Carrying 230,000 tonnes of crude from Iran to the Mediterranean she was a VLCC (Very Large Crude carrier) discharging to a floating platform 6 miles from Genoa in 1991. With 80,000 discharged she disconnected for an internal transfer (wing tanks to central tank) when the inevitable happened. Five crew died in the initial blast while flames soon leapt to over 100m high and 30-40,000 tonnes of cargo leaked into the Mediterranean (more than the Exxon Valdez). Haven is currently the largest wreck int the region.

Having arrived the day before in Genoa (Genes in French) I had already visited the dive centre, met my buddy and had a good old reminisce! I rocked up at the appointed hour – 0845 (i was told 0900) to find that everyone was already assembling their kit. Needless to say this did cause me some trepidation as I like to kit up early in order to relax and visualise the dive without rush.

    Still, I had ‘stacked up’ (put sofnolime into my unit) and verified my bailout gasses the day before so I was not at a complete disadvantage. With my diluent and oxygen verified and all gasses plugged into my CCR I ran through my checklist, pulling apart everything I had done the day before and starting from scratch so I could not miss anything and finished with the pre breath.

    Unit ready, boat loaded we semi kitted up. It is summer in August, its 36 degrees. Hydration is a problem so I intentionally did not pull my drysuit above my waist, and left a light t shirt on. It was about a 30/40 minute trip to Haven so I did not want to sweat more than necessary. I did not forget the sun cream.

    After a beautifully flat trip to Haven we arrived and were assisted into our kit. There was an option to jump into the water and cool down before kitting up but I forwent this in order to simply kit up and get in without messing about with wet hands. I did however take the option of attaching bailouts in the water, allowing the cool embrace of the sea to steam around me as I went in (figuratively anyway!).

    Now nice and cool I waited for my buddy – a man I admire and respect for his skills, confidence and personality, both in and out of the water – on the shot line. I do not remember when we first saw the wreck in the gloom but I do remember that it was truly massive. I worked at sea, not on tankers, for a few years so I’m used to big but this was bigger.

    As we got to the bottom of the shot my buddy put his strobe on the line so we could clearly identify it on the ascent and we headed off down to where the funnel once exhaled from the lungs of this enormous vessel. Heading around the open decks to the funnel position I was blown away by the sheer scale, the number of fish and yet how weirdly intact the decks were after such a brutal fire onboard. We ambled along and dropped into an interior area – I could not say what – and exited through a hatchway onto the starboard side, just aft of the accommodation block at around 55m. Going through such openings I am always warmy about my unit hitting the deck head/hatch coaming and the size of my bailouts so I unclipped the aft clip and pushed the lean bailout forward ahead of me. Ta da..no real boom/bangs as I went through the hatch yet my pocket caught! Ugh! So much for looking graceful in front of my watching buddy…

    Clipping the bailout back on we bimbled aft again, around the aft mooring station and along the port quarter before dropping down to the prop. Descending down over the quarter into the black void once again reminded me of the scale of this vessel with her shell plating looming over us like an implacable beast that dissapeared into the blackness below. Passing pad eyes (welded loops designed to hold/hoist heavy equipment below) I knew we were getting close, then saw the rudder. A colossal beast rising from the murk like a sentinel standing over its charge which emerged shortly after. The shiny blades and clean lines of the enormous propeller now standing mute and idle below the sea, never again to slash and rip the waters around it.

    With a maximum depth planned of 85m today we were at 76.6 so still had lots of ‘room’ but decided to start our ascent back to the open decks above by the starboard quarter which incidentally had a number of fishing nets dangled from it. Generally most of the nets and lines on this wreck are clearly visible fishing nets. There are however some smaller monofilament lines around the place as we will find out tomorrow.

    Back on the open decks we made our way to the engine spaces via the cavernous hole aft of the accommodation block but forward of the funnel dropping into a brown silt cloud reminiscent of my IE at Wraysbury. While the vis cleared about about 1% we decided to try and follow a catwalk forward along the top of one of the engines (i counted 9 holes ontop of the block so perhaps a 9 cylinder? Perhaps an auxiliary or compressor engine, forgive me those with an engineering mind!) but after a few fin kicks we wisely turned back. It simply did not make sense to penetrate where we could not see.

    Swimming out of this area we rose our of the murk, investigating the two decks above the engines that we had bypassed on the way down, finding a jumble of cabling, falled deck head panels and weirdly enough, a small piece of fishing line in amongst the detritus of what may have once been an engine workshop. Rising still further we examined the upper deck of this caven but to no avail, it was essentially merely a catwalk so we hopped out and swam through the gas storage area with a number of what was once presumably oxygen and acetylene but now reduced to mere scrap metal amongst the blue of the sea above.

    Swimming back across to the port side I had about 100 minutes of decompression to conduct to told my buddy to which he responded in the affirmative and we agreed to start heading back to the shot, with a slight diversion to the biggest section onboard. The cargo holds.

    Where the vessel broke (the bow lies at around 2000m) there is a huge tear, literally as if someone had taken a can opener to the vessel, which allows access to the truly enormous cargo holds that once held the the worlds energy supply yet now stands empty and devoid of much apart from fish. Gargantuan is a word that perhaps does this area justice. You could easily fit a two bedroom semi in these holds, probably a three bedroom detached house! Swimming through them my mind was blown away by their sheer scale and yet here we are. At this stage I did put my hand in front of my torch just to see the blackness and it did not disappoint. Continuing through we arrived at a small ladder and its hatch onto the open deck, that would have been used to climb in and out for inspections, minute in comparison and the hatch that I banged and boomed against (it did not seem as easy to exit as it looked!).

    Out of this hatch we both signalled ok and made our way back to the shot. I started my ascent while my buddy had a last wander around the top of the accommodation block to see what was happening there, while the other set of divers (also our group) joined us a few metres below. I was at this stage freezing so was glad to start my ascent.

    Mercifully it started getting warmer and hit 20 degrees at 15m so the shivering stopped about there. Something to note is a huge school of fish passing through us while I was at about 15 metres, too deep to recover my divevolk dangling a few metres above me annoyingly. It must have been a good thousand or more fish all schooled and swimming over the wreck through our deco trapeze.

    I may have gone on about how big this wreck is because its just enormous. I cannot possibly convey the scale accurately but perhaps I may have, at least in some small part.

Max Depth: 76.6 m.

Minimum Temperature: 15 degrees.

Average temperature: 23 degrees.

PO2 on the bottom: 1.3

PO2 on Deco: 1.5

Dive Time: 165 minutes.

Gas Used: 10/63.

CNS: 105%.

GF: 40/75.