Diving the Mikhail Lermontov

HISTORY - Lermontov and wreck pictures

MIKHAIL LERMONTOV - The “Rusty Ruskie”

Probably one of the worlds best wrecks to dive on! A first class vessel and a First class dive!!


Her Vital stats!!
Displacement: 10,742 net reg tons, 20,027 gross tons Builders: V.E.B. Mathias-Thesen Werft, Wismar, in the former German Democratic Republic Launched:18 March, 1972 Length: 155 metres or 578 feet Beam: 23.6 metres or 77 feet Draft: 8.3 metres or 27 feet Machinery: Sulzer Diesels, twin screw Cruising speed: 21knots. Owners: Baltic Shipping Company Port of Registry: Leningrad Passengers: 700 one class


On the morning of Saturday, the 15th of February 1986 at midnight she departed Welington to cross the treacherous Cook Straight for Picton at the head of the Queen Charlotte Sound on the Northern coast of the South Island. The following morning she departed Picton at 3 p.m. for Milford Sound on the South-west coast of the South Island. Captain Don Jamison, a Marlborough Sounds harbour pilot was to remain aboard the vessel instead of leaving her at Long Island, so that he could be available to pilot the vessel into Milford Sound.

743 people were on board. Of the 372 passengers, 327 were Australians including 5 children, 36 British, 6 Americans, 2 Germans, and one New Zealander. Of the 348 crew members, 330 were Russian and 18 British staff. Another 9 were Australians and 13 were British CTC staff members in transit. The weather was overcast with heavy rain and a 25 knot Southerly wind.

That doesn’t look right!!!!
Passengers reported that the ship had gone between the Light-house and the end of Cape Jackson (above) instead of clearing the rocky reef which extended past Walker Rock and was clearly shown on the charts. The vessel was drawing about 27 feet and Captain Jamison claimed his understanding of the depth in the channel to be 35 to 40 feet. It can be seen from the above chart that there was ample room for the Mikhail Lermontov to have passed through the channel had she missed the major rock pinnacles. However it would have been a very foolhardy course to take for anyone aware of the presence of the rocks.
The Birth of a NEW Wreck GOOD WORK Captain Jamison!
About 5.37 p.m. there was a thud and the ship started to list as the sea flooded through a 40 foot long gash in the hull, penetrating three water-tight bulkheads. The water short-circuited the electrical system, thereby stopping the engines. It is reputed that at 6.03 pm a Mayday call was broadcast, but this is disputed by local VHF operators. Presumably, because of language problems, no announcements were made to passengers to advise them of the position and tell them what to do, although many passengers were alerted to the problem by the fact that the crew were wearing life-jackets. In the meantime there was an announcement that dinner would be delayed an hour and the wine tasting session that was in progress would be extended. The band continued to play, but the wine tasting stopped when the list sent glasses sliding off the tables.
Oops!
The Russian captain had endeavoured to beach his ship, but without the assistance of engines this manoeuvre was unsuccessful, and the ship, by now down at the bow and listing, floated towards Gannet Point in Port Gore. The sea was choppy but not rough and the Tarihiko was able to get her boats to the stricken ship. 356 passengers and 164 Russian crew crowded every inch of space in the LPG ships quarters, eventually to be deposited at the Overseas Passenger Terminal at Wellington in the early hours of the following morning.
The crippled liner took on a 12° list and drifted into Port Gore where Captain Vorobyev tried to beach his ship. At 10.15 pm she was listing 40° to starboard and at 10.27 pm she foundered in 15 fathoms, sinking by the bow and laying over on her starboard side by Gannet Point.
There was a lot of criticism of the state of the lifesaving equipment carried on the Mikhail Lermontov. Many of the locals towed in lifeboats. They saw for themselves. It was reported that in many of the lifeboats bilge pumps were inoperative. They were seized up and had handles missing. There was a radio shack in the bow of one, but it had a hole, one and a half inches by three-eighths of an inch, where battery acid had leaked and eaten through the Aluminium. One of the enclosed boats had the exhaust disconnected from the hull and the exhaust discharged into the interior. Many of the life-jackets picked up in Port Gore fell to pieces, the fabric covering them was so rotten. Water containers in the lifeboats had holes in them, and in some of the lifeboats they'd been painted in place. It was hard to find one in good condition."

