How far can you go to quench your thirst for beer? Probably not as far as a bunch of thieves who went underwater to steal a coveted collection of hidden-away beer bottles off the Argentinian coast.
According to an Irish Times report, a team of divers in Argentina stole 700 liters, or 185 gallons, of artisanal beer that had been left by three local Argentinian breweries to age. The beer containers were attached to a sunken ship. According to the Daily Mail, the wreckage was a Soviet-era fishing vessel, Kronomether, which found its way to the Argentinian coast after being abandoned, following the end of the USSR in the 90s.
The experimental underwater storage of the beer was a combined venture of three local breweries: Heller, La Paloma, and Baum in Mar del Plata, who had teamed up with a diving school for what they described as a first-of-its-kind months-long experiment in deep-water beer making. However, the shocking theft of the limited-edition beer has left the owners heartbroken.
Speaking to Irish Times, Carlos Brelles, who runs the Thalassa Diving School in Mar del Plata, said that as soon as he learned of the theft, he started crying. He further said that three or four people without morals destroyed the work of so many people who put in effort into the project. The report further mentioned that Brelles and the brewery owners have no clue over how the beer heist took place. The brewery owners asked prosecutors to open a criminal investigation into this theft that has destroyed what could have been a one of its kind alcoholic drink.
According to Daily Mail, the idea of submerging the beer barrels underwater for fermentation was the brainchild of one of the owners of Heller Brewery, Eduardo Ricardo, who had heard about similar projects elsewhere. However, none were at this depth quite literally. Had the barrels not been stolen, the brewery owners would have retrieved the fermented alcohol from the seabed and later blended it with another drink before being bottled up and sold.