Arcade Ghost Ship - Massive Haul Found in Beeched Ship off Liverpool

kevin2me

Hey all,

Though this one was well worth a share.
One lad found an abandoned beeched ship full of old arcade machines, newest was 1981 machine, so pretty old school.
And took him 2 years to get permission to get them all off the ship after presuading owners to sell and craned them off the ship.

He picked some of his closest mates from arcade site, and all sworn to secrecy they bought them all in bulk buy,
craned them off the ship on one 4th Feb 2012, dozen turned up from all oer to be part of this.

Links:
http://www.dragonslairfans.com/smfor/index.php?topic=3346.0
http://www.ukvac.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=330452&title=the-duke-of-lancaster


See links above for more... Heres sart of the story.


Back in 2009 I was made aware of a link to an urban exploration website. For those that don't know, this is a pastime where people break in to old abandoned buildings and explore, taking pictures along the way. They call is urbex. (the original link to the urban exploration pictures are here).

Whilst looking at this site I found myself suddenly looking at some arcade machines, and well, you know me! The hunt was on.

I spent 8 months trying to contact the owners of the place I could see the games in. I phoned the council, I phoned the post office (yeah I really did!) in the town and phoned everywhere, each time getting another clue in the puzzle that would lead me to the owners of this place that had the games in.

I finally contacted the owners in January 2011 after going through the said local councils, local shops (you name it) and finally got in contact with a family member. This family member put me in contact with the owners and we started talking. Two things came out of that.

1. The arcade games are for sale
2. I can go and see them

So in February 2011 myself and 2 others, Rav and P-man, drove for what seemed like forever until we reached our destination, and the destination was pretty magnificent. People, this was the most magnicifient story that could ever be told.

It was a beached ship.

This ship is the Duke of Lancaster.

Dale Parish

Epic

CiDeRmAn

There's a Fringe episode in there somewhere....

They look awfully well preserved for there ordeal, don't they?
I mean, all that time on that ship, you'd imagine they wouldn't quite so cherry...

K.O.Kiki

Total elapsed time without sleeping : 43h30min

Now THAT is dedication!

Myrddin

Wow :eek:

o1s1n

The pyongster posted a link to this a little while ago and I nearly pissed myself with sheer awe of that find. One of the greatest things I've ever seen.

Seriously, it's like the videogame equivalent of archaeologists finding an untouched tomb in The Valley of the Kings. I can't believe how perfect those machines look.

Emcee Kenna

That is an incredible find. Absolutely amazing!

Welease

Those guys used to post on UKVAC listserv for years.. they already own an amazing amount of old and rare cabinets.. It's nice to see them being able to rescue some more machines.

Jack burton

epic indeed

kevin2me

Ya this was absolutely EPIC!!!

I mean the odds are just unheard of,
1 Only reason this happened was a group of guys trying to make extra bucks,
found a work around to No Business Rule allowed on a Sunday in the UK back in UK in the 70's or so.

So the got around it by putting an arcade in a beeched ship that laws didnt apply to, was meant to be more than just arcade on the ship,
But things didnt do well for FunLand Idea so ended up getting bandoned.

2
Plus how in hell did no one ever say hey lets remove whats left on the ship?
And then top it all off, group of people that break into old abandoned buildings found all this, they didnt care at all, but one of lads on UKVac stumbled across their find and rest is History.

3
Plus this all took 3 years from discovery to getting off the ship,
and a lot of planning and dedication, and ship will be no more in few months.

Just unreal story, we prob never hear likes of it again
Fair dues and Kudos to all involved.

LEGENDS!!!

Doge

FIND OF THE CENTURY!