Plymouth April 12th to 14th 2008

I had arranged this 3 day trip aboard Seeker with Steve Wright. We originally had 12 on the trip plus 3 reserves, however by the time of the trip we had 9 divers on board.

Steve Jones, Ash Boxall, Stuart Miles, Chris Ward, Colin Thomas, Paul Duckworth, John Campbell, Simon Kay, and Steve Cheshire.

We did have an original plan of:
Day One – Victoria
Day Two – Dirigo (possible name)
Day Three – Claverley (possible name)

However it turned out to be very breezy on the Saturday morning and we agreed with Wrighty that we would go out and have a look. It very soon became obvious that we were not going to get the 23 miles to the Victoria, so instead opted for the Medoc.

The water temp was between 9 and 10 degrees on each of the dives, and after day one we decided not to do the Dirigo this weekend as it was quite deep at 77 minutes, and we were all feeling the cold even after being in the water for 90 minutes. It was felt that the extra depth would entail at least an extra 30 minutes of deco, so we would give it a miss and pick something else.

Day 1: 
Medoc
Depth 55 metres
Bottom time 30 mins
Run time 82 mins
Viz 15 metres

The Medoc (sometimes called the Halfway Wreck) was 273 feet long with a beam of 34 feet, weighing in at 1,166 tons. She was sunk in 1940 when she was attacked by enemy aircraft. She survived the first attack but then the aircraft dropped a torpedo which sent her to the bottom killing 39 of those on board. She was carrying ammunition supplies at the time of her sinking, there are still cases containing 6 rounds of 40mm shells on her. 

The shot was just aft of the boiler, the viz was excellent at about 12-15 metres.I went forward to the bows and then back again doing a general tour of the wreck, lots of congers on her in just about every nook and cranny.

I was off the bottom at 30 minutes and then on the surface at 82 minutes. While on the final stop it was apparent that it was rough up on top. When I surfaced the waves were indeed quite high, probably a swell of about 8 feet, and guess what, no sight of the boat. So it was a case of trying to ride up on the waves and doing a 360 degree turn to try and spot it. After many attempts at this I was starting to get a little concerned. I finally got picked up after 20 minutes of being battered by the waves.

Day 2:
Victoria, 
Depth 72 metres
Bottom time 25mins
Run time 92mins
Viz 25 metres

The Victoria was a collier weighing 973 tons gross, and measured 65 metres by 9.6 metres. She was sunk in 1917 when she was torpedoed in the port side by U 103 while en route from Cardiff to Dieppe. At the time she was carrying 1,170 tons of coal. But I haven't seen any of this on the wreck.
The wreck is quite intact with a list to starboard. At the bows an anchor is in place. Midships there is plenty of wooden decking still surviving. At the stern the rudder and prop remain albeit covered in netting. There are a lot of portholes scattered around which I think are phosphor bronze.

The idea behind doing this wreck again was to try and prove that it was not in fact the Victoria.
I went in first and at 40 metres I could clearly make out the wreck, the deck of which was at 66 metres, so I knew this was going to be a great dive.

I set off to look for torpedo damage on the forward port side, but couldn’t find any. Then I saw a lovely porthole on the seabed, but a few tugs showed that it was still attached to something so decided to leave it. 

Then on to my next task which was to measure the beam. My measurement put it within 0.4 metres of the size of the Victoria. 

From previous dives I knew there was no coal in the stern hold, so I went to the forward hold instead, there I met up with 2 others who had already found some coal. I went from here into the boiler room. There is indeed coal but not sure whether it was there as a cargo or for its own use, as there was not a huge amount. I couldn’t get past the boiler so wiggled my way back out of here and then up on top to find the engine. There was a lot of debris on top of it but it looked like a smallish triple expansion engine.

I left the bottom at 25 minutes for a run time of 92 minutes, once again the waiting time made easier as I listened to my mp3 player.

Back on board we compiled our info. No one had found any signs of a 13 pound gun that was supposed to be on her.

Steve C had found a hole on the port side close to the stern that could easily have been the torpedo damage, albeit further aft than was expected from the reports.

Chris had found a name tag marked “Wd Sch” which may reveal something, but we are not holding out too many hopes on that.

John found what now looks to be a barometer, there is some writing there which may be more apparent when it is cleaned properly.

Apparently Colin had a problem on the descent when he realised that he forgot to connect his suit inflator. Steve Cheshire helped him out but connected the feed off his bail out instead, which meant that Colin inflated his suit with a helium mix. Apparently it was not very warm.

Without doubt this dive was the highlight of the weekend.

Day 3: 
Afric
Depth 77 metres
Bottom time 27 mins
Run time 115 mins
Viz 8 metres

Hang on…what did I say earlier about not doing a wreck at 77 metres because it would be too cold to be in the water for at least 2 hours. Then we pick the Afric which is…77 metres.

The Afric was 11,999 tons gross, measuring 167.6m X 19.2m. Built 1899 by Harland and Wolff, Belfast. White Star Line. She had twin quadruple exp engines and was en route from Liverpool to Sydney when she was torpedoed by UC66 on 12/02/1917 with 23 lives lost.

After the previous day we were hoping for fantastic viz on this dive, unfortunately it was not as expected, it was only about 8 metres. I was first in again and attached a strobe to the line. I had a general look around in the area of the shot then decided to head off to the stern. It was much further than I expected and had to swim quite hard to get back to the shot in anything close to my planned bottom time. As it was I managed to leave the bottom at 27 minutes to give a run time of 115 minutes. 

There were a few bits and pieces lying around including portholes and crockery but as the owner does not like stuff being removed we of course respected his wishes.

On the trip out to the wreck we saw a pod of dolphins but too far off for any good pictures, however on the trip back to Plymouth we had another pod which played in the bow wave giving some good photo opportunities.

All in all a great weekend, with 3 of the group doing their deepest dives to date on day 2, and then again on day 3.

As usual our thanks to Steve Wright, and to Sean and Lauren at In Deep.