Shown here: approximate location of damage to the Port side of hull. The impact points are dents only, the hull distorted inwards but was not penetrated at these points. The tears, which are no more than 150mm wide at any point, occurred where the inward pressure caused the hull plates to fail near the joint with the bottom plates. The first impact point was 10.3 metres aft of the bow thruster, with the first tear starting 2.15 metres behind that. The main series of tears starts about 18 metres aft of the bow thruster and runs for 11 meters. The tears opened the double bottom to the sea and did not prevent further flooding because the upper plating was damaged by the distortion caused on impact. The vertical lines show the position of water tight bulkheads, the numbers above them being the frame numbers of their location. Note that three watertight compartments have been holed to varying degrees. The bulkhead at frame 106 developed a crack which led to the electrical power being short circuited and the engines losing power. This ultimately sealed the fate of the ship since she could not then be run aground. It is unclear why this compartment flooded since it is well aft of the damaged areas. However the shock of impact may have distorted the frames of the watertight doors, preventing correct sealing off from the forward compartments. The crack in bulkhead 106 may also have been caused due to the transmitted shock of impact. The initial point of impact just forward of the bulkhead at frame 154 would have been very stiff due to the three way intersection of hull, bulkhead and double bottom. Rather than having any 'give' at this point, the hull would have transmitted the massive force of impact around the ship, possibly causing considerable secondary damage. The bilge keel was torn from the hull from it's forward attachment point to slightly aft of the hull damage, then bent down and under the hull. It now forms a big horizontal strip of metal at right angles to the hull, and this could be the reason for the difficulty the crew experienced in steering the ship on a straight course after the impact.
This is a schematic of where the mooring line is situated and approximate depths.
She Rests!
The vessel is now lying in Port Gore in approximately 37 meters of water although this varies with the tide and is on an approximate 10 degree slope. The Port bridge wing is only about 12 meters below the surface. Bottom visibility varies greatly from 5-20 meters, depending mainly on the amount of recent rainfall in the area.
She truly is a BIG vessel and you can spend many dives on her and never get bored! The swimming pool area is really interesting. The skylights are normally not that visual because of the lower ambient light as a result of poor visibility. Occasionally when the viz is good you the light streams into the pool area!

Below are the plans of the ship.

Diving the Wreck!!!

The Nevsky Bar
AS Nevsky looks now!!
Astoria Bar



Recent picture taken looking from the floor above the dance floor. Notice the bubble chandelier. The remains of it is just a few posts (shown top right)

Telegraph in the wheelhouse still predominantly seen in the wheelhouse
The Bolshoi Lounge

Leningrad Restaurant. This is not a dive for the faint hearted. Well deep into the udders of the wreck, the Leningrad Restaurant is one ‘Scary monster’ dive (but well worth it to the discerning diver)
	Will get some pictures of the lenengrad soon!!

Here many Russian Dolls are found in a playroom along the starboard side of the wreck. These areas are least explored. With the dangerous nature of the wreck few people venture this far.	Sinister bloody things!!!!



This is the library. Here shown is layer upon layer of books. The weird thing is that they are all the same book! I don't know how to read Russian but the writing was all the same on the cover.

‘opening Hours’! A sign letting patrons know when the ‘Jasmine Room’ Was going to be open!! The stuff all around the sign is Hessian. It was all over the walls getting in the way of everything.


Mmmmm This is definitely a ‘before’ picture!! Obviously of Neptunes Bar. Beside the pool area

Not the best shot but you can still see the patterns on the bar front!! Stools are still standing!! (Ozzi Husband and wife not there anymore!!!!)

This is the pool with the skylights. Very impressive sight. Thankfully only one skylight has been broken and divers are now cleaning the glass to let the light in. Here is a picture i took recently of the pool area.	This picture above was actually taken IN the pool! Looking toward the stern Diver in pool facing boweard.

ENGINE ROOM

Breather diver dwarfed by the massive engines of the lermi.

Another angle of the engines

Area of entry into the engine room via ventilation areas

just looking out of the ventilation shaft