losing millions of dollars hurts the
soul especially when it happens just
because you wanted to clean out some
space in your desk that's what exactly
happened to james howell he accidentally
threw away his hard drive that has
hundreds of millions worth of bitcoin
many crypto experts consider bitcoin as
more than a digital peer of gold calling
it a replacement for the fiat currency
powell is one of those experts he's a
libertarian who firmly believes in a
decentralized money system how was in on
bitcoin from the beginning you know when
the rest of us said it was stupid
bitcoin the first cryptocurrency was
invented by a mysterious individual
known as satoshi nakamoto no one is sure
if nakamoto is the pseudonym for a team
of designers or one brilliant individual
still in 2008 the bitcoin network was
created and thrown to the wolves
literally nakamoto whoever he she or
they may be never intended on
controlling bitcoin instead the users
controlled the network nakamoto designed
bitcoin for complete decentralization in
other words no one individual no matter
how smart can control bitcoin not even
nakamoto that's what drew how to bitcoin
the freedom and the fact that the
government can't inflate or deflate the
currency or fiat currency as crypto
enthusiasts call it like they can the us
dollar or the british pound howell
believes the people should dictate
currency's value not the government
powell's belief led to mining bitcoin as
a hobby mining to put it simply is how
you get bitcoin put another way hal's
computer was writing code in exchange
for bitcoin however the overall goal for
how was generating more bitcoin and
helping the network circulate more
decentralized currency soon it became a
full-time hobby in 2008 and 2009 bitcoin
was worth less than a few bucks since
then its value has skyrocketed up to
fifty thousand dollars per coin in the
late 2000s howell says no one knew if
bitcoin's price would go up and when his
wife hafina complained about the loud
computer noises powell decided mining
wasn't worth the hassle mining bitcoin
cost him about 10 pounds of electricity
per coin back then howe mainly mined for
fun but the cost and his wife's
complaints made him realize mining was
impractical for a middle-class family
man howell is an engineer who at the
time helped maintain emergency response
systems throughout wales at night though
when he got off how was mining bitcoin
he started around 2008 when he was just
the fifth miner to join the network
because he was among the first miners
howe harvested thousands of bitcoin the
currency is similar to any other
commodity the more bitcoin you buy the
more valuable it becomes howell had
three kids to take care of so he shut
down his mining operation and spent more
time with his kids howell helped turn
their room into a minecraft replica
using the carpentry skills he picked up
from his dad the universe regarded hal's
fatherly kindness by spilling a glass of
lemonade on his computers including the
one he used for bitcoin mining powell
wasn't too upset he removed the hard
drives which luckily survived the citrus
tsunami powell transferred all essential
data on the hard drive to another
computer except for his bitcoin hal says
he didn't think his bitcoin were that
essential at the time and wanted to use
his other computer space for practical
tools like email and so he says the hard
drive sat there on his desk the bitcoin
inside growing in value every month over
the next few years hal got caught up in
life he raised his kids worked his job
and continued fiddling with new
technologies meanwhile his bitcoin
holdings grew to over a million dollars
the year was 2013 bitcoin took off as
people like howell invested in the
currency some were looking for a fortune
while others were like how government
skeptics looking to get their money out
of fiat currencies howell was aware of
bitcoin's rise but didn't want to cash
in just yet he wanted them to grow
before selling them or using the
currency to buy anything one day hal
decided his desk needed cleaning he got
out his wastebasket cleared off some
clutter and threw away some computer
parts he'd stuffed inside the desk
drawers including the hard drive
containing his bitcoin powell saved two
different hard drives an empty backup
and the drive with all his bitcoin he
thought he could tell them apart but
threw away the bitcoin drive by mistake
that same week hal asked his wife if she
could take out the trash while he was
out of town with some friends hal
recalls hafina answering with heck no
and asked why he couldn't do it himself
since trash was his job he brushed it
off and decided he'd take out the trash
when he got home despite the fun nature
of the trip hal recalls feeling not
quite himself while partying with his
friends who corroborated hal's later
statements they remembered how hal
seemed distracted and distant throughout
the raucous trip hal didn't realize what
was bugging him until he got home he
wanted to make sure he'd thrown away the
correct drive powell expected the drive
to be in the trash bin where he'd left
it except the bag was gone he asked
hafina if she'd taken the trash out
while he was gone she said yes she had
powell recalls cursing out loud upon
examining the other hard drive he soon
discovered that it was empty and his
bitcoin was somewhere at the dump by now
howe hopped in his car and sped towards
the dump in newport he remembers hoping
that he could find the hard drive lying
around in the landfill surely it
couldn't be that difficult however when
