Malta deep wreck diving
If you subscribe to DIVER magazine you should have seen my Malta deep wreck diving article in this months issue about diving French Liner Le Polynesien(Poly). I have a soft spot for this wreck which I first dived back in 2003. I have added some extras here with a bit of narrative, obviously best enjoyed with the DIVER article as well.
My trip to Malta, allowing me to get the images for this article was run by Jack Ingle technical diving.
As well as the Poly I dived HMS Stubborn 55m, Schnell boat 63m and bow of HMS Southwold 70m. I lost one day deep diving to high winds but was able to dive the blue hole on Gozo that day.
If you want to do some great trimix diving in clear blue water I can thoroughly recommend a trip to Malta.
What I like about the Poly is that it remains a whole ship, you can almost envisage some of the cracks and holes being patched up to get her floating again, not many wrecks and certainly not many that are 125 years old remain in such good condition.
A number of artefacts can still be seen on the Poly that make her seem more real and perhaps most significantly after the bell is the ships wheel.
Aft steering position with rim of ships wheel
It can be difficult to work out what you are looking at in a picture but the circular structure is the rim of the wheel, the spokes having rotted away, there would have been 2 of these wheels on this steering position. The second one is on the seabed
Sea bed wheel rim
Sea bed rim with less marine growth is easier to understand! The next image is a closer view of the steering position with the central boss of both wheels clearly seen, the top of the trapped rim can also be seen.
If this could be seen in its working heyday it would be something like this:
Looking aft from this point gives a spectacular view of the stern gun.
Le Polynesien stern gun & diver
From the stern drop to the sea bed to take a look at the rudder and propellor of the ship:
Under the stern
When this ship was launched in 1890 propellor technology was still developing. The propellor has an unusual shape in comparison to later and more modern ships. The description in DIVER takes the trip back to deck level then forward over a jumble of wreckage:
moving forward over the engine
Then inside:
Entering the wreck
A number of different deck levels can be explored. Exit easily via the square structures that link the decks:
Forward cargo loading structure
A little way forward from here brings you to the anchor winches then forward gun. If currents are not too severe a look at the bow:
Looking down the bow
Finally the swim back to the shot-line and decompression:
Fabulous Malta deep wreck diving: Moving back towards the shot-line at the end of the dive
I think you could spend a whole week diving the Poly and not tire of her, there is just so much to see. Go and book that trip!