Victoria ship completes first global circumnavigation

On September 6, 1522, the ship Victoria arrived in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Spain, marking the completion of the first circumnavigation of the globe. The expedition originally departed from Spain on September 20, 1519, under the command of Ferdinand Magellan, who sought a western sea route to the Spice Islands in Southeast Asia.

Following Magellan’s death in the Philippines in April 1521, Basque navigator Juan Sebastián de Elcano assumed command of the Victoria. The return journey was marked by extreme hardship, including starvation, scurvy, and evasion of Portuguese vessels. Of the approximately 270 crew members who began the voyage across five ships, only 18 Europeans and four Indians survived to complete the journey.

The expedition successfully navigated the strait at the tip of South America, now known as the Strait of Magellan, and was the first European fleet to cross the Pacific Ocean from the Atlantic.