Latest Dive Reviews

May 20, 2013 - Truk Lagoon

"After many months of waiting, the time was finally here and we were off to Truk, a place many of us had been wanting to dive for 20 years. Truk Lagoon was one of the Japanese naval bases durign WW2 and came under attack from the US navy in Operation Hailstone. About 70 Japanese wrecks now litter the huge lagoon, most of which are in easily diveable depths.

After 25 hours of flying and loitering in airports, we finally made it to Truk. The Island itself was not much to look at with new cars and busted up houses but the diving was absolutely spectacular.

We did 18 dives in total which doesn't seem like much but the 2 dives a day that we did were long and usually entailed about 30 minutes of deco per dive so we had alot of time to explore each wreck.

Most of the wrecks in the lagoon were merchant ships taken over for the war so the dives involved investigating engine rooms, a number of holds , bridges and following dark passages to see where they went. In the wrecks were everything from limpet mines, cars, bulldozers, trucks, complete zero fighter planes, bullets, bombs, torpedoes, etc... Many of the wrecks were in 35-40 meters and some even came up to about 5 meters making for great multilevel diving. Many of the wrecks were 120 meters long and some were about 150m long.

There was plenty of fish life around the wrecks with schools of fish present as well as sharks and turtles. There was significant hard and soft coral growth as well as some colourful gorgonians adorning the wrecks which added a whole new element.

One dive we all enjoyed was the San Francisco Maru which was a very stylish looking freighter that sits upright in 62 meters of water. The clarity of the water, the miniature tanks sitting on the deck, the holds loaded with ammunition, the amazing bow gun and the sleek bow made this a standout dive. Either that or it was the narcosis :). We enjoyed it so much we did it twice.

Anybody who likes wrecks will love this place. Why dive one Coolidge when you can dive 70? Absolutely spectacular !"
By Andrew Burt