Britannic-Test

Diving
BRITANNIC
Rick Ayrton








Diving
BRITANNIC




Diving Britannic
The story of the 2019 Expedition to dive the wrecks of His Majesty’s Hospital Ship Britannic
&
SS Burdigala
By Rick Ayrton


Published by: [Insert] www.publisherswebsite.com © Copyright Rick Ayrton
The views expressed in this book are those of the author and not necessarily those of the publisher. Images (except as otherwise shown) © Rick Ayrton
First published 2021
ISBN: 123-456-789
All rights reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, scanning, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Application for the reproduction of images should be made to the publisher. Every effort has been made to trace the copyright holders and we apologise for any unintentional omissions, which we would be pleased to correct in any subsequent edition of this book.
Edited by: James Neal
Indexed by: Rick Ayrton
Underwater Photography by: Rick Ayrton
Other Photography by: Rick Ayrton & Expedition Members Additional Words by: Scott Roberts
Designed & Layout by: James Neal
Printed in the UK by: Imagery Direct Imaging Ltd
Bound by: [Insert]


CONTENTS
Introduction Expedition Build-up Arrival The First Dive Dive Britannic And Pause.... Britannic Stern Routine Time in the Blue Final Dive Appendix 1. Gas Planning Appendix 2. Expedition Standard Operating Procedure Appendix 3. Underwater Photography Glossary of Terms


Dedicated to / the memory of .........


INTRODUCTION
I break the surface having just spent over four hours underwater of which only about a sixth of that time was actually spent on this famous old liner, HMHS Britannic. The wreck I had dreamt of diving for many years.
How had I got to this point in my diving career? What is the pull that makes divers behave like the explorers of high mountains or the polar ends of the earth; like the archaeologist unearthing a previously unseen artifact; the biologist seeking otherworldly creatures and the engineer pushing the latest technologies to the limit. I believe it is an amalgam of all these things.
To have the desire to embark on a trip such as this [HMHS Britannic] should never be undertaken lightly. Unfortunately
history tells us that this type of expedition has a degree of risk, sometimes things do not work out, participants end up paying the ultimate price.
Despite this the pull remains, each year expeditions are organised to dive targets like Britannic, There is no shortage of divers prepared to sign up; not everybody’s motive is the same, different divers will have a different emphasis from the varied collection of interests. Some may be there not for the diving but for the glory of being able to tell the world what you have done, bringing ethical dilemmas similar to those on Everest. Stories of ill prepared climbers being abandoned to die while others step around them to reach their own personal goal of standing on the summit. I hope technical diving never goes down this route.
My own diving career changed forever when I took up rebreather diving in 2002. Prior to that I had always enjoyed deep open circuit diving and had completed my Trimix certification in 1999. In the time between those dates I started to see the new rebreathers being used successfully. At the time the AP Valves (now AP Diving), Inspiration was the only rebreather available to the masses, it was carving itself a big name within the diving world. Already achieving a degree of notoriety being referred to as the Yellow box of death.


In those early years’ divers, manufacturers, instructors, and training agencies were all learning at the same time, with, unfortunately the diver being at the end of the development food chain, subject to the ultimate learning point. It was disheartening to hear of the loss of divers who were using these pieces of equipment. In many cases we will never know the real sequence of events that leads to a diving fatality. Inquests will attempt to piece together what is known from the recovered equipment and its analysis as well as the post mortem reports.
Over the years it has led to a better understanding of rebreathers, and diving with them. Manufacturers have expanded, they all produce units that are rigorously tested and certified for use. Maintenance schedules are strict and uncompromising, we now know these rules are to protect the end user, the diver.
Still corners are cut, for instance, oxygen cells that manufactures categorically insist have a limited life still get used far beyond what is safe. Many divers are repressed engineers, they like to take their equipment apart, make modification or just tinker with their kit and not always successfully. These days incidents can probably be put into three categories.
1. Human error; this covers poor maintenance, improper set up, diving
outside qualification, diving recklessly etc.
2. Diver health; It is well known now that rebreather diving affects human physiology rather differently to open circuit diving. In addition the cohort of rebreather divers tends to be skewed towards the older end of active divers (such as myself). The older divers inevitably have a greater incidence of health problems e.g. hypertension diabetes etc. These conditions start to impact on how the divers physiology reacts to prolonged immersion.
3.Genuine accident; probably the least likely of the three but it remains a possibility, diving is and always will be a risky activity at whatever level the diver is.
With my own rebreather diving, I quickly (probably too quickly) moved to deeper diving!
With my own rebreather diving, I quickly (probably too quickly) moved to deeper diving as well as starting my education in underwater photography. Rather sooner than would be acceptable these days, I was part of an expedition to dive HMS Russell off Malta in 115m. Looking back on that expedition, which was fortunately
without serious incident, I can now see we were very naive.
My bailout was two 7 litre cylinders one with bottom mix and one with air, we were not reaching the durations that we would on Britannic but what I was carrying really was not up to the job.
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Diving HMHS Britannic
As an ocean liner she would have had a black hull & freeboard with white gunwhales and superstructure, mustard yellow funnels with black top rings - The White Star Line colours. Britannic was the third and final Olympic class ocean liner to be built, the first being Olympic. Her immediate predecessor and more famous sister was the legendry Titanic. Olympic was the only ship of the three to go on to have a successful 24 year career.


