Divers: Youri, Ben & Mark
Surface support: Nick, Mick & Steve

For over 15 years now SOE divers have taken on the  unenviable task of identifying the ship wrecks of Victoria’s Ships Graveyard – Area Number 3. Our work continued today when a team of SOE divers dived a site that we have been working on for the past 12 months, the wreck previously known as the Albert. At a depth of 68 metres and generally poor viz the amount of positive work that can be completed on each dive is very limited, however we have been able to establish a few facts about the site.
•The site is 155 feet appx. long.
•The site has netting off the stern that is not supported by any structure & is buoyed up by its own buoys/floats. It is not apart of the ship.
•The bow is a ‘dead’ straight Stem.
•It is a steam ship, with steam pipes  still clearly visible.
•The Boilers have been removed, however the supports/cradles are still there.
•The ship is made of Iron.
With the location of the wreck confirmed by the local wreck seal (see video), we started our descent, the top 20 metres had a ‘soup’ of large Jellyfish and Plankton that dropped the viz to about 5 metres, however once we get through the jellies the viz picks up & by the time we are on the wreck the viz is about 15  metres. We had allowed a couple of tasks for todays dive – one such task was to check out what was believed at first sight on our last dive to be a mast with a fish net over it. This turned out to be a net on it’s own, buoyed up by its own floats. We were also able to confirm that the ship is made of Iron. After our 25 minute bottom time is up we now start our 78 minute ascent. The long deco of these technical dives is always made easier by the fact that we have just dived a site that no one else is diving – it is a very hard site to find even if you do have a GPS!!  and the fact that we are achieving some results on the Graveyard Wrecks, apart from the fact that we have successfully dived what can only be described as a really cool wreck. But on this dive, we are joined by a tiny 4cm fish, that swims with us all these miles out to sea and also 4 seals spend some time swimming with us as well. Many thanks to my dive buddies Youri & Ben and a special thanks to Nick, Mick & Steve without who’s support we could not do these dives!!

Mark