VI Wreck Diving Festival in Lodz - report and photo gallery

Finally, Saturday the 13th of February 2016 arrived. Early in the morning it appeared to be freezing. Thermometers indicated -2° C and the glow of the waking day could be seen on the asphalt. In such circumstances, together with Maciej Jurasz from “Płetwal”, we set off to Lodz to participate in the 6th Wreck Diving Festival.

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I will say right away that it was worth it. The last major meeting of divers in Poland took place in Gdynia at Baltictech. Now 250 people showing their tickets received their badges, programmes and, in the all-inclusive version, also festival T-shirts.

A few days before, it turned out that not everyone got tickets, which ran out literally days before the event.

The organisers made sure to let newcomers in smoothly, and often greeted them personally with a handshake and a kind word. Maybe because they were looking for Tomasz from D24?

Slightly late, we could already see the flag of our portal flying from afar. The cloakroom was able to accommodate all the coats and jackets.

Already at level -1, i.e. after entering the inside of the building of the Technical University of Lodz, several companies had their stands (the rest were presented at the very top). On the right, there was a bar, which was not quite prepared to receive such a crowd of people, and we all know that a diver has to eat and drink as well.

The official start took place at 9:40 am in the auditorium on the third floor. There were 2 lifts and stairs available for the participants. Those who care about their figure and are on a diet had the opportunity to walk up and down several times. The programme of the festival was interesting and, in some places, tight. All the speakers, well almost all of them, tried to fit in the allotted time.

At 10:00 the lecture entitled. “The Wrecks of the Messina Strait – New Discoveries”. It concerned everyone who was interested. Then, from 11:30, another 3 rooms entered the schedule and the eternal problem began, which topic to choose? Should I bet on the speaker or on the content? Should I sit in an air-conditioned and spacious hall or suffocate in unventilated rooms A, B or C?

And the topics were encouraging. As a 4-person D24 team it was impossible to attend all the meetings, especially that we also caught the speakers to talk to them in front of the cameras. Not less, from 11:30 Sebastian Dluga gathered enthusiasts of Side Mount configuration, he also had his stand, so you could ask him about various topics afterwards.

At the same time Piotr Stós from Nautici in Krakow had his presentation. He talked about, or rather described the wrecks of the Croatian island Vis. Piotr is a great photographer so his talk was accompanied by very interesting and nice pictures.

The alternative was Michał Kosut, who, focusing on safety during diving, described accidents during diving training, and as everyone knows, he has a lot of experience in this matter. At this time, the lecture “Andrea Doria on the 60th anniversary of the sinking” took place in the auditorium.

Gallery:

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The following hours again made the participants anxious, as they would have liked to be both here and there at the same time. Marek Popielarz presented the medical and psychological aspects of diving and gathered such a large audience that some had to support the walls. The situation was the same at the workshop on how to photograph wrecks, led by Leigh Bishop, and an alternative were rebreathers, talked about by Joanna Nalewajko and the topic “Rescued from the Flood – New Facts” presented by Hubert Kowalski and Marcin Jamkowski.

The theme of the Wreck Festival turned out to be “Kujawiak”, happily found after 72 years. The 2014 and 2015 expedition resulted in considerable photographic material, and the enthusiasts in the persons of Peter Wytykowski, Roman Zajder and the team, thanks to whom this undertaking turned out to be a great success, took great pains to search the archives and reach the last surviving crew member of our, Polish destroyer.

Mariusz Borowiak, who was asked to write a book about “Kujawiak”, joined the team and was up to the task. It was here at the Festival that the book, still warm and smelling of fresh ink, could be purchased, together with the author’s inscription. Piotr Kardasz was responsible for the processing and editing of the photos and created a professional film – a story about the destroyer ORP “Kujawiak”. The footage includes an interview with the last surviving member of the crew, as well as archive films from the Second World War. Piotr also presented the backstage of the film’s creation in an interesting and funny way.

At the end there were also presentations: about the combat ships ORP “Sokół” and ORP “Dzik” presented by the aforementioned Mariusz Borowiak; Wrecks of British islands presented by Mark “Jonesy” Jones; Analysis of dangers in wreck diving on rebreaters presented by Adam Wysoczański.

That’s not all. When there were no classes scheduled in the smaller halls, the auditorium hosted a Mushashi Expedition talk by Dr Timmy Gambin and an Arctic Expedition – Mystery of the X5 talk by Leigh Bishop.

After 8pm the charity auction started and the diving community could disperse for evening talks over a glass of wine.

To sum up, I think the Wreck Festival was interesting, well and efficiently organised. The only downside was the unventilated smaller rooms A, B and C and the bar, which was not fully prepared. With no rush and with peace and quiet, time quickly fled taking with it all the events that we tried to keep for you in the camera and camera frame.

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