Dive year 2008
2008 started with a movie night at Stefan’s house where we watched diving films made by the participants themselves. During the evening we watched films, ate pizza, ate chips and discussed various diving-related things. We alternated between wreck and mining films as well as nature diving films from Sweden, Norway and Egypt. Among other things, Henrik brought a film with wreck diving in Norway and a film with nature diving in Egypt. Göran showed a film from the wreck Dania. It was a very successful diving evening and it was fun that several people were interested in coming and we look forward to more diving film evenings in the future.
Throughout January and February, the weather was perfect for not going out with the boat but instead devoting time to maintaining the boat and some training dives.
At the beginning of March the boat was ready and we went out to the German timekeeper Ostmark.
After the quick 40-minute trip we anchored on the wreck. The drag sat on the outside of the wreck amidships. When we got down we started swimming aft and met the cannon. In the good visibility you could clearly see the whole cannon from a short distance. Then we swam forward and amidships and looked for entrances. We found some possible passages for future dives. At the end we saw some whole valves with a diameter of about 30 cm. In the five-degree water we started our ascent and reached the surface as planned. When we set off home towards Halmstad we took two stowaways with us, two birds. They were completely exhausted. The big bird was content with half the journey, while the small bird jumped off inside the harbor. We were back in harbor at noon.
Before Easter week we mixed some gas and prepared ourselves for a lot of interesting diving. However, the weather was not on our side this time. It was windy, winter road conditions and some snow and ice. Instead of wreck diving it was a training dive and a little fixing with equipment and some reading in ship archives.
A couple of weeks after Easter it was still quite windy but the forecast predicted that Saturday would be calmer so we decided to go out to Walkyre for a nice wreck dive. Unfortunately the forecast wasn’t quite right this time so there was some rough seas all day. It took us just over an hour to get to the site but after the wreck image had towered up on the echo sounder we were able to quickly anchor up and get ready for descent. When we had checked that the anchor was properly down on the port side aft of the midship we took a turn on the stern and down into the cargo holds. Visibility was about 3-4 m so you could get a good overview as you slowly glided forward. In addition to all the fishing equipment and trawl nets hanging here and there on the wreck there are still many interesting details to see e.g. winch, steam boiler and various things that belonged to the crew. After 30 minutes we decided to end the dive and started the ascent with the associated deco. It was 6ºC down on the wreck and 5ºC on the ascent.
There are many wrecks in the Kattegat, both older wooden wrecks where the wood is gone and only ballast and objects that were on board remain hidden in the mud, as well as newer wrecks built of steel. Several of the wrecks are well visited by both divers and fishermen. There are also many places where fishermen have gotten caught with their trawl nets or where someone has passed by and noted something interesting on the bottom and marked the place as “Unknown” but then never had time to investigate what it is.
In mid-April we went out to check out just such an “Unknown” position.
When we left the harbor in the morning it was raining and the temperature was a couple of degrees above zero. There was not much wind but enough to keep the big waves that had gone out to sea going. As we approached our “Unknown” GPS address, the excitement on board increased.
We have checked so-called “Unknown” positions several times before but usually there is nothing on them. Maybe it was there once upon a time but what was there may have been consumed by the sea or is now buried in mud. However, it is always exciting to check these positions because you never know what treasures may be hidden down there in the depths.
We passed over the GPS address and saw that there was something down there towering up on the sonar. The joy felt great inside. Imagine if no one else had visited the address since the ship sank. Imagine if this was a completely untouched wreck! We turned around and drove back to the site and saw the shadow on the sonar appear again. We sent the drag and then slowly slid back. However, the current took us parallel to it and we had to take up the drag again. We repeated the procedure and Thomas, who was holding the line, felt the drag scrape over metal. Shortly afterwards he announced that we had hooked into the wreck. The gate to the address was now open!
We ate a little before getting ready to go down and see what was in the darkness on the other side.
We broke the wavy surface and sank slowly through the water. After 30 m we came down into a layer of dark water and poorer visibility but as we sank through this layer it opened up and ahead of us we saw the wreck towering up. The dredge was on the starboard rail and we followed this ahead. On the way we passed the foremast which was still standing. In the bow we turned aft. Over the wreck there was some trawl trawl. It was not cut up where it lay but rather resembled old cobwebs where it had wrapped around the wreck and lay over the deck and hold. The thought came to me that if anyone had dived here before, there couldn’t have been many. Everything seemed very untouched. When we got further aft to the bridge we looked at the stairs that the crew had once climbed and looked into the wheelhouse. All around there were still glasses in the valves. We continued aft and then turned the dive around and swam back towards the ascent line. Once there we untied and drifted with the current over the wreck. We slowly watched the wreck disappear into the darkness and when it was completely gone we slowly rose to the surface, back to our own world.
