Another WWII Shipwreck

August saw us slip away to Vanuatu and New Caledonia in the South Pacific to celebrate a significant milestone, we've been married for 40 years! But don't worry, we are due for parole sometime soon :-)
High on our list of things to do was dive on the WWII wreck of the SS President Coolidge in Vanuatu, a 200 meter long luxury cruise liner converted to an armed troop carrier for the second world war. The ship was carrying 5000 US troops and lots of military vehicles & machinery when it hit two mines set by allied forces in the entrance channel to Luganville on the island of Espiritu Santo. The captain drove the ship onto the shore to save her, but she sank stern first and now lays with starboard side up in depths of 21 to 70 meters.

We did two dives using larger tanks than normal (not recommended for bad backs due to the long walk) with 30% nitrox to allow us ample time to check out the cargo holds contents and forward guns. The short video below shows some of our finds.

Troops escpape the sinking ship just after her captain drove her ashore

NOTE: We dived with Absolute Adventures Santo (thanks for your organisation Tom, and also Steve for guiding us through the dark interior of the ship). This was the only dive company we could find that had positive answers to our requests and had various mixes of  nitrox available (as well as rebreathers and mulitple tanks), Our dive guide had twin tanks and a slung spare nitrox tank should anyone need additional air. Plus we had four hour intervals between dives. Now we understand why so many people have been bent over the years diving on this wreck, as other dive companies we contacted promoted doing two dives in a morning on standard air.... No thanks!