Wey Chieftain for diving, Chesil Chieftain for searching.

The brief was, we wanted a stable platform with low speed stability for sonar work, we also needed a turn of speed to get on site quickly and take advantage of the little bit of good weather we get. Additionally we also required a vessel that we could dive from occasionally. Economy was another major factor as it is me that is funding all this! After searching the UK we have come up with this little catamaran “Star” to be renamed Chesil Chieftain and stuffed full of electronic wizardry. She is a fantastic little vessel built by BW Seacat the builders of Wey Chieftain 4. At last we will have a search vessel fully and permanently equipped ready to go at the press of a button. Her navigation and data acquisition systems mimic those of her big sister so a flash card transfers the data from search boat to dive boat instantly and we get to dive exciting new sites. Not bad me thinks and I am already turning my attention to the next project. Diving might be going through a bad time right now but I have never been one to give up or let the grass grow. 2012, bring it on.

The real threat to our underwater heritage

Our open access to the underwater world is under threat on the basis that divers/treasure hunters are destroying our underwater heritage. The photograph courtesy of Jason Brown is an illustration of what is really destroying our heritage, trawling, dredging and this is a supposedly protected site (Protection of Military Remains Act 1986). This aircraft site and a two hundred year old wreck nearby are covered in rope, wire and net, both of these sites are uncharted and were found by us using sidescan. You can’t be too hard on the fisherman if they didn’t know they were there, why don’t we put our efforts into locating sites at risk so we can protect them from destructive commercial operations such as fishing and dredging? Rather than talking about them and then restricting access even though we don’t know where they are. Ah problem, we would need the help and cooperation of amateur divers and amateur marine archaeologists, Catch 22 comes to mind.

Chesil Project 2012

Over the last seven years we have been gathering sidescan data out to a distance of a mile off Chesil beach. It has been interesting to see how the beach constantly changes and pieces of wreckage come and go all the time. That said we now have enough pointers in the form of cannons anchors etc to be able to pinpoint some specific wreck sites. This has come about from our own discoveries and that of local historian and diver Selwyn Williams, Selwyn and I will be working together on this project over the next few years. Knowing where these sites are such as the Piedmont from Christian’s fleet wrecked in 1795 will enable us to watch them as the beach moves back and forth, some years hardly anything will show, other times there will be much to see and investigate. When parts of wooden ships become dislodged and uncovered sadly they don’t last long and after the winter storms many pieces such as in the photograph are exposed and soon degrade. Interesting little design on this piece can you see it? I have spent a lot of time recently mapping out sites from sonar contacts and diving information and slowly we are starting to unlock the Chesil, 2012 will for sure turn out to be our best year yet, watch this space.

"It's just an old fishing boat not worth diving" Is that so.

Most of our time is devoted to hunting for old shipwrecks but occasionally we digress. The Rowella sank in May of this year and not long after she went down we located her with sidescan. I thought divers would be all over her during the summer when the position became known but imagine our surprise when in September looking for a photo opportunity Simon and Jason Brown were able to descend to an untouched wreck. The images across the deck and from inside the wheelhouse are very eerie and I defy anyone to say that this old fishing boat isn’t a magnificent sight in her new underwater world. The BSAC magazine Scuba features the Rowella this month and a nice piece by Simon Brown.

To dive or not to dive?

Running the boat single handed, following a track and operating the sidescan at the same time does tend to make things a little busy. I leave the analysis till I have time to sit down and go through the data on the big screen at home. Just lately due to the weather I have had chance to start catching up. The image is 75 metres across left to right and shows an area of Stenis ledges west of Portland Bill. On the left of the image you can see a straight line sticking out from the ledge which doesn’t look natural and top right you can see four similarly shaped objects in a group, this also doesn’t look natural. Didn’t see it on the boat, stands out like a sore thumb now. So are we going to dive it? Of course we are that is what the Project is all about, you don't know for sure till you look and you have to be in it to win it.
Click on the image to enlarge.

Images of sound

Jason Brown and I have been experimenting with some of our sonar images for a project related job. It's fun but time consuming however I think we are getting some interesting results, click on the image to enlarge.

Making the most of the rubbish weather

I am surrounded by charts, documents, scraps of paper and hours and hours of sidescan images as I build a new database, reckon it will take most of the winter on and off. Folk still find it hard to understand that anything is left undiscovered which amuses me. On the last official survey around here in 2009 the survey team rang me up because they couldn’t find a particular wreck and just going through some of the data from that survey I see they have a wreck site down as a natural feature! Granted we aren’t going to find a dozen ten thousand ton ships but with the equipment now available we are about to enter a new age of shipwreck discovery, It’s all out there.