Found... the sunken Spanish treasure ship ‘worth £11bn’
A SHIPWRECK that may hold the biggest-ever haul of sunken treasure has been found off the coast of Colombia 300 years after it was sent to the bottom by the British.
The San Jose, described as the ‘holy grail’ of shipwrecks, is thought to have been carrying a huge cargo of gold, silver and jewels when it sank in 1708.
Although some experts have valued the load at £2billion in today’s money, others claim it may be worth up to £11billion – making it by far the most valuable ever to be lost at sea.
The ship, which was part of a Spanish treasure fleet, was sunk near the port city of Cartagena during a battle with a squadron led by British Commodore Charles Wager.
It has reportedly been found in an area off the coast of Baru, in what is now Colombia, near the Rosario Islands.
The previous largest find was the £330million load taken from the Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes, which sank off Gibraltar in 1804.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos tweeted: ‘Great news! We have found the San Jose galleon.’ However, he did not mention the long-running row with US-based salvage company Sea Search Armada over claims to the treasure.
A group now owned by SSA claimed in 1981 that it had located the area in which it believed the ship had sank – only for the government to pass a law saying it was entitled to the bulk of any findings in the future.