10. Hell’s Gates
Current Estimated Value: $13 million* Date of Disappearance: 1533; Year of Discovery: 2008
A shipwreck close to a vast desert would seem like the last location you’d expect to discover one, yet that’s just what happened with this one. A Portuguese ship known as the Bom Jesus was sailing from Lisbon, Portugal, to India 500 years ago. It sank because it was unable to handle the choppy seas and dense fog off the Skeleton Coast.
Hell’s Gates ©Jahuey/content from Wikipedia
It took hundreds of years after the sinking for a diamond mining operation to find it off the coast of Namibia’s desert, which Portuguese seamen had dubbed the “Gates of Hell” due to its extreme heat and inhospitability. The wreck left behind 44,000 pounds of copper, tin, gold, and ivory tusks, with a combined estimated value of $13 million.
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