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Above: CCR divers:
Jo Murphy, Graeme Mcoll and Danny Winstanley surface after
their dive on RMS Justicia
Images: Copyright
©2007 Nick Gilbert
I had been checking the weather forecast for
10 days prior to the expedition. Conditions looked good and
as I made the 390 mile journey north from Buckinghamshire
to join MV Loyal Watcher in Ayr, Scotland, I have to admit
I was optimistic. Loyal Watcher -which has been under the
ownership of Darren and Linda from
Inga Charters
since 2004 -is the perfect vessel for this type
of operation.
On arrival we found that, yet again, the
met office had got it wrong! Apparently the long awaited high
pressure from the Azores (buffering Britain from the Icelandic
low pressures systems during the summer months) was not making
quite the appearance we had expected. So, unfortunately, the
weather was now looking more like Force 5's to Force 6's,
with a heavy swell, until Tuesday.
If (or usually when) this happens you have
two choices: stay further east and at least dive, or push
over to Loch Swilly and sit the weather out in the pub. Thankfully
the team and skipper preferred the first option and on Saturday
night we made the crossing as far as Ballycastle (Co Antrim
in the north of Ireland), with the intention of doing a warm
up dive on Sunday on the Santa Maria - an intact steam tanker
sunk by a U-boat in 1918. The Santa Maria lies half a mile
off Fair Head in 65 metres of water.
Although the conditions were rough, the dive
went well and I had 25 minutes on the wreck. On surfacing,
Loyal Watcher's skipper, Darren, expertly maneuvered the boat
to shelter us from the elements, enabling us to easy detach
stages and climb the ladder. Linda's efficiency was truly
remarkable; somehow managing to be in three places at once,
hauling stages up, helping divers to the bench and bringing
out hot cups of tea.
The bad weather, as predicted, had persisted
into Monday so rather than get beaten up for 7 hours trying
to get to Loch Swilley we stayed in Ballycastle and dived
the S.S Lochgarry on the east side of Rathlin Island. The
S.S Lochgarry was a turn of the century passenger / cargo
ship that ran aground and sank in bad weather on 21st January
1942, with the loss of 23 lives.
 
Left: Martin
Dash trying out the Aquazep Right:The
stern of the S.S. Lochgarry
Images: Copyright
©2007 Nick Gilbert
Being quite a shallow dive it gave me the
opportunity to dust off my camera skills and take a few practice
shots before we hit the serious stuff.
Lying at a depth of 35 meters (which for
some reason makes it 'of no interest' to many technical divers)
the S.S Lochgarry is a actually very interesting dive. The
wreck stands upright, intact and is penetrable to two deck
levels. Some of the holds contain ammunition and boxes of
Leigh-Enfield rifles - which have been made inaccessible by
the Royal Navy dumping massive chains into the area. The nice
thing about this dive was that even after an hour on the wreck
I only had a 13 minute time to surface; a stark contrast to
the two hours decompression that would be required for only
half that time on RMS Justicia.
By Tuesday the bad weather had abated, so
we left Ballycastle at 7 a.m. in calm conditions on route
to dive RMS Justicia lying in 70 metres of water 25 miles
off Malin Head, Co Donegal. At just over 32,000 tons RMS Justicia
was one of the largest merchant ships to be sunk in the First
World War -the largest being RMS Britannic.
Above: There
is a shared pedigree between RMS Justicia and the most famous
of all ocean liners, RMS Titanic, which is clear from her
bow section.
Images: Copyright
©2007 Nick Gilbert
As we entered the water poor visibility looked
set to spoil the dive, but as we passed 40 meters the murk
cleared and I could easily pick out divers and wreckage 30
meters below. Darren had placed the shot within 10 meters
of the intact bow section so, camera in tow, off I went.
RMS Justicia is an amazing wreck to photograph
and I was surprised to find that after 27 minutes I hadn't
ventured much beyond the bow section (although this is the
3rd time I have dived her). So with my planned bottom time
running short I swam to the shot line, recovered my strobe,
and began the slow 2 hour ascent to the surface.
  
