Diving
The SS Thistlegorm
John Kean
A
trip around Thistlegorm today is like traveling through time and many visitors
experience high emotions during the dive. It is after all a bombsite with highly
visible signs of great destruction and loss. It's also a giant underwater
museum, a war grave, a unique piece of military history and an opportunity to
step into the past during a period when the free world was under threat from one
of the most tyrannous regimes of modern times.
Sunk
by German bomber planes in World War Two, SS Thistlegorm has lain at the bottom
of the sea for over sixty years. Located in the Straits of Gubal, Northern Red
Sea this famous vessel has been the subject of much activity and drama during
its two lives as both a seagoing merchant ship and as a world-class diving site.
Despite extensive public knowledge and interest in Thistlegorm, it will continue
to inspire a sense of mystery. Jacques Cousteau's visit in 1955 remains the
subject of much discussion and like the legend himself Thistlegorm continues to
attract speculation and controversy from beyond the grave.
Divers
can visit the wreck from Sharm El Sheikh by daily boat or during a weeklong
safari. Located on a bed of just thirty metres in good visibility this is the
perfect wreck dive where much of the original cargo still remains. The bow is
just fifteen metres below the surface and the propeller at twenty-seven.
Measuring over four hundred feet long, SS Thistlegorm often requires several
dives to complete an extensive coverage, inside and out.
Currents
may occasionally be strong; however, mooring lines tied by the guide allow
divers to make a comfortable descent to the shelter of the wreck. Once inside,
divers can explore the ship's holds where time has seemingly stood still.
Motorbikes, trucks, guns and wartime cargo, never to reach its destination, lay
stacked where it was loaded back in 1941.
It
must be said, that even after several hundred dives on Thistlegorm, such is the
allure it holds for divers, that there is always something new to see. Very
recently, a local diver claims that he stumbled across a newly discovered
locomotive some one hundred and fifty metres from the wreck. The race is on to
reach and photograph the engine together with the ship's funnel, both of which,
allegedly, are still attached to the deck blown clean off the ship by the
explosion.
Diving
SS Thistlegorm requires certification as a trained diver, beyond entry level,
through a recognised scuba training agency. In any event, divers visit the wreck
at their own risk.
Crew
Interviews:
Excerpts from live interviews
with actual survivors of
SS Thistlegorm under attack in 1941:
Glyn
Owen
"I
heard a plane making what appeared to be a second run or at least sounded like a
diving run and my training I suppose came out and I just flung myself out of my
hammock on the deck beneath and crouched behind a winch and then there was just
two explosions and a mass of flame and my hammock above my head caught
fire."
Ray
Gibson
…"I
was on watch behind the bridge, and next thing there was a big bang and I
realised we had been either bombed or torpedoed, one of the two, but we'd been
hit by enemy action….."
Angus
McLeay
"I
made for the side to jump overboard and the rail was almost red-hot under my
hand. I don't know why, but, just as I was going to jump, I looked back and saw
the gunner crawling along the deck on the other side. The deck was covered with
broken glass and I had to take the bits out of my feet before I could carry the
gunner through the flames, which came up to my chest in places."
John
Whitham
"I was
on watch at twelve o'clock and about one o'clock we heard the sound of aircraft.
We looked across to the Carlisle and there was nothing indicating from her and
the sound of the aircraft got nearer and the first thing that we realised was
that he was planting a few bombs on us, which, unfortunately, dropped in number
four hold, possible number five, but number four I do know, because there was
some flames shooting out from there and we……we'd quite a good fire going for
a while."
Denis
Gray
"…it
seemed like two or three minutes I would think, that this huge explosion took
place and of course we were looking in the direction of the Thistlegorm at the
time and shortly after the explosion there was a huge sheet of flame which lit
up both sides of the Red Sea at that point, we could see it light up the Mount
Sinai on one side and Egypt on the other side and all the ships and everything
around and then all of a sudden there seemed to be a second explosion and still
looking in that d irection we were amazed to see what turned out to be a railway
engine and it was red hot with sparks flying from it and it was coming in our
direction."
Leverbaar
Price: Euro 37,50