Scapa Flow March/April 2004

by Steve Jones

Useless fact:
Apparently German cruisers are named after German towns, the battle cruisers after German Generals, and the battleships after German nobility or Royalty.

It had always been an ambition to dive the German High Fleet that was scuttled in Scapa Flow in 1919 so I joined up with a trip organised by Lynn Jones. There were to be 6 of us travelling to Scotland but Greg Jewell had to drop out, this left myself, Lynn Jones, Adam McCarthy, Ian Mills and Ralph Woodman. The other part of the boat charter was taken by a group of divers from Bristol, Lawson, Phil, Gus and Paul. They travelled independently and we first met them on the ferry crossing.

I was picked up in the mini bus from Remar Diving in Caerphilly at 6:30 pm on Friday 26th, then on to Cardiff to pick up Ian and Adam, then finally to Chepstow for Ralph. We left there at 8 pm for the long journey north. We made good time and arrived at the ferry terminal at Gills Bay (close to John o' Groats) at 8 am on the Saturday morning, in plenty of time for the 10am Pentland Ferry to St Margaret's Hope on Orkney.

We were booked into the Sands Hotel, The Sands Hotel which has several 3-bedroom apartments. This is conveniently located about 5 minutes from the ferry terminal in a small village called Burray Village. Even more convenient was the fact that the pier and the boat were only 100 metres away.

We had booked with Scapa Flow Diving Centre on their boat Crusader, skippered by Dave Wombwell and his new crew member Gavin. The boat is a 63 foot hard boat with load of kitting up space. There is also a compressor on board for air, which is supplied free of charge, and also several J's of oxygen for blending nitrox. The cost for fills in the 28% to 32% was £4 per cylinder. For those who didn't want to take their own cylinders there are plenty of O2 clean 15 litre cylinders on board. Each day we got to the boat at 9am as requested. Unfortunately we never got away on time, sometimes 45 minutes late as cylinders had to be either filled or topped off as they only contained 180 bar.

Sunday Dive 1:Karlsruhe, Max depth 26.2 metres, Viz 8 metres, Run time 51 minutes
The Karlsruhe was a light cruiser weighing in at 5354 tons with a length of 490 feet. She is lying on her starboard side with the highest point being 12-14 metres from the surface.
I was diving with Ralph this week and we had problems at the surface when trying to get to the shot line as it had been pulled under by the previous pairing. After trying for some time to reach it when it reappeared we were thrown a rope and towed closer to it, unfortunately we were not upcurrent and could not reach it. We were then pulled back to the boat and climbed onto the ladder to be dropped again. However Ralph was somewhat lower than me and spent most of the time underwater with the rope wrapped around him as the boat moved off, with me holding onto the manifold of his twinset. We then climbed back on board for yet another attempt. Fortunately a successful one this time.
Quite a large wreck which is quite broken up in the mid section. We went along the bottom to the bows where there was a swim-through, the headed back towards the stern where there were several swim-throughs.
When we got back to the dive boat there was another problem, the ladder had broken and we had to dekit in the water, helped by Phil, then climb up the remaining section of ladder which was about a foot or so above the water line. Fortunately Dave managed to partially fix the ladder for the next dive.

Dive 2: F2 and YC21 barge, Max depth 16.8 metres, Viz 8 metres, Run time 47 minutes
The F2 was a World War 2 Escort boat, similar to a corvette. The F2 was 260 feet long with a beam of 29 feet. She had 2 105mm guns and an assortment of anti-aircraft armaments. She was given to the British as war reparations and sunk at her present location in 1946 during a gale. In 1968 she was salvaged using the YC21 barge. However during another storm the pieces fell back to the sea bed and still remain there.
This was a quiet second dive with plenty of time to explore both pieces of wreckage, however as with many second dives in Scapa they simply fill in the schedule and could not be considered worth diving in their own right.

Monday Dive 1: Köln, Max Depth 34.1 metres, Viz 8 metres, Run time 60 minutes
The Köln was a light cruiser weighing in at 5531 tons, and was 510 feet in length. She was built to replace the original Köln which was sunk in 1914 at the battle of Heligoland Bight. She carried 8 5.9 inch guns, plus 2 3.4 inch guns. She is now lying on lying on her starboard side with the shallowest part of her in 20 metres.
We dropped in expecting the shot to be mid ships, but as we very soon reached the bows this was clearly not so, we then headed back where there were many areas where the hull could be entered. As my buddy was not accelerating his deco from this point on we agreed that he would ascend at a convenient time, leaving me to carry on with my dive.
During the surface interval we tied up at Lyness, on the island of Hoy. here there is a museum with many items of interest including some of the guns from the wrecks in the Flow.

Dive 2: Drift on Dumping Site, Max depth 18.3 metres, Viz 10-12 metres, Run time 45 minutes
The site is a dumping ground for all sorts of rubbish. It was supposed to be a slow drift dive but we soon found out that there was absolutely no current, so we just finned around collecting scallops. This dive really was a complete waste of time, but back on the boat we cooked up the scallops so it was not a complete waste.

