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An image of the Dmitrii Donskoi

The Shinil Group’s announcement on July 17 that it had located the Dmitrii Donskoi, a Russian cruiser that went down 113 years ago, just two days before created a sensation, with the stock price of Jeil Steel (in which the Shinil Group holds a majority share) soaring and setting a new record.

But the next day it turned out that the Dmitrii Donskoi was not a new discovery by the Shinil Group but had actually been found fifteen years before by the government-funded Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology (KIOST), which had also attempted to raise the wreck. KIOST furthermore argued that the Shinil Group had located the Donskoi through the unauthorized use of location information that belonged to the institute, which raises questions about the credibility of the Shinil Group’s assertion that it is “the first to discover the Dmitrii Donskoi and the only proven right holder.”

For now, therefore, extreme caution and care are probably required for the various projects and deals organized by the Shinil Group and promoted with rumors that the Donskoi is loaded with 150 trillion won (US$132.41 billion) worth of gold coins and gold bars. Jumping into these projects could have unforeseen consequences.

“We had already discovered the Donskoi in 2003 and even released photos. It’s preposterous for the Shinil Group to claim ownership as if they’d been the first to find it,” a key official at KIOST said during a phone call with the HuffPost on July 18.

In 2003, the monthly magazine Shin Dong-a and other news outlets reported that a team of KIOST researchers under Yu Hae-su had discovered the Donskoi and tried to have it raised. Photos of the hull of the Donskoi taken by Yu and his team were also made public and can still be viewed today in the photography database section on KIOST’s website.

As mentioned earlier, KIOST alleges that the Shinil Group made unauthorized use of the institute’s location information to find the Donskoi. “We haven’t received any kind of request or proposal from the Shinil Group in regard to raising the Donskoi,” said a key official at KIOST.

“A navy veteran and an expert in raising ships who had been a consultant while we were independently preparing to raise the Donskoi took the actual location data and the geological and marine information we had given him and joined the Shinil Group’s ship raising team. The result was that the Shinil Group was able to find in a matter of days what it took us years to discover,” the official added.

According to a press release issued on July 17, the Shinil Group’s exploration team had been preparing for the Donskoi search since 2017. Supervised by JD Engineering, a South Korean marine exploration firm, the team consisted of Allan, a British ocean exploration expert; a pilot named Jeffery and four others from a Canadian marine exploration company called Nuytco; and Jin Gyo-jung, a marine exploration consultant for the Shinil Group and a member of the 28th class of the Korean Naval Academy who served as a salvage and rescue commander.

KIOST claims that it had discussed raising the Donskoi with Jin at the beginning of this year and provided him with location information so that he could sketch out the process of raising the ship.

a Russian warship that Shinil Group claims to have discovered. (provided by Shinil Group)

However, the Shinil Group’s exploration does appear to have removed any doubts that this ship is in fact the Donskoi, since the team acquired footage of the stern of the ship, which is engraved with the word “Donskoi” written in the Roman alphabet.

“We also definitely confirmed that the ship is the Donskoi in 2003 by finding the ship guns and the tiller. At that time, we were only able to check the ship’s prow and didn’t manage to get any footage of the stern. You have to wonder about the intentions of a group that drums up attention by releasing a press report as if they’d been the first to find the exact same ship we discovered 15 years ago,” the KIOST official said.

The HuffPost tried calling the Shinil Group on the phone number listed on the press release to hear its position about KIOST’s claims, but it was unable to make contact. The Shinil Group is aggressively promoting the discovery of the Donskoi by posting the phrase “150 trillion won treasure ship Donskoi” on a cryptocurrency website that it operates. The phone number for customer service on this website is the same as the contact number on the press release. It is very unusual for a customer service center and a public relations department to share a phone number.

By Son Won-je, staff reporter

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