- 2 days ago
Imagine this: after centuries of silence, both the sea and the earth suddenly reveal their long-hidden secrets. Deep underwater, explorers uncover a ghost ship lost 363 years ago, and inside its dark, untouched hull lies an unbelievable treasure worth over $1.1 billion. Meanwhile, in the very heart of London, archaeologists stumble upon another mystery: an ancient ship buried far beneath the city streets. How did a vessel end up so far from the water? And could this forgotten ship hold the key to understanding one of the greatest disasters in London’s history? Two discoveries, separated by centuries and continents, now collide in one breathtaking adventure - a journey where the past rises to the surface and every new clue reshapes our understanding of the world. Animation is created by Bright Side.
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Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/
Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV
Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz
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https://www.eastnews.ru
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For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me
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This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.
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00:00For years, the world's most valuable shipwreck was just a legend, until now.
00:06It has finally been found, and among the wreckage was a real treasure worth $1.1 billion.
00:13To understand this better, we need to go back to 1622.
00:17That year, the mighty Spanish galleon, Nuestra Señora de Atocha, set sail from Havana,
00:24packed with riches belonging both to King Philip IV of Spain and to the wealthy members of the crew.
00:30We're talking about gold, silver, copper, and emeralds from Colombia, Peru, Mexico, and Venezuela.
00:37The cargo was so large, totaling more than 40 tons, and so vast that it took two months to transport it to the ship.
00:45The ship was also packed with people. There were 265 people on board.
00:51At first, everything went well.
00:53But then came the Florida Straits, and trouble.
00:57The crew found themselves lost in the night that was not only cold, but also stormy.
01:02And before long, they were facing a powerful hurricane.
01:05The wind tore the masts apart, giant waves destroyed the rudder,
01:10and soon, the Atocha was sinking toward the darkness of the seabed.
01:14The disaster that night meant a huge loss of wealth for King Philip IV.
01:19But even worse was the loss of life.
01:21Of the original 265 crew members, only five survived.
01:27They managed to climb up the mizzen of the ship, the only part that remained above water.
01:32With all that treasure gone, the Spanish were quick to spring into action and devised a salvage operation.
01:39Five ships were sent to recover the cargo.
01:42The plan seemed simple and easy.
01:44After all, the hatches were securely locked, so the treasure could still be there.
01:48But almost immediately, things went wrong.
01:52For example, one of the five ships ran aground before it could even begin its journey.
01:57In the end, the search dragged on for 60 years, and many factors contributed to the mission's failure.
02:02That may not seem so bad today, but back then, divers didn't have the technology or safety equipment that we have today.
02:12Exploring the seabed was risky, and more often than not, it led nowhere.
02:16While searching for the Atocha, the rescuers found traces of another vessel, the Santa Margarita, the Atocha's sister ship.
02:26Another hurricane passed through the region a month after the sinking.
02:29The seabed became a jigsaw puzzle with pieces of the ship scattered everywhere.
02:35The rescue mission became almost impossible.
02:37Over time, the Spanish managed to recover part of the Santa Margarita's cargo, but Atocha's treasure seemed lost forever.
02:46Even so, no one forgot that story.
02:49Then, in 1969, more than 300 years after the sinking, everything began to change.
02:55An experienced deep-sea diver, Mel Fisher, stepped in and decided to rewrite history.
03:01Mel had already spent a big part of his life at the bottom of the sea.
03:04He and his wife even ran a diving school in California.
03:09So, Mel gathered his family and moved to the other side of the country.
03:13He led a new team of hunters whose mission was clear, to find the lost treasure of the legendary Atocha.
03:20They had little more than a boat, some diving equipment, and metal detectors, but that was enough to get them started.
03:27They focused on a region called the Matakumba Keys, mentioned in several 17th-century documents.
03:33In the first year, they traveled more than 100,000 miles, but found absolutely nothing.
03:39It seemed like an impossible dream.
03:42But Mel still had a card up his sleeve.
03:46Eugene Lyon
03:47A historian who would change the course of the search.
03:52Eugene delved into the Spanish archives in search of clues about the shipwreck.
03:56It was there that he found an important document that mentioned a group of people trying to save it.
04:02On the last page, it was mentioned that an area 100 miles from where Mel was searching had been the scene of the main exploration.
04:11This little piece of information was the needle in the haystack they needed.
04:15They rerouted the ship and soon arrived at the new location.
04:18But there was a challenge.
04:21That part of the ocean was deeper and the visibility there was almost zero.
04:25It was difficult to see your own hands.
04:28However, Mel knew how to deal with the adversities of diving and came up with a simple and brilliant solution.
04:34He installed two large tubes on the boat called letterboxes.
04:39Those tubes could be lowered in front of the propellers.
04:41The idea was ingenious.
04:44They sucked clean water from the surface and directed it to the bottom of the sea, exactly where the divers were.
04:49This technique not only cleared the murky water, but also helped to reveal objects that had been hidden for centuries.
04:56And still, the search took 16 years.
05:01During that time, Fisher found many lost items.
05:04Then, in 1971, they discovered a huge anchor.
