A bronze cannon known as a 42-pounder, for the size of ball it fired, is lifted from the sea above the wreckage of the HMS Victory.

LOS ANGELES (ETATS-UNIS)  - Le Victory, disparu en 1744, a été retrouvé dans la Manche. Ce navire de guerre britannique était un des plus puissants et des plus perfectionnés de son époque.

L’Odissey Marine Exploration de Tampa, en Floride, a trouvé dans la Manche l’épave d’un des quatre grands navires de guerre perdus au 18e siècle, le Victory, dont la disparition a fait grand bruit. Cet immense navire de guerre de tout premier ordre à trois ponts faisait plus de 53 mètres de long et pesait près de 2 tonnes. Le 5 octobre 1744, alors qu’il revenait d’une mission au Portugal escorté de 26 autres navires, un violent orage le renversa, avec à son bord 1000 passagers et une quantité d’or estimée à pas moins d’un milliard de dollars, rapporte le Los Angeles Times.

Les archéologues ont mis la main sur un véritable arsenal : une centaine de canons de bronze d’un diamètre de 17 cm, l’arme la plus meurtrière de l’époque, un ensemble unique au monde de pistolets en bronze portant les armes du Roi George, ainsi qu’une ancre de 63 cm de long.

« Ceci est l’équivalent du Titanic, peut-être même plus important que le Titanic », a déclaré l’archéologue Sean Kinglsley, directeur du Wreck Watch International. L’Odissey est actuellement en négociation avec le gouvernement britannique afin de préserver le site d’éventuels chasseurs de trésors. www.artclair.com

The discovery of the shipwreck solves a longtime mystery about the fate of the warship, which sank in 1744 with 1,000 people and potentially $1 billion in gold aboard.

American salvagers say they have discovered the long-sought wreck of HMS Victory, the mightiest and most technologically advanced warship of its time, which sank during a violent storm in the English Channel in 1744.

Armed with as many as 110 massive bronze cannons and carrying a crew of 900 men and 100 supernumeraries, the Victory was lost with all hands and reportedly with a treasure of gold bullion whose value is estimated at $1 billion.

In a news conference Monday in London, Greg Stemm, chief executive of Odyssey Marine Exploration in Tampa, Fla., said the company found the remains in 330 feet of water more than 60 miles from where the vessel was thought to have sunk -- exonerating the captain, Sir John Balchin, from the widespread accusation that he had let it run aground through faulty navigation.

"This is the naval equivalent of the Titanic, perhaps even more important than the Titanic," said marine archaeologist Sean Kingsley, director of Wreck Watch International, who consulted with Odyssey on the find. "It's the only intact collection of bronze guns from a Royal Navy warship in the world."

The ship, he added in a telephone interview, "was the equivalent in its day of an aircraft carrier armed with nuclear weapons. . . . When it disappeared off the face of the Earth, there was a collective gasp in the establishment and the general public."

Like the Titanic, the Victory had flaws that rendered it vulnerable to its fate: Its three-deck design was unusually top-heavy, making it susceptible to excessive rolling, and its timbers were not aged properly, leading to premature rot.

Those flaws were corrected when its successor, the sixth and last British warship named Victory, was designed and built three decades later for Admiral Lord Nelson.

By that time as well, the massive bronze cannons had given way to lighter, cheaper cannons made of steel, marking the end of an era.

Odyssey Marine Exploration, which finds sunken ships and sells the artifacts, has made other notable discoveries.

In May 2007, it announced that it had recovered 17 tons of silver and gold coins from a Spanish wreck in the Atlantic, off the coast of Portugal.

The company is now in court with the Spanish government, which claims ownership of the treasure.

The company has been criticized by experts who say it has inflated the value of treasure to procure financial backing. Kingsley and Stemm both noted that the team had so far seen no sign of cargo on the Victory.

Odyssey's shares, which have fallen sharply since September, rose 25 cents, or 6.3%, on Monday to close at $4.20 on Nasdaq.

The Victory search will be profiled this Thursday night in a documentary on the Discovery Channel.

Odyssey has also been criticized for its emphasis on finding wrecks carrying valuable cargo.

"I don't approve of treasure hunting," said marine archaeologist George Bass of Texas A&M University.

"I would like to think that historic shipwrecks would be treated like historic monuments on land, not broken down and sold for profit," he said.

Stemm said Odyssey was negotiating with the British Defense Ministry over what salvage rights it will have.

The Victory site was discovered in May during Odyssey's extensive surveying of the English Channel area with ships carrying sensitive magnetometers and other instruments. The location has been kept a closely guarded secret ever since.

Researchers used the company's 8-ton remotely operated vehicle (ROV) Zeus to explore and photograph the site. By Thomas H. Maugh II  www.latimes.com