H.P. Lovecraft, "The White Ship"
The wreck of the Clan Cumming, a 'Clan Line' steamer mined in April 1941, has been identified by our team working together with Kostas Thoctarides back in July 2012 and is still an open project.
The 'Saronikos wrecks' project relates to our ongoing effort to explore and document modern wrecks in the greater area of Saronikos gulf. While some of these wrecks remained undiscovered until today, a few have already been located and visited by other divers. The proximity to our main base location makes these wrecks suitable for isolated outings rather than multi-day expeditions. A further advantage is that weather conditions in the Saronikos Gulf are usually mild making the dives less demanding overall. In any case, it is a great way to keep the team sharp and busy in-between major projects.
Diving the Clan Cumming had been on the agenda for a couple of years. The reason for delaying doing it was that her wreck was in the middle of a busy traffic lane on the approaches to Piraeus port, therefore we were reluctant to dive her due to safety concerns. Initially we contended ourselves with just locating the wreck with the echo sounder and getting a general idea of its size, depths, orientation, etc. In the course of time we managed to setup a dive within acceptable safety margins. After this dive which was done in July 2012, we have identified the Clan Cumming which is resting in 94 meters of water off Cape Tourlos, island of Aigina.
Clan Cumming was a steel, twin screw cargo steamer of 7264 grt, built in 1938 in Greenock Dockyard Co Ltd. She was owned by ‘The Clan Line Steamers Ltd.’ and managed by 'Cayzer, Irvine & Co. Ltd'. As per some preliminary research carried out so far, it seems that during the Second World War she was on Government service which eventually brought her to Piraeus where she stayed for repairs after having been torpedoed. There, she was again damaged during the port’s bombing of the 06 April 1941 and the resulting infamous Clan Fraser explosion. On 14 April 1941 she managed to sail from Piraeus but she accidentally entered the defensive Tourlos – Phleves minefield, hit a mine and sunk on the 15th.
Diving her would not present any serious difficulty if only she was not so dangerously close to dense ship traffic. We had to wait for perfect surface conditions, minimal scheduled ship traffic and planned for a shorter bottom time. The wreck lies at 94 meters of water on her port side making an impressive sight due to her massive size. The parts visited are in a generally good condition; due to the limited bottom time and a scooter problem we managed to visit just the forward part of the accommodation and her forward decks up to the mast. Visibility was not that good, especially closer to the bottom, meaning that the port half of the ship is wrapped in a cloud of silt. Current was negligible.
Closing this brief report, further dives are scheduled in order to document points of interest on the wreck. However it will be an ongoing task for quite some time as these dives must be carefully planned and done in conditions such that will guarantee the team’s safety. Documenting the ship’s story as fully as possible from various sources will also be attempted in the near future.
Team members:
Bibliography and Sources: