The intact remains of the scuttled German fleet of, U-boats, steamers, tugs and Churchill's extraordinary 'Blockships'

Scapa Flow has been used as an anchorage since the days of the Vikings, and through two world wars. Situated on the north East coast of Scotland it is a large expanse of water surrounded by a ring of Islands known as the Orkney Isles. Scapa Flow is a natural harbour providing shelter to the worse of the weather, being blown out on a dive is rare, and Scapa Flow is with out doubt the finest wreck diving location in the UK. And here's why

On the 21st June 1919 Admiral Von Reuter ordered the high seas German Fleet to scuttle. This consisted of 74 ships being sent to the depths of Scapa Flow, 10 battle ships 6 battle cruisers 8 light cruisers and 50 destroyers. Out of the 74 ships 52 went to the bottom and 22 were beached or saved by armed naval boarding parties. Salvage operations by Messrs Cox and Danks and later by Metal Industries ltd and Scapa Salvage raised 45 ships.

The German fleet wrecks are great diving no doubt of that but that's not all what Scapa is about we have scrap sites from previously salvaged ships we have block ships in shallow fast tidal waters, wrecks like the Gobernador Bories a Chilean registered steamer sunk in Burra Sound in 1915 is the one for the photographer, this wreck is just teaming with life, the large Ballen and Cuckoo Wrasse really do expect to be fed with sea urchins from visiting divers, honest if you don't feed them they'll bite you. The average depth of this dive is around 15 meters, and the viz well, check it out.

There are seven ships from the fleet which are S.M.S Kronprinz, Koing, Markgraf, Dresden, Brummer, Karlsuhe, and Koln.

August (13-20th) 2005 we travelled to Orkney and dived for one week from MV Karin Liveaboard, in the famous Scapa Flow. This area is famous for the WW1 Scuttled Fleet and on the 21st June 1919 Admiral Von Reuter ordered the high seas German Fleet to scuttle. This consisted of 74 ships being sent to the depths of Scapa Flow, 10 battle ships 6 battle cruisers 8 light cruisers and 50 destroyers.

M/V Karin
      
Mato and Slav, scenery and a gun poking out from one of the wrecks, and Serena.

There are seven ships from the fleet which are S.M.S Kronprinz, Konig, Markgraf, Dresden, Brummer, Karlsuhe, and Koln.

We dived them all apart from the Konig. The viz was a constant 15m and water was a cool but acceptable 12c. The Battleships were turtle (Upside down) but some did leave huge cavern like swim throughs for us to explore.

The boat we used as a Liveaboard was not quite up to Red Sea standard. However, we had a good dive deck area and gas filling was made easy by Little John extending a compressor whip to reach each divers tanks. Our pre-booked brunch was a hearty meal for any hungry sailor which kept us going to about... now actually. I am still trying to loose the weight and digest all that mince.

The amazing thing about these wrecks is the shear size. Quite often we were told where to dive and after realised what a short distance along each wreck we ventured. Plus often missing the huge turrets and guns. We have become experts on 5.9" and 12" guns now and had to revisit Kronprinz Wilhelm to confirm our sightings of the half berried 12" guns.

Marine life included Scorpion Fish, Lobsters,friendly Wrasse,Crown of Thorns and many brittlestars covering areas of the wrecks.

I would highly recommend any diver visiting these virtually intact wrecks. The depths were around 30m so any recreational diver would be suitably pleased.