NEWS

Divers look to Maldives and Canaries

Welcome news for travelling scuba divers running out of officially approved warmwater destination options as the UK winter approaches is that the Maldives and Spain’s Canary Islands are back among the travel corridors. Read more...

Basque divers explore British shipwreck

The wreck of a 19th-century British cargo ship that had been carrying bags of cement for an imperial infrastructure project has been investigated in the Bay of Biscay by a joint French-Spanish archaeological team. Read more...

Mary Rose diver to sell rare Omega

A scuba diver is hoping that the rare Army-issue watch he wore while working on the Mary Rose nearly 40 years ago can now help his children – and fund his dream dive-trip to the Great Barrier Reef. Read more...

Safety board blames operator for Conception fire

Major safety improvements for dive-boats and other small passenger vessels are called for by the USA’s National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in its report into last year’s devastating fire aboard the Conception liveaboard in California, which killed 34 people. Read more...

FREE November DIVER magazine out now!

TO ENSURE prompt delivery of DIVER Magazine during the continuing period of coronavirus disruption a special FREE digital version of the NOVEMBER issue has been produced to replace the normal paper copy. Read more...

Dive into these new videos

Essential free viewing for wreck-divers is “Fallen Oak”, a new 26min documentary marking the 81st anniversary of the sinking of HMS Royal Oak in Scapa Flow. Read more...

Blue whales: Too busy eating to sing

Blue whales, the biggest animals on the planet, switch from overnight singing to daytime vocalisations every year as they start to migrate – and now scientists have worked out why. Read more...

Fine follows ‘gas-switch trick’ diver death

The New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF), which embraces all branches of the country’s armed services, has been fined following the death of a Royal New Zealand Navy diver during rebreather training exercises. Read more...

Clearance divers spared as Tallboy blows

The planned five-day diving operation to defuse a WW2 Tallboy bomb in north-west Poland, reported on Divernet on Monday came to a premature end when the device exploded suddenly yesterday (14 October). Read more...

Blackwater shot triumphs at WPY 2020

Chinese underwater photographer Songda Cai’s image “The Golden Moment” has won in the Underwater category of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2020 competition. Read more...

Dive-climber Scott peaks in style

Longtime charity champion Lloyd Scott has completed his nine-day Three Peaks Challenge, climbing the last of Britain’s highest mountains while wearing a 59kg diving suit, helmet and weights. Celebrating his 59th birthday today (13 October), he has said that the mountain feat will be his last major charitable challenge. Read more...

World-first as divers tackle Tallboy bomb

Polish Navy clearance divers are starting work on the first-ever attempt to defuse a WW2 deep-penetration bomb today (12 October) - while in Australia, the removal of an unexploded 45kg bomb from one of the world’s southernmost coral reefs has been announced. Read more...

Seabed wipe-out shocks Russian divers

All but 5% of seabed marine life over a wide area of the Kamchatka peninsula coast in eastern Russia appears to have been wiped out – but the cause remains unclear. Read more...

Divers reveal shameful history in Enslaved

Shipwrecks form the spine of a new TV documentary series called Enslaved: The Lost History of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, which begins on BBC 2 at 9pm tomorrow (Sunday, 11 October). Read more...

Divers find first WW1 sub off Tunisia

Tunisian scuba divers have discovered the almost-intact wreck of French submarine wreck the Ariane, sunk during World War One. Read more...

Blenny popular choice at Torbay

The fourth annual Splash-in underwater photography competition run by the Torbay branch of the British Sub-Aqua Club, postponed by coronavirus from July, took place in challenging weather conditions in West Country waters on 19 September. Read more...

Life-saving diver drowned after CCR spike

An off-duty police officer who died while scuba diving in the south-east of Ireland last year drowned after sudden convulsions caused his closed-circuit rebreather mouthpiece to fall out, a coroner’s inquest has heard. Read more...

£9200 for diver’s whisky bottle

An unlabelled bottle of probably undrinkable Scotch has been sold at auction for £9200 – along with the helmet of George Currie, the diver who recovered the bottle from the wreck of the Politician in Scotland in 1987. Read more...

Want to winter in Malta?

Malta remains on the British government’s no-go list for non-essential travel and a two-week quarantine is required on return for anyone who does go - but what if you feel it’s essential for you to go and work from there for an extended period this winter? Read more...

MoD censured for failing another diver

For the second time in the space of a month, Britain’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has been issued with a Crown Censure by the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) following the death of a military diver while training. Read more...

Have Polish divers found fabled Amber Room?

Last month Divernet reported on the discovery of WW2 German light cruiser the Karlsruhe beyond diving depths off Norway; we already know about the also-scuttled WW1 light cruiser Karlsruhe in Scapa Flow; but now Polish technical divers have found a third Karlsruhe - a steamship that could solve one of the greatest unsolved shipwreck mysteries of all time. Read more...