A rumor circulating online in October 2024 claimed a "ghost ship" from the 1700s had washed ashore near St. Augustine, Florida, after Hurricane Milton . The posts included an image of what appeared to be an old wooden ship stranded on a sandbar.
For example, on Oct. 16, 2024, the Facebook page Casper Planet posted ( archived ) the image paired with a caption that began:
1700s Ghost Ship Washes Ashore in Florida After Hurricane Milton
In an eerie aftermath of Hurricane Milton, a fully intact 1700s-era ghost ship washed ashore near St. Augustine, Florida, on Wednesday, baffling both locals and experts. The mysterious vessel, which had been lost to time, emerged from the ocean's depths as the Category 4 storm churned the Atlantic, sending the ancient ship onto the beach.
(Facebook page Casper Planet)
At the time of this writing, the post had received around 2,200 reactions and 1,700 comments, many of which expressed doubt in the post's claims. One commenter, for example, wrote : "Yea… that absolutely is not the water in nor near St Aug." Another wrote : "Is this really real or an AI generated post?"
However, there were no credible reports that such a ship had washed ashore in St. Augustine after Milton. A Google search for the terms "St. Augustine ghost ship after Milton" on Oct. 18, 2024, returned nothing related to the claim beyond a Sportskeeda.com article debunking it.
The results of reverse image searches conducted using Google Images and TinEye indicated that the image included in the post in fact showed the Flying Dutchman — a prop ship used in Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean" franchise. According to the fan-run Pirates of the Caribbean Wiki , the ship first appeared in the franchise's second film , 2006's "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest."
According to multiple Disney fan websites , from 2006 to 2010 the Flying Dutchman was on display just off the coast of Castaway Cay, a private island in the Bahamas that, according to its official website , is "reserved exclusively for Disney Cruise Line Guests on Bahamian and Caribbean cruises."
Although we have not yet identified the original photographer of the image used in the post under investigation here, the resemblance between the ship that photo depicted and the Flying Dutchman was apparent from numerous photos and videos posted to websites including TripAdvisor , Flickr , and YouTube between 2006 and 2010, when Disney reportedly removed the prop ship from Castaway Cay.
For example, the photo collage below shows the image from the Facebook post about the "ghost ship" on the left and a 2007 Flickr photo of the Flying Dutchman on the right.
(Facebook page Planet Casper/Flickr user scmikeburton)
Details of the ship are visible in the video embedded below, which was also dated to 2007.
We have reached out to the Walt Disney Company for official confirmation that the ship shown in the post was indeed the Flying Dutchman — a prop ship constructed for the "Pirates of the Caribbean" films — and we will update this story if and when they respond.
Ultimately, the rumor about an 18th-century ship washing ashore in St. Augustine originated with Casper Planet — a Facebook page that describes its output as being humorous or satirical in nature. Its Info section states:
Delivering the Snews that doesn't matter directly to your Snews feed. Did we say this is satire? Satire, satire, humor, satire and opinion, names/locations are made up
The fictional story spread roughly over a week after Hurricane Milton made landfall just south of Sarasota, Florida, on Oct. 9, 2024.
Casper Planet has a history of making up stories for shares and comments, sometimes relying on artificial-intelligence (AI) writing software to do its storytelling. The AI text detectors ZeroGPT and Quillbot both indicated that some or all of the page's post about the "ghost ship" was written using AI software.
Snopes has addressed other satirical claims stemming from the account in the past, including the assertion that a photo authentically showed Mickey Mouse dropkicking a toddler at Disneyland.
For background, here is why we alert readers to rumors created by sources that call their output humorous or satirical.
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