I first became aware of the ship when I watched a Youtube documentary about it several years ago. Ever since then I knew it would never be restored.
It's some group of nobodies e-begging for donations, the majority of which cover the storage, security and bare minimum of upkeep of the ship, absolutely nothing was going into actual restoration works, and it had been over 20 years at that point.
Every year labour gets more and more expensive, and the condition of the ship gets worse and worse.
I would honestly be interested in a report of how the donations were spent over the 30-ish years, because I have a strong feeling the heads of the "conservancy" were basically using it as a pay-cheque.
In one Facebook post not long after the sale was announced, people were asking financial questions (gib donation back plz), and they responded that 80% of donations went towards the ship (storage, security, upkeep, etc), meaning the other 20% were used to pay themselves a wage for heading the "conservancy" they set up. I also saw there was a lot of volunteers on staff, meaning less wages to pay other than their own.
It's pretty clear the whole thing was mismanaged and they got complacent over nearly 3 decades, and here we are.
