Timeline

Soon after Christopher Columbus discovered the new world, Spain began to send fleets of ships to the new world to pick up and bring back amazing amounts of treasure. Starting in the 1550s, Spain established a port in Havana Cuba where they could repair their ships and fortify their provisions for their non-stop trip back to Seville, Spain. Columbus had established trade routes which included sailing north with the Gulf Stream up the east coast of Florida. Earlier treasure ships carried riches from the Incas, the Mayans, and the Aztecs, while later ships carried mined treasure. The ships in these fleets averaged in size from 100 tons for a small ship, to 800 tons for a large ship. With no way to forecast the weather, hundreds of ships were caught in storms, and in some cases, entire fleets would sink.

Following the War of Succession (May 15th, 1702 – September 7th, 1714) the King of Spain (King Philip V) sent nine ships to the new world to retrieve his treasure which the Spanish had been stockpiling. The fleet picked up two prizes (two additional ships) during their voyage and also used them to carry treasure back. The Spanish also rented a twelfth ship called the Le Griffon, a French slave ship. The Spanish spread the massive amount of treasure among the 12 ships and, fully loaded, the flotilla set sail for Seville, Spain on July 24th, 1715.

Le Griffon, the French slave ship, sailed much faster that the Spanish ships. With a lead far out in front of the rest of the fleet, the French ship was unaware of a hurricane forming along present day Florida. The French ship, returned to Spain announcing that the other ships were to arrive soon. The rest of the fleet, moving slower, were caught in the hurricane. In a desperate attempt to save ships and their precious cargo, the captains were able to run six of the ships into shore. This desperate move gave the Spanish the ability to salvage them for nearly two years. Once they were able to recover as much as they could, the ships were then burned down to water line, then salvaged further by local tribes. Five of the remaining Spanish ships were unable to make it to shore and until modern day, were considered lost forever.

Close to the shore near Fort Pierce, Florida, William J. Beach discovered one of the ships in this fleet known as The Urca de Lima.

The first permit for a salvage operation was issued for Urca de Lima.

Kyle Kennedy founded Seafarer Exploration

Kyle Kennedy raised $750,000 amongst himself, family, and friends for the recovery of the JUNO BEACH shipwreck.

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Seafarer made their first trip to Cuba for a week to research their archives and to gain introductions to archaeologists, conservationists and military Generals, thus developing relationships for future business, post embargo. Seafarer’s relationship got off to a good start and has continued to grow.

Dr. John de Bry a leading historical Phd specializing in research and underwater archeology, was able to gain access to the archives in France. He brought Kyle Kennedy along to Dieppe, France, for the first time, to meet with local archaeologists and conservationists at the repository. There they researched the archives concerning the French Le Griffon ship and the 1715 fleet.

Kyle Kennedy and Dr. John de Bry went to Seville, Spain for the first time to research the archives and to meet their top archaeologists and conservationists. While in Spain, Seafarer met with some key legal counsel in Madrid to gain their trust and approval for their future working relationships on Spanish shipwrecks.

Seafarer went to Cuba for four days with Josh Gates and the Travel Channel to film a show entitled “ Expedition Unknown,”  that aired in June 2017 and featured Seafarer’s archaeologist John de Bry.

Kyle Kennedy attended the UNESCO conference in Paris, where he met with the head of NOAA and the Secretariat General of UNESCO,  to continue to expand Seafarer’s relationships with the academic world. Mr. Kennedy also met and established relationships with SEARCH and LAMP, as well as several foreign countries’ lead archeologists.

Kyle Kennedy, CEO of Seafarer, stated, “I am very pleased to have this leg of the journey complete after 2 years of detailed legal work as requested by the Florida Bureau of Archaeological Research. While we now will file for a renewal of our recovery permit with the Bureau, the history of the continuous admiralty claims for the site gives us certain rights under Federal law. It will be exciting to receive our recovery permit and investigate the vastly undiscovered and approximately one-square-mile area in the deepest part of the site which was previously deleted from the magnetometer survey.”