The Big Kahuna
The San José was one more Spanish galleon, part of the treasure fleet bringing booty back from all over the Empire. When it sank in 1708, it carried 200 tons of gold, silver and emeralds. The treasure had been Peru’s before, but now it was Spain’s, and today, that stuff would be worth $17 billion.
This was one of those years when Britain and Spain weren’t getting along, so it was only a matter of time till an English squadron showed up and fired on them. The plan, as far as anyone could tell, was to board the San José and loot it. That didn’t happen. Instead, it seems the British accidentally targeted the room that held all the explosives because the ship suddenly exploded and sank, killing all but 11 of the 600 aboard.
The world knows exactly where the ship is. A team found it in November 2015. But nearly a decade later, it remains unlooted, because no one can agree on who has the right to do the looting.
The ship sank off the coast of Colombia, so Colombia says it owns it, under the Submerged Cultural Heritage Law. Spain says that it owns the Spanish ship’s contents, thanks to the U.N.’s convention on underwater cultural heritage. Meanwhile, an American company claims to have been the one to determine the ship’s coordinates back in 1981, which means that it’s entitled to at least half of the haul.
We think you know who we say has the right to loot the ship: You do. Mount an expedition, and grab that treasure today. The salvage project might cost $60 million, but that’s nothing compared with how much you’ll get when you plop the haul on the counter of the nearest CASH-4-GOLD store.
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