At the end of April the weather stabilized and it was time to head out to Rolandseck. The boat trip out to the wreck site was at 20 knots, so we were there quickly. However, the position we had was not correct, but after searching for a while we found the wreck 200 m from the position we had. We threw in the drag and hooked the wreck. Afterwards we had a coffee on the calm sea and enjoyed the warming sun.
We came down to the stern of the wreck. The visibility was very good and when we swam before we stayed in the middle and could then see both the port and starboard railings at the same time and thus everything in between. This gave us a good overview of the wreck. Getting an overview of the whole wreck was also the goal of the dive, rather than going into details. There were quite a few vehicles, including trucks, on the wreck. We swam all the way to the bow and then turned around and looked at a lot of things while we slowly moved back to the stern and the ascent line. Big and mighty wreck!
When we got on the boat we prepared the equipment and then set off to check the positions of Hansa1 and T13. The positions matched perfectly and the outline of Hansa1 showed up on the echo sounder. The bottom is at 72 m and the upper parts at 56 m. The deck looked to be at 62 m. At T13 the bottom depth is also at 72 m and the deck is at 65 m. When we passed over the wreck you could clearly see the superstructure sticking up to 62 m. There are many exciting wrecks in the area!
The month of May started with us going out and doing a dive on Robert Müller where visibility was good down on the wreck and the temperature was 10°C at the last stop on the way up.
The weather was perfect for a day at sea so we took a boat trip. We initially planned to dive an old passenger ship called the Oberon that sank in December 1930 after a collision with another ship. However, there were already divers on the wreck when we arrived so in order not to disturb their activities we went to Rolandseck instead. At Rolandseck the visibility was good and we had a pleasant dive where we looked at vehicles, various debris and a spare wheel in the stern.
At the end of May we took the boat up to Gothenburg to dive on the wreck of Feodosia. We left Halmstad early in the morning and managed to catch the ferry over to Hönö at 0510.
The position of the wreck was perfect and just after 8 am the first pair of divers were on their way down to the wreck.
Feodosia is a large wreck, 107 m long and 15 m wide. On the night between 4 and 5 April 1945 the ship was on its way to Norway with submarine weapons on board when it was sunk by British bombers just after midnight.
Stefan and Thomas, who dived first, said when they came up that they had come down quite far astern and that the wreck was lying with a list of about 75 degrees to port. After they had attached a line, they had swum earlier and almost immediately came across a couple of mini-submarines mounted on a transport trailer with truck tires on it. One of the submarines was quite badly damaged and at first they thought it was some ventilation pipes before they could see on closer inspection that it was the mini-submarines. We had already received information about their existence before diving on the wreck but not where they were on the wreck so the first pair of divers found them straight away was pure luck. Stefan and Thomas continued their dive before and turned around when a lot of nets and trawls were towering up and visibility was no more than 1 to 1.5 m. After getting back to the ascent line they continued aft and found the spare steering wheel in the stern which was still on its bracket. After a bottom time of 40 minutes they left the wreck and began their ascent.
Henrik, who was with us that day, and I (Erik) went down as the second diving pair for the day. We encountered the wreck at 38 m and attached the line. We then sank to 45 m and then followed the wreck forward. We had decided that we would not dwell too much on details but instead try to get towards the bow to get a larger picture of the wreck. Almost immediately we passed what looked like large pipes, probably the submarines that Stefan and Thomas had taken a closer look at during their dive. Right next to these was also a large winch. We continued forward and came to the building, which we swam around, and then continued forward a little bit before the line on my line reel ran out and we turned the dive around. I have 100 m of line on the reel so we probably turned around just before the bow. We made our way back to the ascent line and then continued aft. When we got to the rear of the wreck, I had pulled out about 20 m of line and we turned the dive around to get back to the ascent line and begin our ascent.
After we got back to the harbor on Hönö, we took the opportunity to look in the fishing museum, where there is some information about shipwrecks on the west coast, before we started our journey back to Halmstad.
For more or less the whole of June it was too windy to go out to sea and dive, but at the beginning of July the opportunity finally came and we decided to go out to Anholt, which is about 30 nautical miles out from Halmstad, to dive on U-251 and M -403, which were sunk by British bombers in the final stages of World War II. Expectations were high and concerns about poor visibility were high because it had been so windy for so long. Once there, the sea calmed down further and the surface current was non-existent. Visibility was good down on M-403 and we could clearly see the various guns on the wreck. After a successful first dive, expectations for U-251 increased. On U-251 the visibility was really good. We came down to the tower of the submarine and had a nice dive over the entire wreck. Fantastic dive!
