dcpac
Registered
On the 18th of March 2005 Thomas Johnson and I departed Tokyo for the 12 hour drive to Hiroshima in order to dive the remains of a Nagato class battleship named Mutsu.
During WWII the Mutsu took part in both the battle of Midway and the attack on Pearl Harbor. On the 8th of June 1943 the Mutsu exploded while moored Hiroshima bay. The ship was broken in two by the explosion with the 535 foot forward section sinking immediately and the 147 foot aft section sinking 14 hours later. 1200 lives where lost on that day in 1943.
There is still some mystery as to what caused the explosion. It was quickly ruled out that any Allied forces where the cause. Some eyewitness accounts report seeing a reddish brown fireball indicating a magazine explosion, and some other people reported seeing smoke around the number 3 turret before the explosion. Divers checked the wreck and reported that there was no evidence of an external explosion and after several months of investigation it was decided that saboteurs or a crewmen in the number 3 turret that was accused of theft caused the explosion. During the war holes were cut to salvage the much needed oil and in the 1970s part of the bow, anchors, screws, rudders and the # 4 turret were salvaged.
As a growing group of DIR divers in the Tokyo we began looking for more interesting sites to dive. The first wreck of interest that we heard about was the Mutsu and after hearing different reports as to what was left of the Mutsu and at what depth, we decided to give it a try and find out for ourselves. We departed at 0800 on Saturday morning for the 1 ½ hour boat ride to the wreck. We would be using aluminum stages with 21/35 as a bottom stage so that we could safely make two dives on one set of doubles that also contained 21/35 and we would use 50% as deco gas. We planned the dives for an average depth of 39m with a bottom time of 30 minutes and 25 minutes of deco. The weather was beautiful with a calm sea as we made our final checks, much to the interest of the boat crew who had never seen doubles, stages and maybe even people actually doing buddy checks. Once we entered the water we found out that it was 10 degrees Celsius, 6 degrees colder than near the Tokyo area and visibility was about 3 meters. We headed to the forward part of the wreck to try and find one of the main guns that still remained. We found it almost immediately at 38m we then continued around the wreck looking for points of possible penetration. The wreck is resting upside and there is a large debris field around the wreck. After 20 minutes we started to head back to the up line which proved to be a good idea because we were having trouble finding the up line, due to poor visibility and large debris field everything was looking the same. We ended up finding the up line which saved us from shooting a bag and drifting during deco. The next 3 dives we used a reel tied off near the up line to avoid and further navigation problems, and we did some light penetration finding gas masks and various other equipment inside. Outside of the wreck there is little sea life but tons of debris we had a good time trying to figure out what some of the material was we were looking at. We also preformed rescue operation on a rather large fish that was caught up in one of the many nets that cover the wreck.
It was an interesting dive and something you should check out if ever in the area but is very silty with low visibility year round, and with the wreck having been heavily salvaged and up side down, it is not a dive that I would do often. It was cool looking at it and imaging what it once was and how that fateful day played out when it went down. I would not dive this wreck on air or try to penetrate again due to the depth, fishing nets and severe silt. Recreational divers do dive it but I would not recommend that either since upon surfacing from our last dive Thomas ended up lending one of the recreational divers that was complaining of pain and tingling in both legs one of my used 50% bottles . We switched him over to 100% that we had brought and had the captain head back in to the nearest drop off point and to have an ambulance waiting. It took an hour to get in and the guy said the pain was gone but still had some tingling. I heard he turned out alright but still do not know what caused the hit or what his profile was.
I would like to thank Japan Underwater Explores and L.M marine for making this trip possible.
Steve Pace
During WWII the Mutsu took part in both the battle of Midway and the attack on Pearl Harbor. On the 8th of June 1943 the Mutsu exploded while moored Hiroshima bay. The ship was broken in two by the explosion with the 535 foot forward section sinking immediately and the 147 foot aft section sinking 14 hours later. 1200 lives where lost on that day in 1943.
There is still some mystery as to what caused the explosion. It was quickly ruled out that any Allied forces where the cause. Some eyewitness accounts report seeing a reddish brown fireball indicating a magazine explosion, and some other people reported seeing smoke around the number 3 turret before the explosion. Divers checked the wreck and reported that there was no evidence of an external explosion and after several months of investigation it was decided that saboteurs or a crewmen in the number 3 turret that was accused of theft caused the explosion. During the war holes were cut to salvage the much needed oil and in the 1970s part of the bow, anchors, screws, rudders and the # 4 turret were salvaged.
As a growing group of DIR divers in the Tokyo we began looking for more interesting sites to dive. The first wreck of interest that we heard about was the Mutsu and after hearing different reports as to what was left of the Mutsu and at what depth, we decided to give it a try and find out for ourselves. We departed at 0800 on Saturday morning for the 1 ½ hour boat ride to the wreck. We would be using aluminum stages with 21/35 as a bottom stage so that we could safely make two dives on one set of doubles that also contained 21/35 and we would use 50% as deco gas. We planned the dives for an average depth of 39m with a bottom time of 30 minutes and 25 minutes of deco. The weather was beautiful with a calm sea as we made our final checks, much to the interest of the boat crew who had never seen doubles, stages and maybe even people actually doing buddy checks. Once we entered the water we found out that it was 10 degrees Celsius, 6 degrees colder than near the Tokyo area and visibility was about 3 meters. We headed to the forward part of the wreck to try and find one of the main guns that still remained. We found it almost immediately at 38m we then continued around the wreck looking for points of possible penetration. The wreck is resting upside and there is a large debris field around the wreck. After 20 minutes we started to head back to the up line which proved to be a good idea because we were having trouble finding the up line, due to poor visibility and large debris field everything was looking the same. We ended up finding the up line which saved us from shooting a bag and drifting during deco. The next 3 dives we used a reel tied off near the up line to avoid and further navigation problems, and we did some light penetration finding gas masks and various other equipment inside. Outside of the wreck there is little sea life but tons of debris we had a good time trying to figure out what some of the material was we were looking at. We also preformed rescue operation on a rather large fish that was caught up in one of the many nets that cover the wreck.
It was an interesting dive and something you should check out if ever in the area but is very silty with low visibility year round, and with the wreck having been heavily salvaged and up side down, it is not a dive that I would do often. It was cool looking at it and imaging what it once was and how that fateful day played out when it went down. I would not dive this wreck on air or try to penetrate again due to the depth, fishing nets and severe silt. Recreational divers do dive it but I would not recommend that either since upon surfacing from our last dive Thomas ended up lending one of the recreational divers that was complaining of pain and tingling in both legs one of my used 50% bottles . We switched him over to 100% that we had brought and had the captain head back in to the nearest drop off point and to have an ambulance waiting. It took an hour to get in and the guy said the pain was gone but still had some tingling. I heard he turned out alright but still do not know what caused the hit or what his profile was.
I would like to thank Japan Underwater Explores and L.M marine for making this trip possible.
Steve Pace