howl arrived at the dump he saw a sea of
trash and grass mounds piled high with
layers of garbage dating back to who
knows when like an infinite trash
lasagna he realized that his 1.4 million
hard drive was already buried under a
new layer of garbage he went back home
realizing he'd need an excavator to dig
the hard drive out of the dump
especially by the time he obtained an
excavator howe only hoped that his
bitcoin didn't shoot any higher
otherwise he'd lose a precious
investment all because he decided it was
time to clean his desk his hope
shattered before his eyes in 2013 when
bitcoin became mainstream the former
crypto miner used a bitcoin value
calculator to track the growth of his
submerged fortune hal knew he owned
around 8 000 bitcoin he saw bitcoin rise
to 377
in late 2014 then it hit 400 dollars in
2014. remember how had earned his
bitcoin back in 2008 when it was still
under a dollar in 2016 bitcoin rose to
over 900 by 2018 however bitcoin
skyrocketed to 13 000 making house
fortune 100 million that year you might
be asking why couldn't hal log into his
bitcoin account and retrieve his coins
there well cryptocurrency and in turn
bitcoin doesn't work that way it isn't
like having a bank account banks were
the primary reason hakamoto invented
bitcoin hakamoto saw the lehman brothers
and other multi-billion financial
conglomerates devastating effect on the
common folk he saw how the banks and
governments played games with their
money and often lost it so he made
bitcoin different from banks one of
those differences involved how a bitcoin
owner accesses their coins whether
bought or mined each coin is born with a
private key this key is always 64
characters long and encrypted into your
bitcoin if you lose the private key or
forget to write it down you can't access
your bitcoin there's no password reset
option with bitcoin in other words
howell had to get that hard drive before
howell could rent an excavator and hire
a crew he had to get permission from the
dump which is owned and operated by the
city of newport at first howell was
afraid to tell the dump managers that he
had thrown away his bitcoin he didn't
want to ask someone if they'd let him
find his magic internet money he'd
thrown away by accident so for those
reasons howe waited a month and his
bitcoin shot up to 6 million it was time
to ask his wife for some advice hafina
with the same harshness she used when he
asked her to take out the trash said he
needed to go down to the dump asap he
talked with one of the managers who gave
him some good news and some bad news the
good news was that the dump might know
his bitcoin's location the bad news was
that the search might require moving
around layers of trash and shredding
grass trash mounds the dump had been
putting grass over the trash for some
time now making it likely that howl's
drive was under artificial earth he was
optimistic when he presented his case to
the city after all there was a lot of
money under all that garbage especially
for a small town in wales however city
officials contrary to hal's assumptions
said no the city told how he couldn't
excavate the dump for one primary reason
they don't think it's worth tearing the
dump apart for a hard drive that may or
may not be there the excavation might
also cause environmental issues they
argued that howe's hard drive was
probably broken beyond repair and thus
pointless to retrieve hall decided that
he'd conduct his own research and found
that most of their claims weren't true
he asked hard drive engineering experts
what the survival odds were they said
that given the type of drive and the
trash bag it was in there was an 80
chance howell's bitcoin were still
salvageable nevertheless the newport
officials declined his proposal again
this time over a zoom interview they
cited the same reasons and ignored any
evidence howell presented to them
newport city even said no when howe
revealed his bitcoin was worth over 100
million despite the nose howell tried
relentlessly to find solutions meanwhile
his home life was getting away from him
hafina in later interviews says she
didn't leave howe because he was
obsessed with finding his bitcoin there
were other more personal reasons fina
also took their three kids with her when
she left hal says he doesn't get to see
them often partly because of his
dedication to finding his bitcoin his
commitment also cost howell his job
after a year of searching he lost the
motivation to work he's been unemployed
ever since howe's powerpoint plan
involves excavating a 250 square meter
area of the dump the project will cost
around 6 million but howe says the
funding won't be a problem the real
problem is getting permission
nevertheless hal remains optimistic
despite getting only knows for eight
years straight he hopes that as crypto
becomes more and more mainstream the
city council will finally understand its
significance and how valuable his lost
fortune truly is as of april 2022
powell's lost fortune is around
344 million well above newport's local
gdp and according to most experts
bitcoin can only go up year by year
howell has offered the city a cut of his
bitcoin fortune wondering how long they
can say no to such an offer at this
point howe's future is tied up in
getting his bitcoin back his family
doesn't see him much anymore and his
engineering career is headed down the
toilet and even though he's tried
everything howell refuses to quit click
to watch one of these next videos and
let us know in the comments section how
long you dig for that bitcoin if you
were in james's shoes