DEEPER INTO THE DARKNESS
Published by
Whittles Publishing Ltd.,
Dunbeath,
Caithness, KW6 6EG,
Scotland, UK
© 2018 Rod Macdonald
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise without prior permission of the publishers.
ISBN 978-184995-360-3
Printed by
Also by Rod Macdonald:
Dive and history guides:
Dive Scapa Flow
Dive Scotland’s Greatest Wrecks
Dive England’s Greatest Wrecks
Great British Shipwrecks — a Personal Adventure
Force Z Shipwrecks of the South China Sea — HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse
Dive Truk Lagoon —the Japanese World War II Pacific Shipwrecks
Dive Palau — the Shipwrecks
Shipwrecks of Truk Lagoon
The Technical Diving Trilogy: diving adventures, from novice diver to mixed-gas closed-circuit rebreather technical diver
1. Into the Abyss — Diving to Adventure in the Liquid World
2. The Darkness Below
3. Deeper Into the Darkness
http://www.whittlespublishing.com/Rod_Macdonald
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Rod-Macdonald
CONTENTS
Book one World War I Naval Wrecks around the UK
4 Explorers Club Flag No 192 expedition to survey HMS Hampshire
6 The Battle of May Island 31 January 1918
10 Diving the shipwrecks of Truk Lagoon
11 IJN Kamikaze-class destroyer Oite
Book Three Latest Developments
17 The desecration of naval war graves in the South China Sea, Java Sea and Jutland
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
As ever, I am grateful to my long time (and long-suffering) dive buddies, Paul Haynes, Gary Petrie and Greg Booth, for taking part in my adventures in the UK and around the world in such far-flung places as Truk and Palau.
For providing some wonderful underwater shots, I am grateful to Bob Anderson of the Scapa Flow-based dive boat MV Halton, and Ewan Rowell, Barry McGill and Richard Barnden.
I am also grateful to those in the many dive centres and dive boats who have gone out of their way to accommodate my unusual requests when out of the blue I pitch up on their doorsteps with an idea for another book, determined to dive only metal, and avoid at all costs fish, fauna and wet rock:
In Scapa Flow, I inflict myself on Bob Anderson and the MV Halton, and Ben Wade and Emily Turton of the MV Huskyan.
In Truk Lagoon, Truk Stop Dive Center & Hotel on Weno are particularly accommodating of my needy requests, kindly assigning a private boat to my team where needed.
In Palau, I use Sam’s Tours based in Koror, where they have a great setup and location. Without exception, Sam’s is staffed by lovely people who also go out of their way to accommodate my requests to dive the World War II shipwrecks, which are mainly overlooked by visiting divers in favour of the stunning reef and wall diving, truly some of the best in the world.
In Guadalcanal, I used Tulagi Dive based at the Point Cruz Yacht Club in Honiara, where Neil Yates and Troy effortlessly and expertly sorted me out.
For archive photographs, I am grateful to the Imperial War Museum (IWM), Orkney Library and the U.S. National Archives.
Finally I’d like to say thank you to my editor, Caroline Petherick, for all her hard work bringing this book together. Over the years I’ve struggled with some editors of my books due to the technical nature of diving, ships and the nautical terminology involved. But Caroline has worked with me on my last three books – and seems to be all things to all people. As well as being a gifted wordsmith, she dives, has a pilot’s licence, and has a good grasp of the sea and all things nautical. It has been a pleasure dealing with her again.
Cover shoot
When looking to come up with an eye-catching cover image for the book I managed to prevail upon Bob Anderson, skipper of the Scapa Flow dive boat MV Halton. Rather than a blurry, dark underwater image, a sharp, moody image of a diver at the