By Piers Boileau-Goad
14th March 2023
Dive report from the club’s September 2022 diving trip to Scapa Flow.
Having never met many of those in the club it was cracking to meet everyone on the 24th September 2022 in Scrabster at the ferry port. My initial anxiety – if it can even be called that – disappeared as soon as I met Ozzy, Dave, Steve, Jules et al. Such a truly lovely bunch of guys, retaining the true meaning of a British dive club. What BSAC perhaps was always envisioned as but isn’t? Apologies to any BSAC followers reading this.
As soon as we left Scrabster on the morning boat it got a tad breezy, nothing much, probably a force 6/7 (23 knots of wind plus) and a bit of a lump, made worse by the beam weather. Still, someone was not having a pleasant time on the quarterdeck so everyone nearby got to see what they had for breakfast. A nearby crew member arrived promptly with a hose and removed her breakfast over the side. As soon as we arrived in Stromness however, the wind and weather departed and the old man made a lovely arrival without a single bump while most in our group wondered about the weather and its affects on diving, I had been reading the weather for he last few days and was worried, but should not have been.
Arrival at the quayside and MV Valhalla was ready for us. Loading began in earnest and once all gear was stowed on the benches in the kit up area, I got to work making sure my Redbare was alive and well, my bailouts were good to go and I was gassed up for the morrow. Still wondering if we would be diving
Breakfast on the morning of the 25th was just what the doctor ordered, lots of confusion about how things worked, lots of tea, toast, butter and jam, gridlock in the galley. Ideal given that the wind was still blowing a little. With breakfast complete however, we were herded into the briefing area and given a very good safety briefing first, then the dive briefing after. SMS Karlsruhe was our first plunge into the green depths of this trip. Writing up this report so absurdly late, I am going to have to rely on my log book, youtube and my units log program, so apologies if anyone remembers something different.
SMS Karlsruhe
Jumping in at 09:48, our skipper, despite the 50 knots of wind made jumping in and kitting up so easy! I had loosely agreed to see other people in the water so I could maximise dive time. After jumping in, not really interested in being thrown around on the surface I headed under as fast as possible to be met by 5-6m of vis and no swell was bliss. After 700 miles of driving, this was what we had come for!
My max depth was 26.72m which was lovely, not deep but this was a check dive for the slightly deeper stuff later in the week, so lets not push things just yet was the thought from the back of my mind. As this was not, however, a technical dive I had no maximum bottom time planned, simply, when my time to surface gives me about 100 minutes, lets start heading up. My logbook gives me a comment ‘lots of big guns (5.9 inch)’ as well as ‘big f**k off lobster’ so its safe to assume there were lots of guns and wildlife here as well as plenty of anchor chain still wrapped around the capstans. On this wreck it was simply the sights of the guns with their shields in place which got me. Neutrally buoyant, behind the breach, thinking of being at sea in a strong wind, with plenty of spray while under fire and trying to keep powder and shells clean, makes me think that these guys were hard, more so than perhaps we are today.
This wreck particularly is a bit special. On the stern, the starboard quarter I believe it was, you can see two ‘pots’ on the deck which they used to create smoke when making a tactical withdrawal or other such action. You can even see the teak decking, still in place. With the visibility being rather good here, you can see so much from almost any location but the stern was impressive.
The ascent however was not enjoyable. After 80 minutes on the bottom I headed up, following a very adventurous ascent plan which stipulated only 9 minutes or so at 6m. My intention was to do an extra few minutes at 3m just in case. Lets not get bent on dive one shall we?! Regardless of my plans, I was feeling horrible on the ascent, burping and dry retching all of the way up under my bag. While my ascent profile looks fine, it belies the fact that I just wanted to shoot to the surface and be damned with the consequences. My look book states ‘off gassing like hell on the ascent which was horrible as a result. Burping/retching – urgh’. Upon surfacing, things got better eventually. Once back onboard, things were fine but I was determined to learn something. Out came my O’Dive doppler sensor and a measurement was taken, 30 minutes later another was done and the result – not bent – but a score of only 53 out of 100. Far from ideal! An email to Mr Clements at Vobster followed with my results and profile. Here the fun began!
- Total dive time: 102 minutes.
- Max Depth: 26.72m.
- O2 Consumption: 66 bar.
- Diluent (14/37): 49 bar.
F2 and Destroyer
Second dive of the day and a shallow one again. A maximum depth of 15.09m and total time of 67 minutes. My shortest dive as I honestly got a bit bored. The wrecks were small and the vis wasn’t great due to another boat having dropped some divers on the site before us. Once again, the vis was roughly 4-5m so not bad at all and pretty good in all honesty. Down the shot we went, onto the barge. Lots of squidgy stuff and a few lobsters for those into it, but for me the highlight was the anti aircraft gun sitting in the barge’s hold. Straight to it I went, had a look and a bimble around the inside of the barge itself which was honestly, enjoyable but not large enough so I headed over to the destroyer. I seem to recall sticking (ish) with Mark and Pete at this stage as we followed the line over to the destroyer F2. I also recall a bit of current which made the whole thing here a little uncomfortable, coupled with the first stage on my drysuit inflate bubbling away (I switched this off and installed my bailout as my suit inflate instead, allowing me to save what remaining gas I had available). Heading up the shot I took my time to deco due to the mornings excitement. Slow and steady. Picked up, in spite of the still rather horrible weather, with ease by a cracking crew and having a mug of tea thrust into my hand once on my bench was heaven! Frankly, I did not like my profile on this dive, it looks bad, it felt bad.