HMHS Britannic Mudros, Island of Lemnos, North Aegean, Greece 1916.
Resplendent in her war-time hospital ship livery, she steams out to take her place in the war effort and the annals of history alongside her sister!
I had been carried away to a degree by the “Alpine” style of rebreather diving, named after the trimmed down kit mountaineers were favouring to enable them to achieve quick ascents on serious alpine peaks. Despite diving having very different risks to mountaineering this type of diving did have its advocates. Some
of the arguments did make sense; being loaded up with stage cylinders made you inherently clumsy and therefore without them it was possibly easier to deal with problems should they arise. Divers in favour of this style of diving would always say they always keep their rebreather in perfect condition so any problems
would be minor and easily dealt with. We all know that despite best intentions, a rebreather is only in perfect condition when it is first delivered from the factory. Divers remain experts at denial.
Coming from that original cohort of rebreather divers who did embrace
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13


the Alpine philosophy, I was fortunate I changed before anything unpleasant happened. I now look upon bailout as something needed for my buddy or myself, I still think my rebreather probably will not fail on me but now acknowledge we are all human, I am responsible for the proper functioning of my rebreather alone. I can have off days and other divers may have need. The side effect of this is that now when my own excrement hits the fan the appropriate bailout is ready and waiting! (obviously bailout on a shallow dive might be the onboard diluent cylinder alone - another discussion!)
As previously mentioned I took up underwater photography at the same time as the rebreather. As well as learning how to keep myself alive on a rebreather that in itself demands significant attention, I was also learning to take pictures. I started down the video route and by luck more than good management found myself helping out as a cameraman on the Deep Wreck Mysteries TV series. This proved to be a fascinating and rewarding chapter in my diving career. My involvement was mainly with the fantastic North Cornish shipwrecks, smashed by decades worth of storms but often dived in crystal clear water that remains so elusive around the British Isles.
Involvement in Deep Wreck Mysteries ignited a greater interest in the histori-
cal side of diving shipwrecks. So much history is laid out for me it was difficult not to get involved.
It started with the wreck of the St George, an early steamship that had been carrying copper ingots, the
group I was diving
with was lucky to have discovered and dived it the very first time. I spent a lot of time researching the Cornish copper industry and was published by the premier UK technical diving magazine of the time - 990.
I think one of the
major historical
& diving challenges of the late 2000’s around the UK South West peninsular was the search for and discovery of the SS Armenian. This was an armed merchant cruiser, although prior to World War 1 she was a liner of the Leyland Line. She was operated by White Star Line, in an uncanny similarity to Britannic she had been built by Harland & Wolff in Belfast. During the hunt for Armenian we dived and identified many deep wrecks off the North Cornish coast, perhaps HMS
Patia being the most well known. Armenian was eventually located some 50 miles from Newquay and lying in almost 100m. She is featured in the Deep Wreck Mysteries episode - “Search for the bone wreck”. There were two series of
Deep Wreck Mysteries but with the 2008 financial crash commissioning dried up and there were no more.
I moved over from taking video to still photography which gives me the challenge that I find so rewarding. I rarely dive without a camera, although I am happy deep or shallow. I particularly enjoy bringing back images that show shipwreck images in their true environment, images that I hope illustrate the technical
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Diving HMHS Britannic


