North Shields May 2009 So off we go at 6am on a lovely sunny Saturday morning, to North Shields, we arrive at the marina, meet 2 guys from YD who have taken 2 spair spaces, load up and head down the Tyne. Spellbinder is a great boat powered by waterjets which makes it very safe, although got a bit cramped with 12 divers on. 1st dive site SS Mars a Swedish steamship which struck a mine in 1939, she now lies in 32m well broken up with a couple of bits that stand up a few metres, the viz was quite good at abour 5-6m, with plenty of nooks and crannies to poke about in our time went quite quick and despite Jasons best efforts the lobbies were too elusive!, 60 minutes later we were ascending the diver lift back on board and presented with a coffee 2nd dive site, The collier 18m, just 4 divers did this dive, the rest deciding to tuck into pie and mash provided by Alan (skipper) the viz was not as good, with a bit of plankton in the water. The shot had been placed between 2 huge boilers which provided shelter for plenty of fish, lobster, crabs and shrimp, after a short swim round the broken wreckage we came across an angler fish, which was quite obliging and let us have a good look at him before swimming off, we then made our way back to the shot and reverse absailed up it in the current! time for our pie and mash now! 3rd Site The Olso Fjord & Eugenia Chandris, as this wreckage covers a huge area and just 11m of water it was a great rumage, and quite interesting to try and make out which is which wreck! Claire and I managed to find a small perfume pot, unfortunatelly one member didnt have such a good dive, his mouthpiece came of his rebreather and he drank quite a bit of the North sea which came back up along with his lunch a while later! Sunday morning came along and more sunshine, with even calmer sea the first dive site was a deeper one for the rebreather team a wreck in 42m possibly the SS Intent, we were briefed in the wheelhouse with the assistance of a 3D image of the seabed and wreck, the shot was deployed and we made our way down the line, viz on the way down was superb and not too bad on the wreck. the wreck was in 2 parts lying North - south the shot being on the North section we inspected that section and didnt find any signs of a gun, we tried to get to the bow section but didnt make it, at that depth time goes so quickly and it was time to get back to the shot and ascend carrying out plenty of deco stops too. Once back on board the boat steamed to Site 2 Site 2 The gunwreck 30m named as a gun was salvaged from it. Those who
dived it came back with psitive reports of reasonable viz and a good
dive. Site 3 was another rumage around the Oslo and Chandris, this time it proved a bit more fruitfull with bullets found, but the spidge prize went to Steve who recovered a brass bog roll holder! very nice indeed. So that was it a great weekend on a great boat with a great skipper
and great bunch of people |