The trip was a joint expedition with ECSAC and St Ives (Cambs) SAC to dive the usually remote wrecks out of Dieppe France.

There were four of us from ECSAC, Steve Jan, Simon and Clare, and three from SISAC; Joe Paul and Dan. Three others from SISAC couldn’t make it due to various problem, so we had plenty of room on the boat. This was Channel Diver, skippered by Steve Johnson and his partner Caroline, a very large catamaran with on-board compressor.

We left Eastbourne Sovereign Marina around 8:30 am on Sunday and motored due south. The weather was glorious all week, and even the though the sea was choppy crossing to Dieppe, thereafter we had flat calm all week with excellent visibility of 5-10m, exceptional for the Channel.

The trip was focused on wreck diving, and was fairly technical, all of us diving twin sets and some with stages. SISAC brought some O2 cylinders so were blending nitrox between dives.

Most dives were 20-35m for around an hour. Sea temperature was a very pleasant 15C.

Enroute to Dieppe we did our first dive, the SS Oijfeld. This Norwegian steamship was built in 1912. She is 76m Long x 12m Beam. A 3 cylinder triple expansion engine sits exposed in the middle of the wreck with her 2 boilers side by side. This big wreck sits upright on an even keel at 35m rudder and big iron prop still in place. The visibility was excellent except for the ridiculously large shoals of bib, that reduced the visibility down to about 0.5m. This was a recurring theme on most of the dives. Plenty of large sea bass too, and pollack, conger, lobster and again ridiculous numbers of large spider crabs hiding the rust.

That evening we made ourselves at home in a 10 bed AirBnB apartment in the centre of Dieppe, enjoying a large lasagne provided by Joe.

Monday the 16th of June

The first full day had us diving Sperrbrecher 178 / Le Gauss on a low water slack.

This large merchantman some 232x36x14m was taken over by the German navy and used for escort duties. On the 11th of December 1942 she was attacked and sunk by British warships 8 miles to the north of Dieppe, there were only three survivors from the sinking. Today this wreck sits on an even keel with the bows being the highest point, she rests in only 25m of water and is very intact with a large gun on the bow and an accessible magazine store below. This used to be full of ammunition but seems to have been stripped out. The large hold is also accessible, leading to the stern with the rudder still there and an anti-aircraft mount on top. Again big shoals of bib and other fish around.

Plenty of surface interval (currents are strong here) until we then dived the SS Heim in 25m.

This was originally built as the SS Romanby by W Gray & Co, West Hartlepool in 1882. She was 78m x 10m x 6m, fitted with a 2-cylinder compound engine. She was sold to T.H. Skogland of Norway in 1899 and renamed SS Heim. On 18th April 1917 this ex British Cargo Steamer of 1,700 tons was on a voyage from Hull to Rouen with a cargo of coal when she struck a mine laid by UC-71 with the loss of 2 lives. The wreck is pretty broken up.

On Monday, Jan and Steve laid on a cheese and charcuterie supper, before an early bed.

Tuesday the 17th of June

Tuesday started with us diving an unknown wreck. We were supposed to be diving the Sperrbrecher 144 / Le Beijerland but just as we were about to descend the skipper was told by the French Coastguard we were diving in a restricted area, so we had to abandon that. Apparently they are about to build a large wind farm in that area and power lines were being laid. Either that or they were being cautious as there was a large quantity of spilled ammunition and shells all over this particular site.