GUE divers have found and identified the wreck of the SS Hernodia

Tomas Nilsson and Mattias Vendlgard, two GUE divers, identified after almost 100 years, the wreck of the Swedish transport ship – SS Hernodia. The unit measuring nearly 90m, sank in the morning on 23rd May 1915r, as a result of sinking into a mine. Until today its resting place remained unknown.

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Unfortunately for wreck expedition enthusiasts, we have some not-so-good news. Although all of the 22 crew members survived and Hernodia is not a grave, it rests at a depth of 120m, remaining within the reach of only the most skilled technical divers.

The wreck first appeared on the sonar screen in 2009, during a routine cruise in the Aland Islands. It was then that the plan was made to make an exploratory dive and identify the find. A year later everything was ready and the expedition could set off. Unfortunately, the capricious weather made diving impossible. The sea was too rough and the wind too strong for such a serious mission.

Fortunately this year, nothing stood in the way and after 2 years of finding the carrier, using side scan sonar, divers were finally able to visit it in person.

After 19min of the 20 that the pair of divers were to spend on the bottom, they managed to find a bell with the name of the vessel engraved on it. About 45min after the first team’s dive, the safety divers met up with the pair exploring the wreck. After a brief exchange of information, they returned to the surface to report on the results of the deep-sea team’s work. Meanwhile, Nilsson and Vendlgard carried out a planned decompression of almost two hours. From time to time, support divers turned up to make sure everything was running smoothly. In their own words, this was a team effort, as part of an excellent project carried out by GUE, where even the boat’s crew members were certified by this organisation.

The participants of the expedition are counting on the possibility of a quick return to the bottom in order to collect photo and video documentation of the wreck, which rests at 120m, well preserved by the freezing waters of the Baltic Sea, not exceeding 4°C in this place.

Source: gue.com