diving difficulty of getting to see these wrecks. Too often I see photographically excellent images of tourist wrecks, they may be great images but they don’t capture the essence of what it is to be at the cutting edge of wreck diving. I hope some of the images in this publication go some way to address that.
Despite deep wreck photography being my favoured discipline, it remains impossible to dive deep wrecks all the time, I get great pleasure in the challenges of all aspects of underwater photography, that keeps me diving in all waters be they shallow or deep.
But why do shipwrecks exert such a pull to divers?
There is no simple answer and each diver will give his or her own reasons for under- taking wreck dives.
Dive training agencies have specialty courses in wrecks and their appreciation. I know some divers who will miss a dive rather than have to dive a reef! Others whose prime interest is marine life, will actively avoid wreck diving (wrecks are artificial reefs whatever anyone might say). A few look upon it as a source of funds, trying to salvage material for financial gain. A number of multinational organisations exist with just that remit.
As an ordinary recreational diver my own interest is fuelled by historical curiosity. A love of being underwater with an element of exploration. Interest in marine life. Adoption of and interest in modern dive technology then using it to achieve goals that years ago would have been unattainable.
Finally my additional challenge of underwater photography, bringing home images that can bring both the spectacle of the underwater world and the amazing heritage and history divers are able to see to a wider public.
Following her sinking on 21 November 1916 HMHS Britannic was left undisturbed on the seabed in almost 120m of water until she was located and then first dived by Jaques Cousteau’s team from the legendary Calypso in 1976.
Her resting place is near the island of Kea off the southern Greek mainland and lying in a shipping channel. Looking back today it can be seen as a ground breaking dive at the cutting edge of what was possible at the time, check out: Jaques Cousteau’s search for Titanic’s sister ship, Britannic, still available as a DVD (Odessy, complete series) or search for
it on YouTube. His expedition was on a par with the first moon landing. When you consider what dive technology of 1976 was like, it really was an outstanding achievement. Chief diver was Albert Falco but Cousteau himself by then aged 67 also dived the wreck. They were undertaking 15 minute dives which included 9 minutes for the descent, so were only spending 6 minutes exploring the wreck on each dive. They used Trimix 15/54 as their bottom gas, this mixturewould not be recommended nowadays,see appendix 2. They did have the benefit of a diving bell for more comfortable decompression, it was winched aboard Calypso to allow the divers the relative comfort of dry and externally controlled decompression.
Following the first expedition by Cousteau, Britannic would not receive visitors again until Robert Ballard’s expedition in 1995, this was a Remote Operated Vehicle (ROV) and manned submersible survey of the wreck. This expedition was the first that Simon Mills was involved in, it sparked for him an interest in Britannic that led him to purchase the wreck in 1996 resulting in a lifetimes’ association with the wreck and an unrivalled knowledge of Britannic.
The next SCUBA divers(Free swimming divers using SCUBA - Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus) were
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to be from Kevin Gurr’s expedition in 1997, this took place with the backdrop of major advances in dive technology and decompression theory, allowing the new breed of technical divers to more safely explore the wreck. The final key to unlock exploration of Britannic was the development of the Closed Circuit Rebreather (CCR). On the 1998 expedition, John Chatterton was the first diver to use a CCR on Britannic. In the UK AP Diving had sold the worlds first mass produced rebreather, the Inspiration in November 1997 and these units would feature significantly on subsequent Britannic expeditions, including this one. By the 2003 expedition the majority of divers were using CCR’s. Nowadays, it is mandatory to use a rebreather.
Visits to Britannic, owing to the complex logistics of getting an expedition in place to dive the wreck are inevitably infrequent. Tragedy struck in 2006 when expedition leader Carl Spencer lost his life on the wreck. This led to a halting of exploration which would not recommence until 2012. Thereafter regular visits to the wreck were an annual feature and the 2019 expedition follows on from that. 2020 saw some relaxation of the Greek bureaucracy involved in setting up an expedition, it remains to be seen how this will affect future expeditions. The 2020 Coronavirus Pandemic will no doubt
affect expeditions in that year and afterwards, travel restrictions inevitably will halt some long planned trips, the extent of these issues remain to be seen at the time of writing.
The immense contribution of Simon Mills as owner of the wreck of Britannic in the exploration of the wreck and the understanding of its history needs to be acknowledged. He has written several books about the wreck and is probably the foremost authority on all things Britannic. His influence with the Greek Ministry of Culture and the Ephorate of Marine Antiquities helped our expedition negotiate the fickle and varied Greek rules affecting our 2019 expedition. In turn I hope we were able to add to his extensive knowledge of the wreck.
And I hope you enjoy the story of the expedition.
It’s not all deep wreck photography - Blue shark selfie taken while snorkelling in the English Channel.
Top right: 2019 Expedition Leader Scott Roberts, modelling his new O’Three drysuit! UK drysuit manufactures, O’Three very generously sponsored the 2019 ex- pedition, continuing a long history of their involve- ment with Britannic, having been one of the original sponsors of Nick Hope’s 1998 expedition.
Bottom Right: Simon Mills on left and Yannis Evangelou, Mayor of Kea holding the (very small) Britannic model at Kea Divers. 2019 expedition. Team members in the background.
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Diving HMHS Britannic
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EXPEDITION BUILD-UP
Scott Roberts:
Everyone laughed, took another swig of their pint and there was an uncharacteristic pause. Faces happy, gazing off into the distance, the fantastic week we’d had was evident. We’d dived some of the most challenging deep wrecks off the coast of Orkney. I broke the silence: “Who fancies diving Britannic then?”
The responses reflected the diverse geographical locations the team had come from – North East Scotland, Northern Ireland, Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Devonshire. The regional colloquialisms spouted all in the positive. The notion of diving the world’s biggest liner dragged minds from what had been achieved to what could be achieved. Britannic sister
ship to the legendary Titanic the last of the Olympic class liners that the White Star Line had produced and the biggest of the three. More importantly she was in diveable depth... just!
The following week, when the drunken conversation had almost been forgotten, an email from one of the Orkney team hit my inbox. “What dates are we targeting for Britannic”. My heart sank a little bit. Had I really said that we’d dive Britannic? Had I really offered to organise the expedition? Surely no one would hold me to something I’d said, half-cut in an Orkney pub? Yes, they would!
Although I could have easily avoided doing anything, with the only repercussions being a bit of ribbing from the gang, it was worth thinking about. And I did think... a lot...
I learned to dive in the early 90s whilst at university, and from the very start, I’d been on a steep trajectory, going through my qualifications quickly and backing it up with as many dives as I could. The group I dived with then loved wrecks, and in our search for previously un-dived ones, the depths got deeper. By the mid- 90s, we took our mixed gas qualifications – diving on air was restricted, for physiological reasons, to 50m and we’d already surpassed these depths by some margin.


