Hundreds died in a shipwreck 300 years ago, now Florida divers make stunning discovery

The waters off Florida’s coast have been hiding pieces of history for centuries. But when divers exploring an old Spanish shipwreck recovered more than 200 silver coins, they uncovered something far more compelling than a collection of precious metal: a connection to one of the deadliest maritime disasters in American history.

The discovery brought renewed attention to a tragedy that unfolded more than 300 years ago, when a fleet of Spanish ships carrying enormous amounts of treasure encountered a powerful hurricane. Hundreds of sailors never made it home, and much of the cargo disappeared beneath the Atlantic Ocean.

The 214 silver coins, recovered during a 2024 expedition and highlighted again in October 2026, are part of a story involving colonial fortunes, deadly weather and the remarkable possibility that valuable pieces of the wreckage remain scattered along Florida’s Treasure Coast.

‘SIMPLY EXTRAORDINARY’ | A team of treasure hunters discovered over 1,000 silver and gold coins valued at $1 million from the 1715 Treasure Fleet, which sank in a hurricane more than 300 years ago.

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— WPEC CBS12 News (@CBS12) October 2, 2025

A deadly hurricane destroyed an entire Spanish fleet

On July 31, 1715, a fleet of Spanish treasure ships sailing from the Americas toward Spain encountered a devastating hurricane off Florida’s eastern coastline.

The ships carried silver, gold and other valuable cargo accumulated through Spain’s colonial trade networks. Eleven vessels were lost, and hundreds of crew members and passengers died.

The disaster became known as the 1715 Treasure Fleet shipwreck, giving rise to centuries of searches along what is now called Florida’s Treasure Coast.

The hurricane did not simply sink the ships in one location. Powerful waves, shifting sand and centuries of underwater movement dispersed their remains across miles of coastline, making the search for surviving artifacts an ongoing challenge.

Divers find 214 silver coins in waters searched for centuries

The discovery came during a salvage expedition aboard the Lilly May, operating off Florida’s Indian River County near Sebastian.

Captain Grant Gitschlag and a team that included veteran treasure hunter Mike Penninger recovered 214 coins and other artifacts between late May and mid-June 2024. The crew was working at sites associated with the 1715 Spanish Treasure Fleet, under the salvage operation 1715 Fleet–Queens Jewels LLC.

The timing was remarkable for Penninger, who had spent roughly 30 years searching for underwater treasure and was considering retirement. Instead, the crew located a concentration of old Spanish silver coins in an area that had already been explored repeatedly.

Unlike modern coins, many of these pieces were irregularly shaped. Known as cobs, they were produced by cutting and striking pieces of silver rather than using the precise manufacturing methods familiar today.

The recovered coins had spent more than three centuries underwater, accumulating marine deposits that made them difficult to recognize. Their discovery showed that even heavily searched shipwreck sites can still produce unexpected finds.

How much treasure is still hidden off Florida?

The 1715 fleet has produced discoveries for decades, but the full extent of its lost cargo remains uncertain.

Historians have estimated that the ships carried precious metals and jewels worth hundreds of millions of dollars in today’s terms. However, those estimates concern the fleet’s overall cargo, not the value of the 214 coins recovered in 2024.

And the discoveries have continued. In 2025, a separate expedition recovered more than 1,000 silver coins and several gold coins from wreck sites associated with the same fleet. That collection was estimated to be worth approximately $1 million.

The discoveries also come with legal restrictions. Historic shipwreck artifacts recovered in Florida waters are subject to preservation requirements, permits and court-supervised arrangements. Finding an old coin underwater does not automatically mean a diver can keep or sell it.

More than treasure, a reminder of the lives lost

The fascination surrounding the 1715 Treasure Fleet often focuses on the possibility of finding gold or silver. Yet the coins also represent a much darker moment in maritime history.

The sailors and passengers aboard the Spanish vessels were attempting to cross the Atlantic when the hurricane struck. Many died within sight of Florida’s coast, leaving behind cargo that would become the subject of centuries of exploration.

Today, each recovered artifact helps researchers understand how the ships operated, what they transported and how the disaster unfolded.

For the divers aboard the Lilly May, the 214-coin discovery was an extraordinary reward after years of searching. For historians, it was another piece of evidence from a catastrophe that still lies beneath Florida’s waters.

And with new discoveries continuing more than 300 years after the hurricane, the story of the lost Spanish fleet is far from finished.