Amazon Prime offers at least some of the series free to Prime members (https://amazon.com/s?k=the+detectorists&ref=nb_sb_noss). So while we are consigned to “sheltering in place” per our state Governor’s proclamation today, perhaps I can find the time to get hooked on it! – Art