SS Andrea Doria - Diving On The Wreck Site

Diving On The Wreck Site

Due to the luxurious appointments and initially good condition of the wreck, with the top of the wreck lying initially in 160 feet (50 m) of water, Andrea Doria has been a frequent target of treasure divers. It is commonly referred to as the "Mount Everest of scuba diving." The comparison to Mt. Everest originated after a July 1983 dive on the Doria by Capt. Alvin Golden during a CBS News televised interview of the divers following their return from a dive expedition to the wreck aboard the R/V Wahoo. The depth, water temperature and currents combine to put the wreck beyond the scope of recreational diving. The skills and equipment required to successfully execute this dive, such as use of mixed gases and staged decompression, put it in the realm of only the most experienced technical divers. The wreck is located at approximately 40°29.408′N 69°51.046′W / 40.490133°N 69.850767°W / 40.490133; -69.850767.

The day after Andrea Doria sank, divers Peter Gimbel and Joseph Fox managed to locate the wreck of the ship, and published pictures of the wreck in TIME magazine. Gimbel later conducted a number of salvage operations on the ship, including salvaging the First Class Bank Safe in 1981. Despite speculation that passengers had deposited many valuables, the safe, opened on live television in 1984, yielded thousands of American silver certificates, Canadian bank notes, American Express travellers checks and Italian bank notes, but no other valuables. This outcome apparently confirmed other speculation that most Andrea Doria passengers, in anticipation of the ship's scheduled arrival in New York City the following morning, had already retrieved their valuables prior to the collision.

22-year-old Evelyn Bartram Dudas was the first woman to successfully dive onto the Andrea Doria. Dudas reached the wreck in June, 1967; her future husband, John Dudas, retrieved the ship's compass.

As of 2010, years of ocean submersion have taken their toll. The wreck has aged and deteriorated extensively, with the hull now fractured and collapsed. The upper decks have slowly slid off the wreck to the seabed below. As a result of this transformation, a large debris field flows out from the hull of the liner. Once-popular access points frequented by divers, such as Gimbel's Hole, no longer exist. Divers call Andrea Doria a "noisy" wreck, as it emits various noises due to continual deterioration and the currents' moving broken metal around inside the hull. However, due to this decay new access areas are constantly opening up for future divers on the ever-changing wreck.

After years of removal of artifacts by divers, little of value was thought to remain. Significant artifacts recovered include the statue of Genoese Admiral Andrea Doria, for whom the ship was named. It was removed from the first-class lounge having been cut off at the ankles to accomplish this. Examples of the ship's china have long been considered valuable mementos of diving the wreck. The ship's bell is normally considered to be the prize of a wreck. This ship carried three bells: one bell located on the bridge, and two much larger ceremonial bells located on the fore and aft decks. The ship's stern bell was retrieved in the late 1980s by a team of divers led by Bill Nagle. On 26 June 2010, a diver from New Jersey, Carl Bayer, discovered the bridge bell lying on the bottom at 241 feet. He recovered it with assistance from Ernie Rookey, also from New Jersey. The bell, measuring 16 inches tall and weighing 73.5 pounds, was possibly used to signal fog on the night of the collision. The forward bell remains undiscovered. It has for years been thought to be in the ship's paint locker where it was stored during ocean crossings, but recent reports indicate that that part of the ship has collapsed in on itself and the forward bell may never be found.