Air is made up of oxygen and nitrogen. “Mixed Gas” diving adds helium, reducing some of the more problematic effects of both oxygen and nitrogen at depth. A new world was now open to us, one that few divers in the country were able to reach.
A couple of years later a British manufacturer (AP Valves, now AP Diving) produced the first “affordable” rebreather. Standard SCUBA gear, enables you to take a breath of gas from a cylinder, but when you breathe out, the gas bubbles off to the surface and is lost. A rebreather has no bubbles. It recycles what you’ve breathed out, gets rid the of the carbon dioxide that your body has produced, and adds just enough oxygen to replace the amount that you’ve metabolised. Not only does it vastly reduce the amount of gas consumed during a dive, it also helps to reduce the amount of decompression you need to do before you can surface from a deep dive. Winner!
Whilst they work!
Before the turn of the millennium, mine failed on a dive, I did not recognise what was happening. My near-death experience was not worse only due to the quick thinking and fast actions of the person I was diving with and the close proximity of medical care. I was one of the lucky ones. Few had ever survived an oxygen toxicity event at depth. In these
early days of recreational rebreather diving, accidents occurring on the units were helping to write the safety courses that now, thankfully make things although not without risk, safer and better!
Over the years of diving, I’d dived some amazing wrecks, but I wasn’t ticking off any of the really big dives from my bucket list. I still hadn’t been to Truk lagoon to dive the Japanese fleet, I still hadn’t dived the wrecks of the Bikini Atoll sunk as part of nuclear testing and I still hadn’t dived the number one item on my bucket list:
Britannic
In the end the decision was easy:
• If not now, when? I’m in my 40s, how many years of deep diving do I have in me?
• If I don’t organise an expedition then who will? There was no sign that any of my diving buddies were going to take up the challenge, and I didn’t move in the right circles to get onto one of the other expeditions run by some of the diving world’s big names.
It was decided.
We would dive Britannic.
I had spoken to Scott and been aware of his plans, in October 2017 I received an email from him;
“The trip is in the diary with Kea Divers, the first day of diving will be Saturday 11th May 2019 for 11 days.”
That was all I needed to read and my keyboard clicked as I quickly typed my reply;
“Hi Scott,
Count me in...”
After that the complexities of organising to dive Britannic gradually materialised! (See APPENDIX) After making our own enquiries about previous expeditions and information from Kea Divers. It quickly became obvious that this was no ordinary dive trip, here we were 18 months away from the proposed trip and in the first few days the following points were being made (with apologies for repetition):
• Kea Divers have a few Ali 80 cylinders but most will need to be taken out from the UK.
• The volume of kit we would be needing to take would be impossible to achieve as personal airline baggage.
• An ROV with operator has to be funded as part of the Licence.
• It will not get wet.
• It’s operator will however
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Diving HMHS Britannic


