Fort Pierce BOOTY

[GatorBoy]

 

[Red_desert]

Didn't they find gold before working shallow? Or was that a different family?

 

[GatorBoy]

They found gold last summer on the same site 15 feet is actually the deep part of that wreck.
It's not a shipwreck like most people think of one.. there is not some big old boat laying on the bottom... these things were destroyed in a hurricane 300 years ago in shallow water and rocky reef ledges

 

[Joeyboots]

Wow you beat me to it. I missed this and thought I started a new thread. Oops ........ This story should be interesting to follow.

 

[Red_desert]

They found gold last summer on the same site 15 feet is actually the deep part of that wreck.
It's not a shipwreck like most people think of one.. there is not some big old boat laying on the bottom... these things were destroyed in a hurricane 300 years ago in shallow water and rocky reef ledges

That's what I'd thought and how my shallow water theory started. You have different drops as the ship is breaking apart, dumped loads from deeper moving in toward shore. Then later the hurricanes come along to redistribute the wealth.

 

[GatorBoy]

 

[occy]

Nice GatorBoy! Where did you find that? And, can you make it bigger?
Are the permit holders/contactors allowed to pull up cannons?

 

[GatorBoy]

The new stuff

 

[GatorBoy]

Old photos from the same site

 

[GatorBoy]

Last year

 

[GatorBoy]

Another photo of the latest find including the "Tri-centennial royal"



top center

 

[Red_desert]

Looks like tons of silver compared to gold.

 

[Gitschlag]

Fantastic find, but weren't these VERY limited special productions meant for the royal family members? I only ask because I would imagine that VERY few of these would have been minted, and since the Nieves carried no registered treasure meant for the king of Spain, would it have ended up on there as contraband somehow? I know other royals have been found on the 1715 vessels, but were they recovered on vessels with registered treasure for the king or from vessels like the Nieves with only private treasure on board? Just curious...

 

[ivan salis]

some of the ships from the 1715 fleet were smaller type shallow draft "adviso" vessels and thus went closer to shore before they started "bottom bouncing" their hulls on the ocean floor and breaking up --being as small as they were --they most likely had little ballast and used cargo instead to make the vessel "bottom heavy" to prevent rolling over ,,,since rocks don't pay and cargo does...which accounts for the lack of a ballet pile or only a very small one..the bigger1715 ships had rather big ballast piles which greatly helped in finding the wrecks..of course.

 

[GatorBoy]

Today is the 300th anniversary of the disaster.
I will be at the Indian River main library along with many others for the commemoration ..
hope to see some of you there

 

[Hitndahed]

Isn't this the one where they had to move like 4 feet of sand before seeing anything?
From the news I saw on this they moved TONS of sand before anything was found.

It wasn't just laying there, (after the sand/overburden was moved it was) .

Hit

 

[GatorBoy]

Propwash deflectors are used on all of these wreck sites to blow the sand away it changes dramatically in only a few feet sometimes you could be blowing three feet to the hard bottom or it could be seven feet of what seems like a bottomless sand drift in a gully

 

[GatorBoy]

something else big happened last night.

 

[GatorBoy]

Bonnie did a great job even with slide projector problems





Carl Fizmer..John Brandon.. And several others were all there great to see everyone

 

[GatorBoy]

This was a text message I got this morning from one of the salvage guys