Runner786

MT Haven, formerly Amoco Milford Haven, was a VLCC (very large crude carrier), leased to Troodos Shipping. In 1991, while loaded with 144,000 tonnes (1 million barrels) of crude oil, the ship exploded, caught fire and sank off the coast of Genoa, Italy, killing six Cypriot crew and flooding the Mediterranean with up to 50,000 tonnes of crude oil.It broke in two and sank after burning for three days, and for the next 12 years the Mediterranean coast of Italy and France was polluted, especially around Genoa and southern France. It is the largest shipwreck on the ocean floor….

Our plan was to head to Italy and dive it ….. I had the pleasure of meeting a fantastic Italian diver named Luca Zanzotto while diving in Scapa Flow. He was a real cool guy and turned out that he ran his own dive centre on the coast of Italy near Portofino, Il Grande BLu .  We had  gotten along very well , and he invited us all out to his centre to dive with him  and meet the MT Haven in person 😀  So, as you do ,  Karon and I headed to Portofino with big wrecks on our mind.

Luca welcomed us with open arms, he is a big handsome friendly fellow with a calming disposition, huge smile and dive skills to rival Jacqes Cousteau 😀 . We were sure to have an amazing time !

His dive centre the Il Grande Blu was amazing !! Built into the  side of a coastal wall and equipped with everything a diver could want , from rec scuba to hard core trimix re-breather diving its got it all. And a workshop built into a cliff !!  I loved it !!

Soon it was time to dive and with a check dive under our belts we were soon in the boat headed out to sea … The Mohawk Deer at 50m 40-50m was superb and beautiful viz made the first day .  The following day was astounding ! Soon a visit to the UJ2216 KT wreck blew my mind !! WOW the diving in Portofino is unreal !! 🙂

After 3 days of progressively harder and deeper wreck diving we set off for the main event the “MT Haven” a long fast Rhib trip along the beautiful Italian coast line away. The journey there was astounding , such a beautiful coast , staggeringly so !!  However our eyes were on the prize and soon we were kitting up readying for the Haven.

We dropped over the Rhib , checked and sank headed for an ominous black shape below. At around 35m we hit the funnel and using this as a guide descended to the first deck and beyond until close to 55m. We had to be careful here and to follow our plan, keeping it tight. Karon is a fantastic diver and looked relaxed and in control as we had time to take in the sheer enormity of it all before ascending via the staircase, keep it interesting.

Exploring as we went up , soon we were in the control room and the upper decks.

Our dive plan was to short !!  I could have spent all day down there , it was the most amazing wreck I have ever been lucky to have dived. All too soon were heading back up the funnel and buoy lines to begin our decompression.

On our way back we stopped by the Christ of the Abyss sunken statue for a free dive , this was sunk here years ago and is a real eye opener !  I shook his hand quickly to say hello

What can I say about Portofino !!  not enough 🙂  its a beautiful place with world class diving. Il Grande blu will be a regular on my yearly calendar and I hope to bring my daughter along to learn to dive here …. for the rest I will let my photos do the talking.

 

“Wednesday 18th September 1907 wasn’t to be Captain John MacKechnie’s day when, at 11:45 am, his steamer the SS Kintyre got in the way of the SS Maori, which was undergoing trials in the Firth of Clyde. The Maori ploughed into Kintyre’s starboard quarter, causing her to sink in just four minutes. McKechnie was hauled, exhausted from the water, but William Lennox, his Chief Engineer drowned. After the impact MacKechnie had vainly steered the Kintyre towards the shore, which explains the wreck’s final orientation. The bow rests at around 30m and drops to the stern around 50m and can be a challenging dive for experienced divers”  C.Divers

Renowned as a true diving adventure the SS.Kintyre literally shouted out for me to visit it down in the depths of the Clyde. I am not sure where or when I first heard about the Kintyre but for some reason I had fixated on diving it for years. It had come up in a conversation between Neil and I and it turned out he had dived it with Karon, who at one time had actually lived on the sea front right next to the dive site. Neil said he would ask Karon and crew if they fancied a return visit. And as luck would have it everyone was keen.

 

We planned it for end of November , the tides and currents were right, the weather hopefully high pressure day arrived and thank the weather gods for a perfect high pressure sunny day.  I left Hawick early to arrive at Neil’s house in Glasgow for 7:30am.   Our plan was to be in the water for 10am high tide and slack , and out by 11:30 before the tide sucked us out into the Clyde.  We quickly headed towards lags and joined the Glasgow crew of John , Grant , Callum and the bubble queen herself Karon.

Our access was a rocky outcrop by the sea where we would drop into an 6m deep pool and swim out.  After a hard hour lugging our equipment down we finally entered the water just after 10am, gathered our group and took a bearing for the pipe then headed out and down into the darkness of the Clyde.

It’s a technical dive that needs to be respected , a long dive from shore with tides to plan, currents to watch for, dark , deep and with decompression commitments. Neil and I would cut our deco short with a tank of 50% which would also give us a good margin of safety should god forbid anything unplanned happen.We followed the pipe until a fixed line left it heading east at around 33m. We followed the line out into the darkness until a large Bow appeared from the gloom. We had struck lucky with our viz and could see at least 6m into our torchlight and the wreck looked very intact except for in places its substructure was bare making it look like a huge whale skeleton you see hanging in the museums.

We descended to 47m and at this point the wreck was broken and lying on the bottom so with deco clocking up and a little narcosis starting to fog the brain we reversed our dive and headed back up its carcass. Neil and I signaled to leave the wreck and we headed off up the line, eventually seeing the pipe welcoming us out the darkness to guide us topside and home.

At 18m we held , altered our computers and switched our gas to 50% , DECO had began and 25 minutes showed as we headed slowly up to 6m. The deco was easy playing around on a sandy bottom at 6m . And it was here that my infamous Irn-Bru deco movie was born , its amazing what you have to do to pass those deco minutes 😀

Eventually everyone had surfaced, the dive had been executed perfectly and everyone was safe and smiling. We were all buzzing as we sorted our gear and started the strenuous job of getting everything back to the car. I loved this dive , it was a fantastic micro-Adventure , it had everything I love about what I do, another amazing trip to see something fantastic and with good friends to share it with.   Result! another bucket-list dream accomplished.

Thanks again to Grant , John and Karon for the superb photos……