be an essential extra pair of hands during the trip.
• Kea Divers does have a Booster Pump (necessary for 200Bar oxygen fills).
• The decompression station is fixed so much of deco is in a current.
• Divers who had been to Britannic recommended using a scooter, you can see more of the wreck & cope with currents.
• Best to dive for 10 days, this should guarantee getting on the wreck, one previous trip only managed 3 dive days in 10.
• Costs will be high! Much of the kit will need to be transported out to Kea overland.
• Currents can be significant, Scooters should be considered. (this kept being emphasised)
• Quite a few hoops have to be negotiated with the Greek Government to obtain permits to dive.
It is essential all permits are obtained correctly and well in advance.
During the remainder of 2017 and much of 2018 it was a waiting game, so much so that I had second thoughts about being involved and actually withdrew, it was only after speaking to Scott at a friends wedding in August that he persuaded me to rejoin which I did in late August.
One of the reasons I had withdrawn was that I had been concerned about my own ability to endure very long dives (which those on Britannic would undoubtedly be) I was no spring chicken but earlier in 2018 I had had a brilliant week diving the Malin Head wrecks where I had easily managed 3hr+ dives without difficulty. Regular Pilates classes had strengthened my back which had in turn made long decompression hangs more tolerable.
When I rejoined the expedition it still remained speculative, we were not expecting confirmation that a permit would be granted until February despite being assured that it would be, there remained a nagging doubt that we would be unsuccessful. Despite this, all the logistical preparation would need to be in place before then. Team members would have to pay up front for travel, accommodation, freight of kit without actually knowing for certain we had the permit.
Using Skype technology, Scott was
getting to know Yannis Tzavelakos, owner of Kea divers, we would be using his dive shop as our expedition base of operations. Yannis would be organising the dive boat for us as well as supplying a fast RIB that would operate as support boat during the expedition.
Kea divers is an interesting organisation. During the hot peak holiday season it is a PADI dive centre, helping guide people through their PADI Open Water course and offering try dive experiences to
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Diving HMHS Britannic
tourists and vacationers, In May and early June, then again in September and October it transforms into a technical dive center. Open circuit regulators with Buoyancy Compensators would be exchanged for rebreathers and wet suits with drysuits, space would be taken up by pallets of Sofnolime (the Carbon Dioxide scrubbing material used in rebreathers) and rigged stage cylinders. Scooters would be those manufactured by Bonex and Suex rather than Vespa or Suzuki. Yannis would prove to be an essential part of the team helping with the logistics and setting up of the expedition but also having the local knowledge that would prove to be so important once the diving had started.
When Scott had first suggested diving Britannic, it was thought that those involved should meet up a few months before hand to dive together and get to
know one another. Additionally, to go over the more technical aspects of the diving (APPENDIX 1). Also to put together a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) document (APPENDIX 2) that would give those involved a guide, a reference that the whole expedition could use.
As the military say - no plan survives first contact - and so it was for the 2019 expedition. Getting divers to commit to a trip such as this was not as easy as it would seem, a certain number of divers would be required to make the trip economically viable. We all knew of divers who would be interested but when dates and costs are put into the mix it very quickly whittles down numbers who are prepared to put their money on the table.
In the end we had to go further afield. Expedition personnel were eventually combined from around the world, with many of us making use of contacts far and wide to solicit suitably qualified divers who would fit into the team. With seven UK members we were joined by New Jersey(USA) wreck divers Joe Mazraani and Rick Simon and Scott Wyatt from Australia
With such widely separated personnel we were never going to be able to get together a pre-Britannic trip. But by late 2018 the team was assembled: Scott Roberts (Organiser) Rick Ayrton, Jacob
Mackenzie, Luke Kiermann, George McClure, Duncan McCormick, Steve Pryor, Joe Mazarrani, Richard Simon, Scott Wyatt. In addition Jennifer Selletti would keep topside operations in order during the expedition, having an eye above the water whilst the team were below and tirelessly recording everyone’s dive data.
Dive fitness for a trip such as this is essential, turning up having not dived for months would be reckless. That was one of the intentions of arranging a trip prior to Britannic. Instead each team member would have to ensure their own dive fitness. Thankfully no awkward conversations were required everyone took their responsibility seriously. Since our trip started relatively early in the annual dive calendar this meant some cold weather diving in the UK or trips to warmer climes. I did all my working up in the UK. In the colder months this was quarry based and gave me invaluable practice using a scooter and working out the most comfortable way of transporting 3 Ali 80 stage cylinders around, I would like to thank Marcus Blatchford for his assistance in this and also Vobster, National Diving and Activity Center (NDAC) & Cromhall quarries which are all an equidistant 40 minute drive from my home. Dive site variety was important in keeping the enthusiasm going when pullingkitoninJanuaryandfinding


