The Spital

By Mark Milburn on 14 October 2008

Torpedoed by U-93

The Spital was a steamship carrying coal and an unspecified cargo. It weighed in at 4718 tons and measured 119m long, this was a decent size ship. It was torpedoed by U-93 on the 5th of January 1918 and now lies about 4 miles S.S.E. of St Anthony Head. The co-ordinates on the map are an estimate, as I do not have the exact co-ordinates.

This was the second dive of the weekend, a little deeper than yesterday at around 64m. Bottom times were going to be a little shorter and decompression times were going to be a little longer. I had planned for just 22 minutes on the bottom, do a little filming and then sit out the deco.

Feeling good

We left the Quay at around 11am, excitement was high, yesterdays dive wasn’t the best and we were hoping for a good one. We had heard of a few good reports, and the skipper said it sat 5m off of the sea bed. It wasn’t a long way out and we arrived at the site very quickly. Ash went in first to tie the shot in, once it was tied in everyone took turns at kitting up and jumping in.

When it was my turn, I jumped in and made my way to the shot. I usually set up the video light at the shot, but the sea was a little rough so I decided to do it on my descent. I hooked my arm around the rope, dumped my air, and went plummetting down while I aligned my video light. It wasn’t long before the shotline levelled out and I was in sight of parts of the wreck. I immediately started trying to find things to film, I usually like my first visit to be with my stills camera. I like to do that as it gives me time to look around, get an idea of the lie of the land and of something that I might want to film later. But, my new camera housing had only just arrived and I hadn’t had time to play with it, so it was going to be the video camera first visit.

Standing tall

The wreckage is quite abundant and there are lots of bits that are upright, not the usual flat plates and spars. The highest point I found was about 58m, as opposed to the sea bed at 64m. Ther were lots of bit lying around, a big cooking pan, all sorts of little bits, you would ideally need a lot of bottom time to explore properly. At just deeper than 60m that would be a huge dive, it will have to be done in several dives.

Life

All the normal Cornish wreck life was present, Plumose anemones were the most abundant, Dead Mans Fingers, Sea Fans, Cup Corals and Sea Squirts. The fish were quite shy and tried to avoid the camera lights, but I managed to see quite a few Bib and Wrasse of different types. It wasn’t long before my 22 minutes were up and I arived back at the shotline to start my 50 minute ascent.

Summary

The Spital is a large wreck with a lot of parts still intact. It doesn’t get dived very often due to its depth, and when it does get dived it is only for short run times. I would be happy to dive this wreck several times more, in fact I am back again in 5 weeks. Next time I won’t take my video camera, but I will spend as much time as I can looking around. I might even bring back some coal, if I can find the cargo area. Although it is listed as carrying coal with a single gun on it, locals believe it was a liner, probably due to its size. Whatever it was, it is a great dive.

Contact

Author: Mark Milburn
Email: info@travel-dive.com

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