Thistlegorm
The Thistlegorm was bombed and sunk in the early hours of 6th October 1941, making 2001 the 60th anniversary of the sinking, a fact drawn to my attention by Red Sea diving instructor John Kean, an enthusiast, who collects any information he can lay his hands on about the ship and working on a book about it.
Found in the 50’s then forgotten again, the Thistlegorm first appeared in Diver magazine early in 1993, when John Bantin wrote about it. “In October 1992, Simshon, an Israeli charter skipper, was told about a good site for fishing by bedouin fishermen,” he told me. “He was the person who rediscovered the Thistlegorm and told the other Israeli skippers.” Bantin’s article referred to “a unique opportunity to dive a wreck that has been virtually undisturbed for 50 years... this has to be the best shipwreck in the world.”
With an omen of things to come, John ended his report with a tearful comment about “the depressing noise of the wreck being vandalised” coming from a group that arrived just as his boat was departing. On his return a few months later and commented “I was shocked to witness the results of the diver activity which had already taken place. The souvenir hunters had already started their vandalism”.
Mark Hobday was on the wreck later that year. “It was my first liveaboard trip in coral waters. I had read John Bantin’s article and was astounded at how she was a real ‘time capsule’, just as he described her. The Thistlegorm will remain the best wreck dive ever, because it was so pristine and complete - upright and full of an army’s shopping list. What still sticks is being down first with no silt, floating into the hold with the collection of Bedford trucks. With powerful torches it was like lighting up the inside of an aircraft hanger on a war film set - all that was missing were the people.”
Photographer and diving journalist Gavin Anderson visited the wreck later in 1993 “I made 10 dives over 2 days” says Gavin. “Since then I have been back fairly regularly and must have made at least 50 dives on the Thistlegorm, all the time stretching it to the last breath of air.”
“After the first trip I wrote an article for Scotland’s Sunday Post. Ray Gibson, one of the survivors and third radio officer of the Thistlegorm, saw the article and got in touch. I travelled down to Preston and we had fish and chips sitting in his living room. It was one of those rare occasions where we both felt really privileged, me to meet someone from a part of history I had become really involved with, and him to meet someone who had dived the ‘old girl’ as he referred to the ship. It was the first he had even heard of the Thistlegorm since abandoning ship in 1941. After the sinking the survivors were just given their pay and assigned to other ships.”
Gavin’s most recent dive on the Thistlegorm was last year, collecting material for the now completed Lonely Planet guide to the Red Sea. He concluded: “even with deterioration caused by the sheer number of divers, it is still the best wreck I have ever dived”.
Caroline Hawkins was the producer and director of the BBC documentary ‘Last Voyage of the Thistlegorm’, first shown in 1994. “I consider myself extremely fortunate to have been one of the first to dive the Thistlegorm in 1992” says Caroline “At that time she was quite a well-kept secret. Only a handful of skippers knew of her existence and no day boats were visiting.”
“It blew my mind. She was a diver’s dream, upright, largely intact and full of cargo. I thought ‘Someone’s going to make a film about this. I’m a diver, a producer and a director. It’s going to be ME!’ ”
“My friend and assistant producer Sally Lindsay spent hours trawling through records, painstakingly piecing together each part of the story. She got hold of Merchant Navy records, electoral registers and retired seamen’s associations. Each day brought a new revelation. It was unbelievably exciting.”
“As our research progressed, one thing started to become very clear to us: The largely unrecognised bravery of the Merchant Navy. They suffered appalling losses. One in four merchant seaman died. That’s a higher proportion than that suffered by any of the armed forces. I felt that through Thistlegorm’s story I could in some way paint the bigger picture.”
“When we finally met Harry (Engineer Officer), Glyn (RN DEMS Gunner), Ray (Third Radio Officer), John (MN Able Seaman ) and Denis (Marine Gunner on the rescue ship HMS Carlisle) it was a humbling experience. For most the memories were painful, but without exception they generously told us their stories and helped us in every way they could. They became very special friends to us and although many of them have passed away since we made our film in 1994, I feel a certain contentment at having recorded their bravery in 1941.”
By 1998 popularity and demand had turned the Thistlegorm from the exclusive preserve of a few live-aboards to a mainstream destination for day boats. Overcrowding was now an established feature of the wreck.
“Being a well organised liveaboard we arrived early so the first dive was uncrowded, but Piccadilly Circus was not in it later on!” says Simon Hayter. “Ours was a fairly small boat and I don’t think we were there on a particularly busy day. We went down in pairs but day boats seemed to literally tip divers off by the bucket load. We had strict instructions to ascend via the line to avoid being run down or squashed.”
Simon is an experienced diver, but the first to admit he is not much of a wreckie. He continues from that point of view: “Some of the other Red Sea wrecks are more picturesque, being up against a reef so you can swim up to the shallows and see a greater variety of reef life. That said, the Thistlegorm is still a pretty good in terms of an intact-ish wreck and certainly swarming with fish.”
Mike and Lindsay Gibbons also dived the Thistlegorm from a liveaboard. They didn’t mind the number of divers, but boats were another thing: “We arrived very early and spent the whole day there, ending up with a night dive on the wreck. That meant that we did 4 dives in all. We enjoyed them despite the large numbers of other divers.”
“The thing that really spoiled the experience for us was overcrowding on the surface. There must have been about 30 boats in the area. Combined with the skippers’ disregard for human life and property this was a lethal combination. We were doing a safety stop on our boat’s line when another boat crashed into it destroying a section of railing. If we had been a couple of metres shallower we would probably have lost our heads.”
