MOVES ARE under way in south Kerry to create interest in a project to recover millions of euro worth of pure copper from the seabed for the benefit of the community.
For more than a century, the south Kerry area, from Waterville to Ballinskelligs to Valentia Island, was the location of transatlantic telegraph cables linking Europe to America. Several were laid between the 1850s and the 1930s using only the highest grade copper.
Local Cahersiveen businessman Joe Keating has been interested for years in trying to recover the cable. Although the cable was at a depth of 100 miles in some parts, he believes a concerted effort involving submersibles would succeed. He acted as a consultant to a submersible rig from Norway which attempted to raise the cable more than a decade ago.
Despite appearing in scrapyards intermittently in the area for 50 years since it ceased operation, most of the tens of thousands of miles of high-grade copper cable insulated with layers of other precious materials is still intact, Mr Keating believes.