The days after we were at Anholt and dived, the weather varied a lot and the forecasts showed a lot of wind but a late forecast during the evening changed everything. The morning of the next day looked like it could be calm and it was certainly true when we went out in the morning to dive on Dania in an almost calm sea and the sun was shining from a blue sky.
When we anchored, you could see that there was a current on the surface and it was also down on the wreck, but on the other hand the visibility was at least 9m because you could see the entire width of the ship without any problems and get a really good overview. You started to glimpse the wreck after 12m and when we came down the anchor was perfectly placed at the very tip of the bow. That in combination with the visibility made it a very good wreck dive and plenty of time to glide over and see all the interesting details. Down on the wreck it was 13 degrees which increased to 16 degrees at the surface. Despite its shallow location this is a fun wreck to dive and many details to look at.
We ended the month of July with a nice boat trip out to Walkyre and Dania. Earlier in the week it had been quite windy so even when the wind on Tuesday night started to subside there was still some swell on Wednesday morning. This was not a major problem though and we were able to anchor on Walkyre for a first dive. Expectations were not the highest as visibility had previously been limited at this location but it is a fun and interesting wreck that you will happily return to. During the descent there were large particles in the water but still so clear that at about 29m you got your first glimpse of the wreck, after 30m it got worse before clearing up again and becoming really good at 35m where the anchor was aft of the midship on the starboard side in some distorted sheet metal parts. After securing the anchor, the plan was to stay in the shallows for this dive and get a good overview, the wooden deck is about 31-32m but we were lucky with the visibility so we chose to stay at 28m and could still see the entire width of the ship. Regardless of whether you swim on the bottom outside the wreck or down into it, there are many details to see. Down at the bottom it was 10 degrees which increased to 16 on the ascent.
The surface interval was used to move us on to Dania for a second dive. When we were there a little over two weeks ago the visibility was very good but it had now deteriorated to 3-4m. It was a calm dive where we aimed to try to see more details in the stern where the superstructures once were.
Even in August it was quite windy which prevented us from going out far, but twice we went out to Tök where the visibility on both occasions was perfectly fine.
In September we thought it had been a long time since we dived on Ostmark so we decided to go out to the wreck. Stefan had his camera with him to document as much of the wreck as possible. Down on the wreck we dived along the railing until we reached the stern. From the stern we walked along the mine rail and came across the cannon which we got some nice video clips of. The trip continued further along the mine rail below deck. Below deck we saw, among other things, the stairs that lead down to the cabins on the lower deck. Finally we went up on deck again and filmed the skylight and the chimney foundation.
For the second dive we had moved to a wreck whose identity is unknown. It is likely that not many people have dived here before. We were met by a wooden wreck that has a cargo of probably coal. The wreck is heavily collapsed which means that you can see things such as winch winches and coarse chain lying scattered on the hard bottom.
At the beginning of November we went out to Ostmark again. The thermometer showed -3°C when we left the harbor shortly after 6 in the morning. Just before it got light, the anchoring was finished and the preparations for jumping into the water were in full swing.
The surface was calm with both waves and current, so it was a pleasant descent in fairly decent visibility. Unfortunately, however, visibility deteriorated after about 30m to less than 2m and a weak current could be noted along the length of the ship. The anchor had settled in the railing on the starboard side between the superstructure and the bow. We started by swimming aft but turned after a short distance when visibility did not improve and it would not be possible to get a good overview of the superstructure. Instead, we used the rest of the bottom time to explore the bow, which despite a strong explosion still offers many details on both the inside and outside.
After half an hour, unfortunately, it was time to loosen the anchor and begin the ascent.
The temperature down on the wreck was 14 degrees and at the surface it was 10 degrees.
The rest of November and the beginning of December were spent on some training dives in the quarry in Grötvik (it was too windy to go out with the boat and dive) with the accompanying sausage grilling.
We ended 2008 by accompanying Magnus out to King at Utklippan outside Karlskrona in the Baltic Sea. It was chilly in Blekinge when we gathered in the harbor in the morning. After the final check of the equipment and analysis of the tanks, it was time to load the boat and head out to the wreck, which was quite well preserved and offered several penetration opportunities. But for us normal west coast divers, it was the visibility that pleased us the most. For us, the visibility was more than excellent. It was easy to orientate yourself and get a complete overview of the wreck.
