- A Welsh Computer engineer is going to great lengths to try and find his hard drive containing approximately 8,000 BTC.
- The drive was thrown out over a decade ago and supposedly sits in a landfill.
- Howells has been trying to gain access to the landfill for years but has been rejected by the local council and the UK High Court.
- His final play could be to buy the entire landfill in the hope of finally recovering his billions of BTC.
How far would someone go to reclaim a lost hard drive brimming with Bitcoin?
Now, keep in mind the drive is probably, at best, slightly decayed, and at worst, crushed into smithereens.
Would they go rummaging through a stinky, snake-filled garbage pit for hours on end? Yeah, probably.
What about straight up buying an entire landfill, 1.4 million tonnes of waste and all?
Well, fear not – we have our answer. Welsh engineer James Howells has no qualms about buying the site and sifting through 185,000 elephants worth of garbage on the 0.001% chance he finds his lost hard drive.
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The Great BTC Heist (A Shakespearean Comedy)
The story is an incredible mix of hilarity, regret, and even comes with an in-built lesson (make backups of your damn crypto wallet keys).
Back in 2013, James Howells’ girlfriend accidentally threw out one of his hard drives that contained about 8,000 BTC.
Yeah, ouch.
Ever since, Howells has been at war with the Newport County Council to gain access to the landfill where it potentially lies, desperately trying to get his hands back on the fortune.
Initially, he took the Council to the UK High Court so they would allow him to rifle through the garbage to try and find his BTC.
However, the court rejected his approach on the basis that closing the landfill would cause harm to the Newport community.
Interestingly, the Council plans to close the landfill next year anyway, to use the land for a solar farm.
Howells found this particularly irksome.
The council planning on closing the landfill so soon is quite a surprise, especially since it claimed at the High Court that closing the landfill to allow me to search would have a huge detrimental impact on the people of Newport, whilst at the same time they were planning to close the landfill anyway.
James Howells, Computer EngineerLandfill Lottery: Howell’s Final Play to Unearth His Treasure
So, on his last legs, Howells is looking to play his final trump card. Do away with the Council’s restrictions entirely by simply buying the land.
His first step is to appeal the High Court’s decision to reject access to the site, but failing that, he thinks he’s singled out an area where the hard drive might be awaiting its master’s return.
So, if he has to spend millions to buy the land, well, it might just be worth it.
Speaking to the BBC, Howells confirmed his strategy.
I would be potentially interested in purchasing the landfill site…I have discussed this option recently with investment partners and it is very much on the table.
James Howells, Computer EngineerCredit: Source link