Left: Danny Winstanley
and Graeme Mcoll hover above RMS Justicia's starboard anchor
Centre: Justicia's
bow from another angle Right:
One of the massive capstains
Images: Copyright
©2007 Nick Gilbert
On Wednesday the weather began to deteriate,
but conditions were still favorable for the dive on HMS Audacious
-a WWI King George V class super-dreadnought battleship. HMS
Audacious is the only dreadnought battleship in existence
today; the dreadnoughts Queen Mary, Invincible and Indefatigable,
that sank during the battle of Jutland being the more lightly
armored battlecruiser class.
 
Left: Propellers
and kiel of HMS Audacious Right:Ivon
Richmond adds some scale to the picture
Images: Copyright
©2007 Nick Gilbert
Again I had the camera with me and began
photographing the impressive stern with its 4 propellers and
twin rudder. Over time the wreck has opened up along the entire
length of its hull and live 13.5 inch and 6 inch shells can
seen in all of the magazine areas. The distinctive boiler
room with its 4 Parsons steam turbines, 3 of the
massive armored turrets and the forward turret's twin 13.5
inch guns barrels (each 15 metres long and weighing 76 tonnes)
are easily identifiable and make excellent navigational features
whilst diving this wreck.
Above: Live 13.5
inch shell cases in HMS Audacious's aft magazine
Images: Copyright
©2007 Nick Gilbert
I spent a total of 43 minutes diving and
photographing HMS Audacious and I'm still awe-struck by the
massive 11 inch thich slabs of armor plating, representing
an era when naval battles were fought at ranges of up to 13
miles by heavily armored leviathans slugging it out round
for round.
On Thursday the weather unfortunately prevented
us from diving on the Empire Heritage, so we headed back to
Ballycastle. However, for me at least, all was not lost. Andy
Mumford and Dennis Vessey (
Megalodon UK
) kindly offered to let me use one of their units with
Martin Dash's Golem radial scrubber.
After a detailed introduction, calibration
lesson and discussion on basic drills (such as flushing the
loop) I was looking forward to another dive on the S.S Lochgarry.
My overall impression of the Meg was that
it is well thought through, well engineered, has 'solid' setpoint
control and a significantly lower work of breathing than my
own unit. For me it sold itself and I believe the combination
of Andy and Dennis will provide the product with a much needed
'friendly face' within the UK.
 
Left: SS Lairdscastle
Right:One of the the Lairdscastle's
staterooms
Little improvement in the weather on Friday
gave us the opportunity to dive one of the many marks in the
North Channel that are either rarely visited or totally un-dived.
The SS Lairdscastle was launched in on the
25th May 1924 as the 'Lady Limerick' for the British &
Irish Steam Packet Co Ltd. On the 17th April 1930 she was
transferred to Burns & Laird Lines Ltd and renamed SS
Lairdscastle. Operating as a ferry between Glasgow to Belfast
she was in collision on the 4th September 1940 with SS Vernon
City (of Reardon Smith) between Cumbraes and Mull of Kintyre;
sinking three hours later. All 72 passengers and 29 crew got
clear in the ships lifeboats and were picked up by a British
Destroyer.
The SS Lairdscastle lies upright and intact
in 89 metres of water, with the top of the bridge standing
around 10 metres off the seabed. Although the wind was blowing
F6 we were able to dive relatively comfortably from Loyal
Watcher as there was little or no swell.
The waters in this area are not clear (4
metres in torchlight) but such an intact wreck standing so
high makes a truly outstanding dive. In addition she is covered
in brass and within the first 15 minutes 2 lanterns, 3 telegraphs
(thanks for the loan of a lift-bag Martin) and a porthole
had surfaced - testimony to the fact that this more challenging
area is rarely visited by technical divers.
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