The Downbelow team revisited an old favourite over the weekend; the ship wrecks found at Usukan Bay, an hour by speedboat away from Kota Kinabalu.
Richard, our resident PADI Course Director and Speciality Wreck Instructor Trainer, along with Joanne and the island crew enjoyed an awesome couple of dives on the Japanese shipwrecks, which have been down there for around 68 years.
Part of a Japanese World War II convoy that was attacked by an American sub on a rainy night with low visibility, the 3 wrecks are generally accepted as being the warships Hikane Maru, Hiyori Maru and Kokusei Maru.
However, they have never been precisely identified, and is locally referred to as the Rice Bowl Wreck, the Upside-down Wreck and the Usukan Wreck.
Perched between depths of 20m and 40m, the wrecks are best dived with a Nitrox setup so as to allow for a longer bottom-times to explore these history sites.
We’ve dug up a bit of history on the Usukan Bay wrecks and have a photo album with a few selected shots of this and previous dives on the wreck.
Downbelow organises trips out to the Usukan Bay wrecks every so often, so do get in touch with us if you’re dive happy history buff – or just dive happy.