Tuesday Dive 1: Brummer, Max depth 33.2 metres, Viz 8 meres, Run time 56 minutes
The Brummer is another light cruiser/minelayer and weighs in at 4308 tons and is 462 feet long. She is lying on her starboard side and the depth over her port side is approximately 20 metres. She could carry 360 mines which was 3 times as many as other German minelayers. Because of this large payload she only had four 5.9 inch guns, and two 3.4 inch guns.
We dropped down the shot line then over the side of the wreck right onto one of the guns then along towards the bows where there was a short swim through the retraced our route back where there were again plenty of opportunities to enter the hull. In my opinion this was the best wreck that we dived this week.

Dive 2: V83, Max depth 17.4 metres, Viz 10-12 metres, Run time 36 minutes
The V83 was a torpedo boat which was 264 feet in length weighing in at 909 tonnes. She joined the fleet just after the battle of Jutland in 1916. A fast ship, she was capable of 36 knots. She carried three 4.1 inch guns and 6 torpedo tubes. In addition to this she could carry 24 mines on the deck. She is well broken up and we hit metal at 5 to 6 metres, the stern is a fair size lump of metal with the rudder still in place.

Wednesday Dive 1: Kronprinz Wilhelm, Max depth 35.4 metres, Viz 8 metres, Run time 56 minutes
The Kronprinz Wilhelm is, by any definition, a huge ship. Weighing in at 25,390 tons, and 575 feet long. She carried ten 12 inch guns, fourteen 5.9 inch guns, six 3.4 inch guns. This class of ship was very well armoured with steel plating up to 120mm thick.
We dropped down the shot to the wreck, the shallowest part of which was in about 20 metres of water. She is upside down, but more on her port side. So we dropped off the side to the bottom, we guessed that we were probably somewhere near the stern and so made for the bows, always looking underneath to try and see the huge guns. As I said, this wreck is huge, we swam for 20 minutes and still didn't get to the other end. Several, if not many, dives would be necessary to get the most out of this wreck, you lose all perspective of direction when swimming alongside her, or even on top of her as I continued my dive after Ralph had gone up.
I had some entertainment as I was hanging around on my 6 metre stop when I heard a loud crash and saw that I was being investigated by an inquisitive sea bird.

Dive 2: Rose Valley, Max depth 19.5 metres, Viz 20 metres, Run time 33 minutes
During the surface interval we went into Stromness. Ralph needed to get his regs checked out, and it gave the rest of us a chance to stretch our legs, and visit the local dive shop, and make the obligatory purchases. As we started to leave the harbour it became very obvious that the weather had deteriorated, the winds were very high and coming from the South East, the worst for diving in the Flow. Dave tried various sites but conditions were not good. Eventually he dropped us on a small wreck called the Rose Valley. Not much to see, we arrived at a piece of wreck at the stern and then wandered off. Didn't see much that was very interesting, hence the short run time on this dive.

Thursday Dive 1: Lambholm, Max depth 21.3 metres, Viz 7 metres, Run time 45 metres
We had planned a slightly later start today, 10:30 instead of 9am. Although times are rather a waste of time when we never seemed to get away on time. However today there was a further delay because Ian was feeling unwell, he had a bad headache and pains in his back. We feared the worst and put him on oxygen and Adam was to drive him to the hospital, while Dave put the chamber on standby. However the hospital diagnosed some sort of virus and decided to keep him in overnight.
Today we were planning to dive the James Barrie, at a depth of 43 to 45 metres. A trawler that lies on its side. However even though it was slightly sheltered from the south easterly that wipes out diving on all the main wrecks, there was no way that we could dive. We were in the middle of a force 8 so Dave instead went to the site of the U116. Same story here, still too rough. The only option was to go into a sheltered bay called Lambholm. Dave found some metal on the sounder and dropped in a shot. He said that most of the area was 10 metres, but he sounded part of it at 20 metres. So in we went and the area was very silty, fortunately very heavy and it settled quickly. I got separated from my 2 buddies almost immediately. I had a look around at 10 metres for 30 minutes or so, then just as I was ready to go up I saw a steep drop-off and went down to have a look. Nothing very interesting there as the whole site is a bit of a dumping ground, but it did mean that I was the only one to find the "deep" section.

Friday
Got to the boat this morning to find the weather was much the same. Some had decided not to dive today and Dave said he would try the U116 again, and failing that the Gobernador Bories. We were not convinced that we would get anything other than a dive in a sheltered bay again, and believed that Dave should have called it. So we saved him the trouble and called it ourselves.
So off we went to have a look around the islands. We went to Scara Brae which is an ancient settlement, 5,000 years old if my memory serves me right, older than Stonehenge and the Pyramids. Then we went to a little village with the quaint name of Twatt, an ideal photo opportunity!
From here it was back to collect Ian from the hospital and after a short walk around Kirkwall it was off to catch the 5pm ferry. Then after another long drive I arrived home at 8am the following (Saturday) morning.

Steve Jones

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