- Total runtime: 67 minutes.
- Max Depth: 15.09m
- O2 Consumption: 52 bar.
- Diluent (14/37): 20 bar.
SMS Brummer
Still lots of wind, on the second day but now, with the first days experience, we are not bothered as it is plainly obvious that we have an awesome skipper who handles the boat better than a few Captains I know onboard (don’t tell anyone!).
Down the shot at 09:16 I went to a max depth of 35.48m. Visibility here was good again, 5m or so, possibly more in places on a cracking wreck. This would be a good one for me to do again, as my log book says that there was lots to see, even more than I didn’t see. A comment from my log book is that parts of the wreck are moving around like paper, which made me a little reticent about entry throughout the week, especially as I was basically diving alone. However, at the bottom I found lots of cool stuff to see. The armoured control tower is still very much in existence, with the viewing ports etc still in place, visible and really interesting. I also found one of the Iris using to flash Morse signals to other ships which made my day really. With so much to see, I didn’t expect to find it. Heating was definitely used on this dive as I started to get a bit chilly. The water was 13 degrees but as you know, you cool down quite fast in the water, so after about 40 minutes, the heating went on. After 60 minutes on the bottom I decided to start heading topside slowly so I could maximise the off gassing while still enjoying the higher parts of the wreck. Unlike the day before, there was no huge amount of burping or retching which was ace. At a certain stage, I bagged up and did my deco at 6m as you can see from the profile below. As you see, deco at 6m was not a problem due to waves/swell etc in spite of the shite capes above me, emerging as I did into some lumpy seas and plenty of wind.
- Dive time: 101 minutes.
- Max Depth: 35.48
- O2 Consumption: 58 Bar.
- Diluent (18/37): 43 Bar.
SMS Dresden
Once again, the weather wasn’t great but by now it was improving so going down the shot and bagging off was definitely easy to get done well.
Heading down the shot to 35.78m, a bit deeper than the mornings dive, but for all intents and purposes I suppose its the same in terms of off gassing and m values. I have a good 6m of vis on this dive from my log book which was great as I found myself underneath a 5.9 inch gun without expecting it. Heading forward, passing the armoured control tower, you could almost see down a few decks through the space. Still not willing to enter as I was diving alone and having some concern about corrosion on the wrecks from that morning. I also have a comment that the shield on the bow is huge which. All in all, this was an interesting dive, if only for the small things that you see such as the construction of the ship itself, the armoured control spaces, and then picture that these ships are over 100 years old and men, much like you or I would have been running around the spaces during a fight. It makes you think, or at least it does for me.
- Max depth: 35.78m.
- Total time: 67 minutes.
- O2 Consumption: 49 bar.
- Diluent: 36 bar.
Krownprinz Wilhelm
One of the big ones! A battleship that was at Jutland. What history! GUNS GUNS GUNS!
Heading down the shotline I was disappointed by reduced visibility as the water was starting to snot up a little, so I need to get back to this wreck because it is simply too big to have a swim around and see everything, especially with 3m of visibility (perhaps a little less once people have visited the main armament on the flow’s floor slowly sinking into the mud. It was here that I can be heard humming/singing a Viennese waltz to myself while Mark and Pete head in the other direction, i’m pretty sure its still on YouTube, but I was happy, this was an awesome dive and I want to get back there. Bagging up from 22m or so, the excitement began as I felt the bag pull sideways as it went up, like a train had hit it and pulled it along.
Now the guinea pigging began! Having spoken to Vobster over the last few days, given my profiles and O’Dive scores we had come to the conclusion of doing dive profiles from a programme, in this case ‘MultiDeco’, before hand with set Gradient Factors and comparing them to the decompression requirements for my unit. Essentially, I needed to start deco deeper meaning that the proximity of the Gradient needed to be further away from the maximum m value of my controlling tissue (the first number when dealing with gradient factors deals with this). As you see from the profile below I did a fairly poor stop at 21 ish metres but the rest at 15, 12, 9, 6 and 3 were better. Consequently, my O’Dive score went up massively after this, from a previous 30 (why did I not get bent?!) to 88. I felt infinitely better as well!
- Dive time: 126 minutes.
- Max Depth: 36.27m
- O2 Consumption: 69 bar.
- Diluent: 55 bar.