For a wreck that so many of us have dived, I have to admit that it was only at the start of last year that I lost my Thistlegorm virginity, diving from a long day boat trip from Sharm-el-Sheikh. I teamed up with another experienced diver and we did our own thing outside of the guided groups.
We had a couple of very enjoyable dives, but personally I wouldn’t rate the Thistlegorm any higher than many other warm and cold water wrecks I have visited. Having said that, it does have one of the more interesting collections of cargo.
Alex Poole, one of my more regular partners for UK dives, visited the Thistlegorm a few weeks later “Most people seem to class it as a world class wreck, but I think it depends what you want out of a dive” says Alex. “For a competent diver the Thistlegorm is a pleasant, easy dive. For the dedicated wreckie I think it is a bit of a disappointment.”
“Personally I don’t think it is in the same league as wrecks like the Murree out of Dartmouth, or the Markgraf in Scapa Flow. The depth involved makes these rather more challenging dives. The Thistlegorm was a wreck I had been really looking forward to, everyone seems to rave about it. Perhaps this had raised my expectations unrealistically high.”
“We arrived on site along with 15 other boats, all determined to put their divers in the water at exactly the same time. As you can imagine it was chaos.”
There was only one dive guide on Alex’s boat, so as an instructor he got roped in to leading half the customers, despite having paid for his trip: “The only part of the dive I enjoyed was when the group got lost briefly. I was diving with a twin set, which meant I was easy to see and follow - until a boatload of techies turned up going in the opposite direction! I eventually found my group again in the third hold. I did however enjoy the peace and tranquillity of my brief solo exploration.”
“I don’t consider it very responsible letting a boat full of inexperienced divers, many of them having completed less than 10 dives, loose on a wreck in 30 plus metres with a screaming surface current.”
“Two of the divers on our boat aborted as soon as they discovered this. Another pair ended up shooting to the surface when one discovered her air was turned off! I am sure this is not an uncommon experience with the number of divers visiting the site, I am just amazed that there aren’t more casualties!”
“Overall this was not an experience I would like to repeat. Perhaps I might consider it again, if I was diving from a liveaboard with a group I knew. As it was, I think I just experienced package diving at its very worst.”
So what does a dedicated deep diving wreckie think of the Thistlegorm? Who better to ask than deep diving record holder Mark Andrews. “I dived the Thistlegorm in April 1998” says Mark. “It was a bit hyped but worth a couple of dives. Compared to other wrecks in the Red Sea it is one of the better wrecks as it is steeped in history, full of general cargo, trucks, steam engines and bikes. Not your normal wreck contents!”
“I saw the Cousteau video when he discovered it. He was not the most environmentally friendly diver, lifting cases of guns and bike parts. Since then all the bike badges are gone, speedo’s, anything that can easily be dispatched. I even saw people’s names carved on parts of the wreck and what year they dived, they are turning it into a public toilet.”
“The guides were pretty good, although too good at times as I wanted to penetrate it beyond the normal holds and they said no. I ‘accidentally’ got lost and found myself in the belly of the ship; there are still lots of goodies in her that the average diver will never see!”
“The wreck is now an accident waiting to happen. The holds are buckled badly and it won’t be long before they come crashing down. We have a similar problem with some of the mid channel wrecks, but the difference is that very few people visit these deep cold water wrecks and so are unlikely to be there when bulkheads give way. The Thistlegorm has hundreds of divers per week and the chances are very high that divers will be present when this happens. Maybe it’s about time to stop the penetration dives but then who would want to dive her?”
John Kean also commented on the structure of the wreck: “Dive guides must be careful about where they tie in mooring lines. Weaker parts of the wreck can easily be damaged by a badly located line. They need to pick a strong point on the wreck such as the anchor winch.”
“In the long term our local diving association wants to install permanent moorings and ban tying in to the wreck altogether.”
Maybe the magic of the wreck is best appreciated by less experienced divers who make up the great bulk of Red Sea diving package customers.
Just back from the Red Sea, Michael Trefall dived the Thistlegorm in April of this year by day boat from Sharm. “When we arrived at the dive site I was surprised to find 4 dive boats already there, 3 more close behind us, and our guide commenting that diving should be good as it wasn’t too crowded. Fortunately, the groups seemed to stagger their dives and not too many people swarmed the wreck at any one time.”
“This was my first wreck dive and I was more than a little nervous at the prospect. Our guide gave a thorough briefing with every eventuality was covered and question answered so that, by the time we entered the water, I was more than comfortable with what was to come.”
“I’ve listened to people rave about this dive for years, but I did not anticipate the eerie sense of history I felt when I entered the hull of the boat. It was more than just visual. It is evident that people have been taking souvenirs for quite some time. Even so, the wreck is still in incredible condition.”
Personally, I like to think the Thistlegorm has been at least partly responsible for attitude changes towards wrecks amongst UK divers. Over the last decade we have seen a growing swing away from tool kits and salvage to an almost universal ‘Respect Our Wrecks’.
I don’t think this would have happened without the growth in overseas dive travel, particularly to the Red Sea and the wreck of the Thistlegorm. Most UK wrecks have been broken by storms and explosives, either to clear the sea for navigation or for commercial salvage. Travelling divers got to see pristine wrecks in clear tropical waters, protected as a valuable asset by the local dive operators.
Damage by souvenir hunters or just plain vandalism is readily visible on wrecks such as the Thistlegorm and abhorred by the vast majority of visiting divers. We are now seeing this concern transferred back to wrecks in our home waters. Various action groups may have nudged us in the right direction, but I give UK divers the credit that we would have got round to respecting UK wrecks on our own sooner or later.
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