Intermediate Martinique
Martinique
A bay with many ships sunk on the same morning in 1902, when the volcano wiped out the city
On the morning of May 8, 1902, a burning cloud came down from the volcano and wiped out the city and the port within minutes. Many of the ships anchored in the bay went down with everything on board. They're still there, scattered between ten and sixty meters.
In this entry you'll find what diving in that bay is like, what each of those wrecks demands depending on its depth, what else the island offers in the south and on the volcanic rock in the southwest, when to go, and at what level.
It's a wreck graveyard with an exact date and a known cause: a cluster of simultaneous shipwrecks that lets you see how a hull evolves underwater when you know the exact day it went down.
Geography and access
Martinique is a volcanic island in the Lesser Antilles arc, with an active volcano at its northern tip.
The 1902 eruption destroyed the port city at its foot and sank many of the ships anchored offshore.
That bay, on the northwest coast, today holds the most singular cluster of wrecks in the French Caribbean, spread across a steeply dropping slope.
The depth of each wreck depends on where it was anchored: some are accessible at just over ten meters, others are in technical range.
The island's south coast, more sheltered and shallower, offers coral reefs and sand flats with much gentler conditions.
In the southwest, an isolated volcanic rock offshore offers wall and cave dives with current.
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