Cork Sub Aqua Club

The wreck of the Santo lies in water up to 35 meters deep (depending on tide) to the south east of Roches point. It is a long boat trip from Oysterhaven, so we have also dived her out of Crosshaven instead. When we last dived her on a spring low tide she was about 30 meters down. She was a dredger, and her most distinctive feature is the chain of buckets if these can be found. The Mark ‘Santo2′ on the Cork SAC GPS can be used to drop a shot close to the anchor. Reeling east or a little north east from the anchor the boiler can be found. Beyond the boiler there should be a big sprocket and stretching away from that the chain of buckets which are at least a meter in diameter. I should point out that the bucket chain shown above was taken on a dive a few years ago, my buddy and I failed to find them on the most recent dive. If visibility is poor they can be difficult to locate. The wreck is small, but seems to be comparable in size to the Aud, though in fact she was only about a fifth the size. Her boiler is upright but with large holes and has formed a home for fish, which seem to be abundant on the wreck: pouting and cod in the boiler, but also conger, lobster and cuckoo wrasse around the wreck. You can find YouTube video of a blonde ray on the Santo from John Ryan of NMCI SAC. The Santo sank in 1900 on her way from Scotland to Formosa (then part of Japan), now Taiwan.