05:08This was the first clue that they were close to finding the Atocha.
05:12In the following days, more objects appeared.
05:15Cups, swords, and ancient nails turned up.
05:18To keep everything organized, the team created a circular map.
05:22On it, they marked the exact location of each item they found.
05:26They also used radio transmitters on land and a receiver on the boat, which allowed them to know precisely where they were.
05:32However, the system was so efficient that it could measure the position with a margin of error of just one foot.
05:39Over time, a line began to form on the map, pointing to where the Atocha's main treasure might be hidden.
05:46They followed this trail for two years.
05:49Just when they were starting to lose hope, they found silver bars.
05:53It was the year 1973.
05:55This opened the door to much bigger discoveries.
05:58The silver alone was worth over $100,000, but the real treasure was yet to come.
06:04On July 20th, 1985, valuables that would be worth around $1.1 billion today were finally discovered in the main hull of the ship.
06:15The treasure included 180,000 silver coins, 24 tons of silver bars, 125 gold bars, a collection of pearls, and 66 pounds of emeralds.
06:27Some of these finds were priceless, not only because they were rare, but because of their history.
06:33The Atocha Cross, the Royal Orb, and the Atocha Ring, three royal artifacts, were found in near-perfect condition.
06:41The Atocha Cross was the most valuable of all the artifacts.
06:44It had nine brilliant green emeralds set in 22-karat gold, a true treasure from the past, shining once again after centuries underwater.
06:54Soon after the discovery, the state of Florida thought, wait a second, we want a piece of that treasure.
07:01They went to court, demanding a whopping 25% of the value.
07:06A bitter legal battle ensued, and it lasted eight years.
07:09It even went all the way to the Supreme Court.
07:12But in the end, treasure hunter Mel emerged victorious.
07:16He was even invited to The Tonight Show, showing off a massive gold chain found in the wreckage, wrapped around his waist like a belt.
07:26People called it the money chain, and for good reason.
07:29The find was so big that the wreck was declared the world's most valuable by the Guinness Book of Records in 2014.
07:35After the initial excitement, Mel sold some of the gems, but the bulk of the treasure remained in the family, for a while.
07:44What was left was auctioned off.
07:46No one knows exactly how much the jewels were sold for, but one thing is for sure.
07:50Their value has skyrocketed over the years, and it's not just about the sparkle, it's about the legend that lives behind them.
07:58Today, these treasures are part of the particular Muzo collection, the largest private collection of the Atocha artifacts in the world.
08:07And no, they're not for sale.
08:10But the good news is that you can still see them.
08:11They're on display, shining brightly in homage to Colombia's rich history and the famous mine from which they came.
08:19The people behind them say that these emeralds are as iconic as the rubies of Mogok or the sapphires of Kashmir.
08:26And honestly, they're right.
08:28Three hundred and sixty years ago, a massive British ship, the London, blew up in the Thames estuary.
08:36The tragedy took over three hundred lives, including the sailors and their loved ones.
08:42No one knows exactly what led to all this, but scientists are finally getting close to the truth.
08:48Divers accidentally found an exceptionally well-preserved bronze cannon from the ship.
08:53This cannon, that was buried in silt and clay for centuries, could have all the answers.
09:00The London was a service ship built for the Navy of the Commonwealth of England.
09:05It set off on its first journey in June 1656.
09:08The ship played a huge role in British history as it was part of a convoy that went to the Netherlands in 1660 to collect Charles II and restore him to the throne.
09:19Five years later, in March 1665, it was traveling from Chatham to Hope.
09:25From there, the Admiral Sir John Lawson was supposed to take it to the sea.
09:31But just before reaching the buoy of the Knower, the gunpowder suddenly blew up on the ship.
09:37About 25 people who were in the roundhouse and coach survived, but over three hundred drowned.
09:43The ship broke into two pieces.
09:46Henry Bennett, the Earl of Arlington, passed along rumors that it all happened because of cheap, low-quality gunpowder that was on the ship.
09:55When experts of that time inspected the shipwreck, they concluded that the cannons could still be salvaged.
10:01But the ship itself was a total loss.
10:03Later, when someone recovered some of them, in 1679, there was a scandal where they tried to use them to settle a completely unrelated deck.
10:14In 2005, divers rediscovered the London.
10:18To protect it, port authorities even had to move the shipping lane, and a team of archaeologists got to work exploring it.
10:25That wreck is a big deal because it gives us real insights into English naval history.
10:31Visibility in the Thames estuary can be terrible.
10:36Sometimes you can't even see a foot and a half in front of you.
10:40Working on the site is also super tough because it's in a crazy tidal environment,
10:45and a busy shipping lane, where huge cargo ships constantly pass by, is still near.
10:50So when a cannon suddenly appeared, stuck deep in the clay, it meant the conditions had to be absolutely perfect.
10:58Experts believe the find is from the Commonwealth era and its medium size, about 8 feet 6 inches long.
11:05It was part of a special set made specifically for the London and was placed on the ship's lower deck.
11:12Every single gun carriage on the London was one of a kind because all of its cannons came from different countries and different periods in naval history.
