Addressing ships ballast, how right you are by your referrals. I have dove most of the Spanish shipwrecks of the 1733 fleet scattered throughout the Florida Keys. These galleons had carried just as much treasure as the 1715 fleet but the only major difference being most did not sink violently and thus were mostly intact and near thoroughly salvaged. Point is that each site is represented by BIG ballast piles. None of the known Spanish treasure shipwrecks (main site) are devoid of ballast rocks; period. It was not uncommon when the ship was built to pour in "basket ballast" (small rocks between the frames) with sometimes even mortar mix. On top of that came the larger ballast rocks, the weight being essential for the ship to maintain a low center of gravity because of the high free-board and high masts carrying strained wind blown sail. If a galleon of 500 tons plus displacement was carrying say 100 tons of treasure, why move ballast? True, there were cases where ballast was sometimes removed from certain vessels in port. The bricks of Williamsburg, Virginia came over as a ballast/cargo. The Atocha of 1622, with all its treasure aboard, has a ballast pile.
In my opinion its out of place to try and come up with all kinds of speculative excuses as to why this particular "section of wooden wreckage" is thus far devoid of ballast.Like capted (and I) have previously posted, there's oe sure sign of a Spanish shipwreck site: ballast (normally creek bed rock) and broken olive jar shards all over the place. Any here yet? If the no ballast theory was even remotely correct, explain why, in its place, there aren't stacks of tons of silver and gold bars, chests of coins concentrated and scattered all over the presumed site? Here again, as capted accurately pointed out, there are powerful boat-operated (and diver) deep penetrating ferrous/non-ferrous metal underwater detection systems that can be applied and, cutting-to-the-chase,will tell one if there are quantities of precious metals there.
I am not trying to rain on anyones parade as this is undoubtedly part of what could be a 1715 shipwreck but I just believe there isn't yet enough evidence to label it as thee shipwreck site. That's my opinion.
