Recommendations for diving the Philippines

[DevonDiver]

The renew interested of Uncle Sam in the Far East might have a detrimental effect on the diving in Subic Bay. I believe New York was off limited for several days when a Amphibious Assault Carrier group were in town recently.

This was, indeed, the case. There is new leadership in the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority who (I am told) took a unilateral decision to voluntarily increase the exclusion zone necessary around docked US Navy ships. The size of that new exclusion zone was (allegedly) "plucked from thin air" and exceeds the actual stipulated exclusion zone of 300m that the US Navy enforces. The result is the the USS New York becomes 'off-limits' whenever major warships/subs come to dock.

Hopefully, that will change - as it's not an official (US Navy) requirement and is damaging to the dive/tourism industry. It's the Philippines...efficiency and common-sense are not attributes one should automatically assume of the leadership.