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Technical Wreck Diving on the USS New York

Our team reconvened in Subic with great expectations. It was dry season now, and as we motored over the bridge into the base the water had a distinctly encouraging blue-green hue. Our last time was in the midst of a month of typhoon rains and the Bay had looked like a huge cup of coffee.

But this is one of the beauties of Subic Bay. One can always dive here. Even in foul weather, the water is sheltered enough to produce no more than a light chop, and though murky outside, the water within the wrecks will still be pretty clean. Add to that that in the past we had done two and a half hour dives at night in 3mm wet suits and still been warm enough to crave cold beer, rather than spilling hot chocolate everywhere with numb pruned fingers. How bad can it really be?

The team itself consisted of expats from around the region, Jerry and myself being escapees from the UK, and Steve Cox hailing from the States. The three of us had the advantage of having done a huge amount of technical diving together over the years, which puts the sixth senses very well in place. With our familiarity came a reassuring sense of trust that each could be totally relied upon if a dive ever became untidy. A very good feeling with which to commit to such tricky overhead dives.

Over four days we made twelve dives, eleven on the New York. It was so easy, tanks pumped, gear rigged, a ten minute boat ride on flat water - splash - a welcome relief from the heat. Heading down the ship is found laying on her port side with a mooring tied in at 20m/65ft just above the stern turret. The seabed is at 28m/95ft but she lies buried in the mud almost to her centerline which means depths of up to 34m/110ft can be reached within the wreck.

Entry to the wreck can be gained in several places. Hatchways in the gun deck around the eight inch guns of the stern turret, amidships near the boiler rooms, or through the gaping hole blasted in the side of the ship towards the bow. One curio, with the starboard side so badly blown out, why did the ship settle on its port? Some say the US Navy went to work on the wreck testing explosives after sinking, or maybe the port side bears even more damage? But for sure this is too far buried in the mud for divers to assess.

Opportunities to penetrate the hull start with dropping one level below the gun deck for swim through running almost the length of the ship. Daylight is generally evident here even though you can’t easily get at it. This deck was formerly ward rooms, galleys, and the ships head and washrooms to the stern. Many fittings were probably stripped prior to scuttling, but it is surprising to see intact wooden deck planking after so long in tropical salt water.

The challenges however, really lay in the guts of the ship. Quite clearly, turn of the century battle cruisers were not designed with crews comfort foremost in mind. Everything is tight. Have you ever been aboard a vessel where you made every move gingerly for fear of smacking your head on a valve or pipe, or stubbing a toe on some spitefully placed seacock? Exactly the feel the New York conveys. What a Godawful existence to have been a stoker on one of these things.

Here again though, lies the appeal of the dive. How far would you like to test your skills? One of the finest routes into the belly of the ship is to drop in through the blast damage and head sternward through open wreckage and dangling pipes to reach a hatchway in a bulkhead marked by the obligatory Grim Reaper ‘Go No Further..’ sign. Here an old encrusted polyprop line left by Hong Kong divers beckons you forward. This entrance had been introduced to us previously as the Tunnel of Death - all a bit much - and it somehow lives on in our logbooks as the Tunnel of Love - whatever, its a corridor right in the keel of the ship, the curve of the hull clear to the left as you dive it. It obviously gave access to some of the bunkers where coal was stored, visible as small compartments below you. Shortly before dead ending, it is possible to jack knife through a door way to another deck level where everything becomes confusing. This is what I presume engine rooms look like in 1890’s war ships. A mass of wheels, valves, boilers and steam pipes with no obvious walkways or decking, and, as noted, everything craftily positioned for unwary sailors to crack heads, bark their shins and scald themselves. Marvelous.

Perseverance in this area will have you eventually pop out into daylight amidships or astern with no clear concept of how it happened. We seemed to find a new route every time. Also within this fascinating maze, we forged far enough astern to meet the starboard prop shaft as it entered the hull, supported by huge A-frames, gears and bearings. A tremendous sight, with visibility only gradually dropping as snowflakes of rust percolated down from above.

As we explored new pathways we found the deeper areas had a habit of dead ending us in deep piles of accumulated silt, breakdown of hardwood fittings as well as mud intruding from outside the ship .In our efforts to turn and exit we almost inevitably produced silt outs to the extent that, HID lights or not, everything was just black - we couldn’t even see our own fingers on the line. Those were the moments where the teamwork and trust chimed in.

Out of this darkness and back to the bomb hole somehow made this particular exit seem even more stunning. Looming daylight, and clear clean water, a garden of gorgonian fans growing on the hull, and with Subics protected status, the water thick with fish. Every dive we had a school of Barracuda, Jacks feeding, small Groupers, cleaning stations to watch, and swarms of silver baitfish. A whole days diving could be spent just sitting atop the hull admiring this parade.

With such a short ride from the dock the three dive days, placed two and a half hours apart fit easily. An unforeseen change of compressor made us unwilling to blend Nitrox, so we dived with air on our backs and decompressed as previously intended on oxygen. Standard profiles soon emerged- as simple as 30m/100ft for 45 minutes every dive, which saw us heading out into open water with half our gas intact - more than enough to cover any unwarranted crisis. In spite of an air bottom mix, the oxygen kept the decompression in the 12-15minute range, given Nitrox it would have been only half of that, nicer still, but no great penalty in water that warm. All the plans were cut on Decoplanner software.

At this point it’s worth a mention that not all of Subic’s diving need not be as committed as that described above. In the past I have worked there as an instructor training Open Water students. Even the New York can be enjoyed by a diver at the basic level, just cruising its upper reaches admiring the fish life. And beyond this historic shipwreck there is a tremendous range of other wreck-reefs to explore. From the simple, shallow playground of the Grande Island Barges, through US Navy Landing Craft, the impressive 90m/300ft long freighter, El Capitan, the Spanish San Quentin dating back to 1898, plus Japanese Patrol Boats and the infamous Oryoku Maru, aka the ‘Hell Ship’.

All of the above can be viewed by strapping on a single tank, and in many cases, going no deeper than about 20m or 65ft. However on this occasion, technical diving, for the sheer fun of it, is what we had come for. Armed with the benefit of prior experience, we were able to throw ourselves into these dives fully prepared in terms of training, and a high degree of mental, physical and equipment preparation.

Long running open water deep diving experience had given us all an intimate experience with each others comfort levels, and with far more complex decompressions than we needed here. Training had been meticulous and thorough here the previous year, at the hands of Alex Santos of IANTD Philippines. Without the clear insights into communication, teamwork, line use and emergency management, that such training provides, one could not even begin to safely entertain dives of this level. Our equipment too, was utterly to our satisfaction. Almost identically configured and all the bugs long ago ironed out. We simply dove isolation DIN manifold Aluminum doubles, back plates and harness, and those unbelievably comfortable Halcyon wings. Apeks regulators never miss a beat and a Hogarthian hose routing gave us everything we needed, nothing that we didn’t. Lighting and guidelines were pretty much all by Extreme Exposure. Function was flawless - the way it should be. There is no excuse here for any piece of gear that causes a distraction from the dive or the other divers.

With all angles so well prepared and in place, the four diving days flew by smoothly and left us with nothing but satisfaction. As we slowly broke our gear down for our respective journeys home, the same feelings were there for all of us as last time. What a phenomenal wreck dive this one is. Historic, convenient, so close to shore, and at least at the technical level, so tremendously under exploited. I dare say we’ll be back…