IT worker James Howells, 38, began mining Bitcoin back in 2009 when it was basically worthless, and had stored 8,000 units on his PC by the time it was accidentally thrown out by his ex-girlfriend during a clear-out in 2013, with it being stored in a bin bag and her not knowing it was there.
As we know, the price of Bitcoin has gone flying in recent years, and James’s Bitcoin hard drive is now worth £450m. Only problem is – it’s buried under literal tons of waste in a landfill site in Newport, Wales.
Not only that, but after eleven years of pleading with Newport City Council for permission to search the site – even offering them a £55m reward if he finds the hard drive – they still won’t let him dig for the device, insisting they are bound by their licensing permit.
Even with millions of pounds as an incentive, one worker at the site has said the chances of finding James’s Bitcoin drive is effectively zero.
They told MailOnline:
“There’s 24-hour security – everyone who works here knows about what’s supposed to be buried in the landfill under the hills. But the other problem is, where would they start looking? The two small hills cover several acres, they’d never find it. The owner has visited the site many times – if it’s here it’s under one of those two hills in the distance. He’s adamant but no one can know for sure if it’s here – some of the stuff that arrives is sent off to incinerators.”
The employee explained that even if the local authority gave Howells permission to under take the mammoth exercise: ‘It would be like looking for a needle in a haystack…. it would be impossible’. They added:
“Unless the computer stuff has some sort of homing device on it, there’s just no way. The fella should just forget about it and move on.”
Well, that’s easy for them to say. There’s nearly half a billion worth of Bitcoin on that thing! If James Howells’s ex hadn’t accidentally binned his hard drive, he’d be chilling under a palm tree outside one of his many mansions on one of his many private island properties right now. Even with 100,000 tonnes of waste to dig through, surely it’s worth a punt?
Although he acknowledges what a difficult task it would be, James reckons he knows roughly where to look:
“The way the landfill operated in 2013 was when a general waste bin was full, it was given a serial number, it was dragged off to the open pit and it was buried. It was also given a grid reference number.
So what that means is, if I could access the landfill records, I could identify the week that I threw the hard drive away; I could identify the serial number of the bin that it was in; and then I could identify where the grid reference is located.”
You might be wondering how a guy who puts all that time and effort into mining 8,000 bitcoin manages to leave it in a bin bag for his ex-girlfriend to throw out in the first place:
“I had two identical hard drives and I threw out the wrong one. I know I’m not the only person who has ever thrown out the wrong thing but it usually doesn’t cost people over £400 million.”
James truly believes that the hard drive will still be in good enough nick to retrieve the Bitcoins:
“There is no guarantee of that because of the environment it’s been in but there are things that give me confidence.
The outside case might be rusted. But the inside disk, where the data is stored, there should be a good chance that it still works.
I believe there still will be a chance. But the longer this drags on though, it’s less likely to be a possibility.”
Well, sounds like he’s got it all figured out. All he needs now is for Newport City Council to give him permission to search the site, which I’m amazed they haven’t done already given the cash incentives he’s offering them, and the cash incentives he could offer whoever gives the council their license, or whoever he has to pay off to make this happen. Come on Newport – give the man a chance to get his property back!
For the crypto bro named NFT Nick who is currently at war with the internet for ‘faking’ his wealthy lifestyle, click HERE.
