Scuba Geek

An elite group of amateur divers has found an important wreck June 6, 2006

Posted by Andy Carroll in : WreckDiving , trackback

James Woodford, from the Sydney Morning Herald, writes a piece about the Sydney Project, a group of divers who are dedicated to finding shipwrecks in deep water. They recently found the Iron Knight, a ship which was sunk by the I-21 Japanese Submarine during World War II, and now lies in a depth of nearly 125 mtrs.

Alhafith, Michael Kalman, Mark Eaves and Tony Keen, all Sydneysiders with regular jobs, were descending onto a giant freighter no person had seen since February 8, 1943. On that terrible day, the Iron Knight was sunk by a Japanese submarine. The ship was one of 16 vessels destroyed by Japanese submarines off the NSW coast during World War II. Only three of these have been found.

What makes the Iron Knight so significant is that it was the victim of one of the most infamous Japanese subs - the massive I-21, which also launched a float plane over Sydney during the midget submarine attack in 1942 and shelled Newcastle.

The divers had a bottom time of 15 minutes followed by more than 4 hours decompression, during which there is always an element of danger, not just from decompression illness, but from the marine life in the area, which can consist of Mako Sharks and Great Whites!

Once over the site a shot line was dropped to the bottom, aimed to land just to the side of the targeted spot. Attached to that line were two shark pods, emitting an electric pulse with a range of 15 metres, designed to keep man-eaters at bay while the divers decompressed. Also connected to the line were two extra cylinders of air - one a nitrogen/oxygen mix and a second, pure oxygen.

Some people may wonder why the scuba divers of the Sydney Project conduct these strenuous and risky dives. Aside from interesting wildlife encountered during deco, the divers want to go somewhere which has never been visited before (at least whilst it has been underwater)

On previous dives killer whales, dolphins and seals have all swum in to see what the divers are doing. Last weekend a sunfish - two metres long and three metres high - stayed with the divers for over an hour. “It was like watching a documentary,” Alhafith says. “Seals have come right up and seem to be sniffing us.

“Some people want to just see rust but for me it is seeing an untouched ecosystem. You see marine life which is amazing. The wreck is like a museum and you are the first person to see it. It’s like opening an Egyptian sarcophagus.

“The wrecks in shallow water have been stripped. Technical diving is all about exploring, going where no one’s gone before.”