Historians had for many years assumed that Torres had taken a route close to the New Guinea coast to navigate the one hundred and fifty-kilometer strait that now bears his name, but in 1980 the Queensland historian Captain Brett Hilder demonstrated that it was much more likely that Torres had taken a southerly route through the channel now called Endeavour Strait.

From this position, he would certainly have seen Cape York, the northernmost extremity of Australia.

Whether or not he did so, the ever pragmatic and calm Torres will never claim that he had sighted the southern continent and simply noted he had passed through a strait.

The expedition proves that New Guinea is not part of the sought-after continent.