The time-honoured adage to ‘ dive the plan ’ is crucial when it comes to finding your way across a wreck , says Kirsty Andrews
KIRSTYANDREWS
Go with the plan
The time-honoured adage to ‘ dive the plan ’ is crucial when it comes to finding your way across a wreck , says Kirsty Andrews
Be prepared . My scouting motto , and pretty applicable to scuba too . How much preparation time do you spend ? On this occasion I ’ m not talking about your equipment or your personal diving skills , although I certainly believe those benefit from preparedness pre-dive . I ’ m thinking of the time put in in advance to gain knowledge of your chosen site .
Personally , I ’ ve been a bit of a late bloomer when it comes to dive site knowledge . I ’ d visited Scapa Flow on no less than three separate occasions before I really put much thought into what I was seeing . I ’ m not proud of that , by the way , but I do cut myself a bit of slack ; at first I was relatively new to diving those depths , and my focus ( as far as I can remember ) was the experience of going that little bit deeper , or getting used to twinset diving , or planning my decompression stops in a rather regimented way , or just having a giggle with my university mates on a holiday trip . All worthwhile endeavours .
Don ’ t get me wrong , I enjoyed the lure of the rusty metal and I had some memorable moments , but there wasn ’ t a lot of method to it . I still remember fondly my first favourite swim-through on the light cruiser SMS Cöln , which sadly collapsed in on itself some years since . The thrill of being surrounded by wreckage , squidgy dead man ’ s fingers and juvenile fish on all sides - a longish swim-through , but with an easy obvious exit ; penetration for beginners . Not a technically special part of the wreck , but a highlight for me in my formative years .
A few years passed and I dived the Flow from a different boat , with skipper Emily Turton , whose dive briefings are quite rightly legendary . What they are not is brief - you may well spend upwards of half an hour going over the dive plan , covering the history of the wreck and a proposed route for the dive , with the aid of photos , sonar side scans and drawings . I vividly remember diving the battleship Markgraf after one of these briefing sessions and it was an entirely new experience , as if I was seeing and understanding the wreck for the first time . As I navigated the ‘ gun run ’ past intact portholes towards the famous rudders , I was ( quite a rare experience for me even now ) following the set route to the letter . I had , if you will , planned the dive and dived the plan .
At this point I must say that I am happy flitting between the dive boats of Scapa ; I ’ ve spent time on most of them and invariably had a lovely experience . They are all quite different and I appreciate each for various reasons . In a crowded field of impressive expertise , Emily does get the gold trophy for briefings though .
“ I had , if you will , planned the dive and dived the plan ”
Even in the absence of a helpful skipper - and the knowledge amassed by the Orkney collective is formidable - I do now try , on my own account , to do as much research as possible in advance of the dive . I know it will pay dividends in enabling me to navigate and appreciate the site once I ’ m immersed .
There ’ s plenty of information available for the enquiring mind . I have an old-school book collection to start with but then there ’ s helpful websites and even incredibly useful photogrammetry projects in many cases , so you can truly visualise the dive . Thank you to the generous souls who made those available to the masses . We ’ re lucky to have these resources , to really make the most of our all-too-brief in-water time . �
Investigating the turrets on the SMS Bayern salvage site , Scapa Flow
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