Marcus Blatchford demonstrating perfect trim in the Vobster shallows, carrying 3 stage cylinders & using his Dive Xtras Cuda scooter.
This image was taken early April before the trip, water temperature was
approximately 8C/46F
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Map showing position of Kea Island in the Eastern Mediterranean/Aegean Sea
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Diving HMHS Britannic


Kea Island and showing the Britannic wrecksite, approximately 5 miles from Vourkari quayside.
the mask wash bucket frozen. From mid March sea diving was added including a few deeper mixed gas dives.
In early January, flights to Athens were booked. We had to be in the Port of Lavrio south of Athens to get the ferry to Kea on 10th May, the majority of us would be arriving in Athens the previous day. Long distance travellers, Joe, Jenn, Richard and Scott would be arriving a bit earlier.
Decisions about how the kit was going to get to Kea remained unresolved as late as December 2018. Steve Pryor came to the rescue with the offer of his van (and to drive it all the way to Kea) this meant we wouldn’t be reliant on freight forwarding companies and our dive kit would be away for a minimal amount of time before we were reunited with it on Kea island. The total cost of taking the van from Aberdeen to Kea return would work out at about £2500.00 or about £350.00 for each of the UK based divers.
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In addition all UK team members would meet up at the National Diving and Activity Centre (NDAC) near Chepstow about 6 weeks before we were due in Greece. We would be able to get a deep 70m cold water dive under our belts as well as having a discussion about the dive planning and operations for the trip. Scott would be able to update us on the other preparations such as accommodation, gas supplies and sources of Sofnolime (We would be joining forces with Simon Townsend who was organising trips later in the year to take a share of a whole pallet of 32 tubs of Sofnolime with delivery direct to Kea Divers).
We would still transport some lime from the UK, but less than originally thought, saving weight in the van. Enquiries were made regarding transportation of full diving cylinders, it came as a pleasant surprise that it was acceptable, full dive cylinders are allowed through the Channel Tunnel and on the Ferries. Numbers of cylinders were not discussed, perhaps it would have been different if we had told them that in excess of 50 full cylinders would be transported. We kept that to ourselves and carefully packed the van so that the heavy cylinders were out of sight! Fortunately we were not challenged.
Yannis at Kea Divers would be co- ordinating gas deliveries direct to the
centre, 3 x 50L oxygen and 3 x 50L helium this would be plenty assuming our full cylinders from the UK are still full when they arrive in Kea. The dive centre is equipped with a booster pump, this enables gas at a low pressure to be boosted to a higher pressure and transferred into a different cylinder.
With the 50 Litre cylinders at a low pressure, the booster pump can fill our 3 Litre rebreather cylinders to the 200 bar required for safe diving to the expected depths and durations we would encounter during the expedition. The booster pump is driven by a low pressure (approx 10 bar) supply from the dive centre compressor. Using a booster pump is an efficient way of using gas supplies and meant that the three 50 Litre cylinders were adequate for the expedition.
Dive Planning
During our discussions at the NDAC gathering we tried to get a consensus on the diving scenarios with gas choices and decompression implications. Everyone on the trip had received advanced Hypoxic CCR Trimix level training so were (or should be!) able to understand the more complex diving physiology and its practical application into what we were proposing to do. Never the less we approached a number of technical instructors who assisted us in arriving at
what would be our “Modus operandi” for conducting the dives.
All diving carries a degree of risk from the trainee on their first open water dive to technical divers diving at the edge of what is possible. The planning is to reduce risk to as low as reasonably practical and the thoughts behind gas choices are that there would be enough bailout gas to sucessfully evacuate a team member who had a full rebreather failure at the end of their proposed bottom time.
Planning document Scott circulated before the trip: See APPENDIX 1.
Right: The massive propellor of the SS Empire Heritage, one of the Malin Head classic deep wrecks, and a catalyst to wanting to explore more and
deeper wrecks.
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Diving HMHS Britannic