UB-116
The afternoon dive was the submarine (UB 116) which I didn’t do, as I wanted to take the opportunity to off gas more. The fact that the submarine was apparently rather broken up due to depth charging in the second world war did also have some sway as I’m not so interested in broken up wrecks, I like to see metal which looks like a ship after all. Regardless of this, everyone came up with glowing reviews of the site and the fantastic vis.
SMS Markgraf
The big dive for me. One that I had worked up in my mind time and time again, planning what I wanted to see, do and where things were on the wreck. In my mind, this was very much a technical dive, so I had been planning it with Vobster the night before and was going to dive the plan. I was to leave the bottom at 48 minutes and not break 45m even though perhaps something to see was there. The wreck is not going anywhere so I could always come back.
Once again, heading down the shot I was a bit miffed by the vis, it had degraded again and the snot was very much still there. I have a mere 3-4m of vis as a result. Coupled with dodgy vis and a bit of depth, the wreck was dark. A torch was certainly required, and a backup therefore mandatory. My log book notes that I might have been slightly over weighted in order to counteract the helium in my second bailout, I was carrying 10kg as when an Aluminium cylinder is empty, it gets even lighter and very buoyant. I could perhaps have done 9.5kg, would I?
Bagging off from the bow area I came up the bow from the deck level with a metal wall right in front of me. It felt huge, imposing and solid. No wonder these dreadnaughts were able to in still such fear.
I didn’t have the best profile that day but it wasn’t too bad. A few screw ups on the deeper deco stop but I cannot remember why. Weighting perhaps? Deco was long, a bit boring, I could have gotten out sooner but I was happy enough to build time in the water and follow the prescribed profile.
- Dive time: 121 minutes
- Max depth: 42.16m
- O2 Consumption: 76 bar.
- Diluent (17/47P): 46 Bar.
SMS Konig
A nice little dive again, but so much more to see. I rather feel that I didn’t see enough of the wreck on this one. That said, I was left with a feeling in places of ‘what was that’. Still, one of the main comments from my dive log was, ‘lots of amazing life!’ which for anyone who knows me, is rare!
I bagged off from around C Barbette. Wondering before doing so, if I would go and have a look inside if possible or, how far I could get. Choosing wisdom rather than exploration I bagged off and headed up. With better Deco stops this time, I felt better and better each time. My O’Dive score was now continuously 100, so I could tell I was doing something correctly.
- Dive Time: 123 Minutes
- Max Depth: 34.83
- O2 Consumption: 74 Bar
- Diluent: 40 Bar.
- Temperature: 13 Degrees.
SMS Coln
This dive demanded a longer, more immersive wander around than we were able to get as there was so much more to see than I feel we saw. Here we have another armoured control tower, and pretty close to the aft of it, a torpedo tube, something that I was really happy to have seen given that I also have a penchant for submarine wrecks.
One this dive, my suit inflate ran out and I simply couldn’t be bothered to connect my bailout again. This was probably a bad move with hindsight because I asked myself afterwards – what if you had just vented and needed to inflate for some reason?
My final dive in the flow and my final comment about it, ‘happy’ rather sums up the week.
- Dive Time: 91 minutes.
- Max Depth: 31.94
- O2 Consumption: 70 bar.
- Diluent: 27 Bar.
- Temperature: 13 degrees.
Summary and Conclusion
Overall, on balance, I would go back to Scapa. Its a great location for some wonderful wreck diving and there is simply too much to see in a single trip. As the wrecks fall apart, new areas will open up, leading to new ‘discoveries’ from divers, new excitement and plenty more stories. We had a more of less steady water temperature of 13 degrees at depth and of course, a mug of tea, hot chocolate or coffee after the dive waiting for you was always hugely appreciated.
Thank you to everyone on the trip, Mark for organising, Helen for feeding us some truly fabulous food, Hazel for being an awesome skipper and of course Phil for his deck work, gas man help. Thank you also to everyone in the club for putting up with my long runtimes. I think my Suunto finally unlocked a couple of days after I got home!
I cannot thank our hosts enough, they were wonderful, fun, fantastic at what they do with a massive amount of information to share. I would certainly dive with them again. Right now however, my ambitions lie further south..while keeping an eye on trips they have.
- Total dive time this trip: 798 minutes – 13 hours, 18 minutes – over 8 dives.
- Average dive time: 100 minutes.
- Max Depth: 42m
Scapa isn’t all deep and dark. Its what you make it! I will be going again, will you?
Things learnt for next time – being very critical of myself
- Deco stops start earlier (deeper) for me.
- I can bubble more than others while not getting a problematic bend – fancy that!
- My deco stops are not always great, more practice at them will be necessary as I plan on more than doubling these depths later in the year (2023).
- I seem to work well with a gradient factor of 40/70 (stops start at 40% of m value, and allow 70% of saturation when surfacing) – essentially stops start deeper and the last stop last longer.
- Batteries and heating on deco is a god send but heated gloves might also be useful.
- More work on buoyancy as I feel that I used too much gas on each dive, finally;
As I off gas into my loop, - I need to vent that ‘new’ gas more often so think of this during the ascent.
