THE WILD ART SITE !

          Spanish navigator. In 1605 he sailed with PEDRO FERNANDEZ DE QUIROS as captain of the ship "San Pedrico" from Callao, in Peru, to La Austrialia del Espiritu Santo (= Espiritu Santo I. in the New Hebrides = Vanuatu). After De Quiros had been swept out to sea (8-11.6.06) (eventually returning to Mexico), De TORRES was left with DIEGO DE PRADO Y TOVAR and other survivors on EspirituSanto. After unsuccessfully searching for the wreckage of Quiros' ship (during which time they discovered that they were on an island not a continent), they first sailed SW to 21degS before being
 forced to the NW, reaching the Louisiade Arch (13.7.06) and Basilaki I. (off southeastern New Guinea)(31.7.06). Unable to proceed further north, TORRES coasted southern New Guinea (called Magna Margarita), naming San Juan Batista (= Yule I.), entering Orokolo Bay (2.9.06), passing Malandanza (=Umuda I.), Isla de Perros (= Bristow I.) and sighting Long Reef off C. York (called Volcan Quernado) (15.9.06). He then unknowingly negotiated the TORRES STRAIT (named after him in 1769 by the Scotsman ALEXANDER DALRYMPLE  who first saw the Manila documents), afterwards coasting New Guinea and doubling C. San Pablo (= Tg. Vals, C. Valsch). After calling at San Juan de Prado and  C. San Lucas (in the region of Kaimana, Irian Jaya) (left 27.10.06), he sailed N to Cinco Hermanas (= Yef Pelee on Misool I.), Ternate and Manila (22.5.07). De TORRES spent the rest of his life in Manila.
    His report of the voyage (dated 12.7.1612) was not discovered until 1762 (although it is briefly mentioned in a Franciscan document from Peru in 1640), and the journal of Prado was not published  until 1930.