ARRIVAL
In late April and Early May a number of us were tasked with getting bailout cylinders filled then transported along with our own kit to a number of pick up points that Steve Pryor would be visiting on his way to the Channel Tunnel the road trip to Venice followed by a 33hr ferry from Venice to Patras north of Athens (A separate book could be written about the European road trip undertaken by Steve and his co-pilot Bob)
Following Steve’s departure fully laden for the Channel tunnel it was a few days back at work and some contemplation before the rest of us met up in Athens on the 9th of May. The Acropolis demanded a visit on the morning of the 10th before we took a taxi down to catch the final ferry to Kea that departed the port of Lavrio. Here we met the enigmatic George Vandoros, a Greek technical instructor
who was to act as our dive supervisor. Having a dedicated diving supervisor in charge of the day to day conduct of the dives is very similar to how commercial diving operations are run. It takes some of the stresses away, organisation would be tick box lists, everyone would know what was expected of them. Over the course of the expedition we would all get to know George, he was to become a very good friend to us all and a fantastic and knowledgeable supervisor.
Scott Roberts:
Two years after the drunken discussion in an Orkney pub, I got off the ferry and stepped foot on to the island of Kea. In the two years of organising every last detail of the expedition, I hadn’t looked at a photo of Kea. It was beautiful.
There in front of me was a familiar face - Yannis. Yannis runs the dive centre on the island and has been involved in a number of expeditions to Britannic. We’d spoken countless times via Skype, thrashing out the details of the trip, always with a smile on his face.
We were here.
We really were going to dive Britannic.
The following day was setup day. An entire day putting together, fettling and


faffing with dive gear. Preparing over 60 cylinders for rebreathers, personal bailout cylinders if the rebreather failed and cylinders ready to be dropped down to divers in case of emergency. Scooters had to be assembled, batteries charged & fitted, camera equipment mounted to them. Rebreathers filled with the sofnolime that removes Carbon Dioxide, sensors calibrated, pressure checks carried out. Then there were meetings, briefs and more meetings. It was a long day.
It was getting close! The first day on Kea was briefings and kit preparation. Scott’s dive planning document that all expedition members were issued with and which we would use as a basis for our operations can be found at the back of the book in APPENDIX 2
Our first meeting with George Vandoros was on the ferry over to Kea, it became immediately apparent he was somebody we could all work with. I had described him in an article as:
“Hewn from the same rock as the Greek God Poseidon”
I think you can see the likeness below!
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Diving HMHS Britannic


Acropolis: Sharing the magnificent Acropolis with hoards of tourists, we were all looking forward to having a more personal and closer look at the wreck of Britannic. Greece treats its heritage both above and below water very seriously, putting in place many safeguards to protect its antiquities for future generations. Whilst the expedition found some of these conditions difficult we could not fault the Greek authorities in their desire to preserve their amazing heritage.
Additional photographs of George Vandros supplied by Jennifer Selletti
Team Shot: The team assembled after arrival at the accommodation on Kea before the diving starts, sunset 10th May 2019
Ferry: Kea ferry at Lavrio Port Unloading: Unloading at Kea Divers
Diving HMHS Britannic
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Vourkari
Kea Divers
Accommodation
Above photograph shows the proximity of Vourkari town to Kea Divers and the accommodation.
Opposite From Left: Scott Roberts, George McClure, Luke Liermann, Joe Mazarrani, Jenn Selletti, Scott Wyatt, Steve Pryor, Duncan McCormick, Richard Simon, Jacob Mackenzie,
Rick Ayrton.
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Diving HMHS Britannic


Diving HMHS Britannic
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