11:20Big cannons were really rare and crazy expensive to make, since they needed tons of bronze or iron and had to be individually cast.
11:30That's why the Navy often grabbed cannons from captured rival ships, old shipwrecks, or decommissioned vessels.
11:37The new find is one of the clues that could eventually help scientists to solve the mystery of the London tragedy.
11:43So far, they've also found leather shoes, pieces of instruments, wooden tools, rope, and a compass.
11:51All these artifacts are like puzzle pieces to them.
11:54They still don't have enough evidence to be sure, but it looks like both the pipe and candles could have been sources of flames that set off a larger bang.
12:04Some workers made another amazing find at a flooded quarry in nearby southeast England, about 60 miles southeast of London.
12:12They stumbled upon the remains of a rare Elizabethan-era ship hundreds of yards away from the nearest coastline.
12:19Finding a ship from the late 1500s is a huge deal, because very few vessels from that time have survived.
12:27Studying it could help scientists answer some big questions about an important era in history, when England was becoming a major player in European trade.
12:37Today, the quarry site is about 1,000 feet from the sea.
12:42But back in the 1500s, it was actually part of the coastline.
12:46Archaeologists think the ship either wrecked on a rocky headland, or someone dumped it there when it was too damaged to sail anymore.
12:54Scientists haven't identified it yet, but they studied over 100 pieces of its wooden hull, reading the tree rings,
13:01and found that it was built from English oak trees, cut down between 1558 and 1580.
13:09At that time, northern Europe was switching from the old clinker method, where the planks overlapped like fish scales,
13:15to the Carville style from the Mediterranean, where the planks are smooth and flush against each other, nailed to an internal frame.
13:22Old wood usually rots away pretty fast when it's exposed to air or water.
13:29But if it's buried under a thick, oxygen-free layer of mud or silt, it can survive for centuries.
13:35That's exactly what happened here.
13:37The team is using laser scanning and digital photography to document everything about the wreck.
13:42Once they finish their research, they plan to rebury the timbers under the silt in the Kori Lake,
13:48so the ship can stay there safe for many more centuries to come.
13:53A team of archaeologists in Norway found a ship in an even more unexpected location, in a flat field.
14:01There's a hill nearby called Gel Mount.
14:03It's actually a huge burial monument that the Vikings themselves had built.
14:07The farmer who owns the field wanted to dig some drainage ditches,
14:12but first, he needed experts to check for anything important underground.
14:17Archaeologists used a high-resolution geo-radar attached to a tractor-like vehicle.
14:23When they scanned the field, they discovered that it used to be packed with burial mounds,
14:27at least eight new ones nobody had ever found before.
14:31And beneath one of the mounds, the radar picked up the outline of a ship.
14:35Back in Viking times, ships were super valuable, so they only buried them with really important people.
14:43Scientists have only found three boat burials in all of Norway before,
14:47and this is the first new one in years.
14:50The team believes this ship is from Viking times, probably between the years 500 and 1000 CE.
14:57Because the burial mound above it got flat over time,
15:00the ship is now only about 1.6 feet below the ground.
15:04That's super close to the surface.
15:07It's around 66 feet long, and the radar showed that parts like the keel and the floorboards are still preserved.
15:14The archaeologists plan to explore more using non-invasive tools so they don't wreck anything by accident.
15:21If they need to, they'll start an excavation.
15:24Far away from Norway, in the Namibian desert,
15:27a miner looking for gems accidentally found a legendary shipwreck almost 500 years old.
15:34The workers called in an archaeologist to check it out,
15:37and they thought it must have been the remains of a Portuguese trading ship,
15:41the Bom Jesus, that had mysteriously vanished in the 1500s.
15:45The Bom Jesus had left Lisbon loaded with treasures aiming for India.
15:49But somewhere along the southern tip of Africa, a brutal storm slammed it into the Namibian coast.
15:57The ship smashed into rocks, broke apart, and disappeared under the waves.
16:01When archaeologists explored the wreck,
16:04they found parts of the ship scattered across the shore and buried under thick sand,
16:09which actually saved the remains from rotting away.
16:11They even discovered treasure, over 40 tons of cargo that had spilled out of the captain's chest underwater when the hull broke.
16:20There were cannons, swords, fabrics, tools sailors used to navigate by the stars.
16:26And most impressive of all, 1,845 copper ingots,
16:32solid pieces of metal weighing 16 to 17 tons in total.
16:36Scientists could even read the old trademarks stamped on them,
16:41revealing they were made by a mega-rich German trading company.
16:45And then there was the real jackpot.
16:48More than 2,000 gold and silver coins from all over the world,
16:52Portugal, Venice, France, and the Moorish states.
16:56Plus 105 giant elephant tusks, weighing about 2 tons.
17:00The tusks were likely on their way to become luxury goods like jewelry and fine carvings.
17:08DNA tests later showed the ivory came from West African forest and savannah elephants.
17:14They didn't find many bones, though,
17:16which means the crew either managed to escape or were lost forever at sea.
17:20That's it for today.
17:24So hey, if you pacified your curiosity,
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