angelfish

User login

Powered by Drupal, an open source content management system

Upcoming Dive shows
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Malaysia International Dive Expo
6 Jul 2012 - 8 Jul 2012
Johannesburg, South Africa
Dive Expo
7 Sep 2012 - 9 Sep 2012
Edmonton, Canada
Divescapes Conference & Exhibition 2012
19 Oct 2012 - 21 Oct 2012
Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
DEMA 2012
14 Nov 2012 - 17 Nov 2012
Hong Kong
Diving & Resort, Travel Expo
15 Dec 2012 - 17 Dec 2012

Care to comment? See our FaceBook page

The Royal Navy’s former flagship HMS Ark Royal could become the largest artificial reef in Europe.

Submitted by Editor on Tue, 07/06/2011 - 19:21
A group of scuba divers in the United Kingdom is bidding to turn the decommisioned aircraft carrier in to a dive wreck.
Credit:   Wikimedia Commons
Plans have been revealed to sink the aircraft carrier Ark Royal as an underwater tourist attraction.
Portsmouth.co.uk  |  HMS Ark Royal could be turned into diving wreck    |   12-07-2011
A group of professional divers is working on a scheme to acquire the 20,000 ton vessel from the Ministry of Defence and scuttle her as an artificial reef off Torbay.
“

We would love to get it ready in time for the closing ceremony of the 2012 Olympics when we could sink it, with a fireworks display, to coincide with that and get worldwide coverage. It should bring us worldwide attention because Ark Royal is the flagship of the Royal Navy.

”
—

Michael Byfield and James Doddrell, from Torbay, believe turning the former Portsmouth-based ship into a reef could bring £40m into the Devon economy, creating the largest artificial shipwreck reef in Europe. It would mean towing the vessel to a port to be stripped and made clean enough to be sunk.

The idea could repeat the success of HMS Scylla, which since being sunk has attracted thousands of divers to Plymouth, generating millions of pounds for the local economy.
The divers have formed a team called ArkRoyalReef which was one of a number of interested buyers to tour the vessel last week.

‘We would love to get it ready in time for the closing ceremony of the 2012 Olympics when we could sink it, with a fireworks display, to coincide with that and get worldwide coverage.
‘It should bring us worldwide attention because Ark Royal is the flagship of the Royal Navy and it would be the third largest artificial shipwreck reef in the world and the largest in Europe.

Primary source â–º HMS Ark Royal could be turned into diving wreck
Further reading â–º Ark Royal Reef on Facebook
Advertisement