An underwater videographer may have a new job as a pirate after he discovered a sunken treasure off the coast of England.
While exploring a shipwreck near Dover, England, a Belgian named Stefan Panis found what appeared to be a piece of cargo that has been overlooked for more than 160 years.
‘There might be more cases.’
Beer goggles
In the depths of the wreck of an English ship called the Mindora, Panis found a treasure that is likely to please historians and beer drinkers alike: bottles of Guinness from 1864.
The Irish Times reported that Panis found up to 20 bottles of the stout in 2025, but only recently connected the bottles to the ship wreckage via a cargo report.
Panis told the BBC that the beer is now with scientists who are studying to see if it is still drinkable, with the photographer citing that the same team previously tested a bottle of champagne that is just as old and was still OK to consume.
It depends on whether or not “sea water has come into the bottle through the corks,” Panis said.
At the same time though, the 162-year-old beer is also the focus of a different project for Panis and his Polish cohort Paweł Truszynski, which they are calling “Project Jurassic Beer.”
The duo is having the contents of the Guinness bottles analyzed to see if they can recreate the original recipe.
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Vincent Isore/IP3/Getty Images
Bottoms up
With the help of a microbiologist from Brussels, the group wants to recreate exactly how the beer would have tasted in 1864.
Professor Kevin Verstrepen said this comes down to the yeast cells in the bottle; the group will try to retrieve living cells, but if they can’t, they will take a “modern sibling” to get as close to the original as possible.
Diageo, parent company of Guinness, told the Irish Times that the Guinness Archive team “has been in communication with the divers to gather more information and evaluate the find.”
“Discoveries like this provide a fascinating window into our past and help build a deeper understanding of our heritage,” the spokesperson added.
As for the case of beer, Panis believes the bottles “definitely” came from a case of 24.
“But there might be more cases,” he claimed.
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Secret stash
The diver said that the Mindora has been searched throughout the last decade, but the beer somehow went undetected. He theorized this was likely due to sand covering his discoveries, which also reportedly included items like pickled vegetables.
The Mindora set sail from London to Vancouver, Canada, in November 1864, and traveled for approximately a week before it allegedly collided with another vessel off the coast of Dover on November 27.
Not much of the recent discovery is verified, as Panis’ team did not make their dive in cooperation with official authorities.
“The story of the shipwreck is never-ending,” Panis said, adding that pieces of history “appear one year and disappear the next year.”
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