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HMS
Vandal Expedition
Vandal Home page
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| The dive team first learnt about
HMS Vandal in June 2001 then having spent months researching
the project they felt no closer to unravelling the mystery surrounding
her disappearance and sinking. The only way to discover any
answers was to plan our own expedition, and we still wanted
to do the memory of the 37 officers and men who died on her
some justice. In addition we wanted to feed back as much information
(video, photo and visual reports) as possible to the families,
the Submarine Museum in Gosport and the Submariners Association
(SA) in Scotland. A number of their members are relatives of
those who perished. The Scottish Branch of the SA hold an annual
remembrance service for the crew of Vandal at Lochranza on the
isle of Arran. |
| The dive team approached
the MOD, SA and Submarine Museum in Gosport. This was without
doubt one of the most nail-biting tasks of the initial phase.
Any one of these groups objecting would have scuppered our plans,
the divers worked hard to convince all concerned that our intentions
were honorable and the objective of the mission was to record
and feedback information, not to pillage! It is a testament
to her efforts that many of the people initially approached
are now our firm friends. |
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The rebreather divers during the expedition return
after the first dive on HMS Vandal
©Leigh Bishop 2003
| A suitable dive boat with a good
skipper in an unfamiliar area (the Clyde isn’t exactly
our main stomping ground) can be a tall order. However, Rick
Waring recommended Jim Queen’s boat the Spinaway Isle,
which he used for the HMS Dasher project. We decided to fly
up to Glasgow and check it out. This also gave us the chance
to meet up with Bryan Thomas, the secretary of the SA in Scotland,
to discuss our proposal in more detail. |
Jim Queen and his Clyde charter Spinaway Isle was
the dive platform choice
for expedition Vandal. Jim's website is
here
©Leigh Bishop 2003
Rebreathers the ultimate weapon for a task such as
the Vandal expedition, each evening the
divers would carefully prepare their individual units for the following
days exploration.
©Leigh Bishop 2003
| Jim Queen is without doubt one
of the most helpful skippers we have ever worked with and we
could see instantly that he was the man for the job. The meeting
also went well with Bryan Thomas and the divers put together
a letter for other interested parties in the SA. |
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