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Diving on Phuket’s Coral Reef Squadron

In November 2008 four World War II planes and six helicopters were sunk off Bang Tao beach in Phuket to create an artificial reef. We went and had a look…

As we were in Phuket after coming back from our Burma liveaboard, my friend Ayesha and I decided to go and investigate the recently sunk WWII planes and helicopters off Bang Tao beach. They are four Douglas C-47 Dakota Skytrain military transport aircraft and six Sikorsky S-58T helicopters. These had been donated by the Royal Thai Airforce and put down to create an artificial reef in November 2008 and to create a new tourist attraction for Bang Tao. They have become known as the Coral Reef Squadron. There’s some great pictures and info of the planes being sunk on the Thai Military Information blog and also on the Tourism Authority of Thailand site.

Bang Tao Bombers
Bang Tao Bombers

After dropping another dive buddy off at Phuket Airport, we got the taxi to take us on to Bang Tao beach. It’s about a half hour drive and costs around 600 Baht. Bang Tao beach itself is a very pleasant sandy beach that seems popular with German and Scandinavian tourists. There are a few hotels and restaurants along the beachfront which are also very tourist-orientated i.e. quite pricey with mediocre food.

We turned up without any real idea of what we were doing or who could take us out to dive on the bombers. Fortunately, standing on the beach looking lost soon brought us to the attention of several friendly touts. It turned out one of them was Jub, a divemaster for the Pearl Andaman dive shop. Usually I’m wary of touts, but Jub was the real deal – we headed to his dive shop which was on the main road behind the beach (a minute’s walk) or so and it was easy to organise our own longtail boat out to the bombers. The price was around 3500 Baht I think for 2 dives with weights and tanks – we’d brought all our own gear. There were several other dive shops along the same stretch of road parallel to the beach but we wanted to get on with the diving so didn’t go shopping around.

Bang Tao Bombers
Jub outside Pearl Andaman diveshop
Bang Tao Beach

The staff in Pearl Andaman were great – we needed space to set up our cameras and generally faff about and for these guys nothing was too much trouble – they made organising our trip very stressfree. You can see a photo of Jub outside the Pearl Andaman shop in the gallery above.

Once onto the longtail, it was about a 20 minute ride out to the sunken aircraft. There are four planes arranged in a cross shape, with the four helicopters arranged between them. Guideropes link each of the wrecks to each other underwater, and there are buoys on the surface marking each plane. The wrecks are located at around 22 metres maximum on a slope. The most intact plane (ie it still has its wings) is also the deepest. If I remember correctly, a couple of the other bombers had their wings removed.

When we got ready to go in, the viz looked great – I could the buoyline for at least 10 metres down. Once we got in, we soon realised that there was great viz for the first 10 metres and then it turned into a total peasouper! The viz was down to about one metre. The three of us actually managed to lose each other almost immediately, until we came out of the thermocline and then went back down together paying a little more attention to each other’s location.

Jub was an excellent guide – he knows his way around the wrecks very well and points out the guiderope to make it easy for you to follow him to the next wreck. He was also happy to patiently pose for photos for me and Ayesha, although as you can see from the results I had little luck getting anything decent – I’m just not a good enough photographer yet to be able to deal with so much backscatter-producing muck in the water.

The planes were still suitably evocative, and they are already covered with a layer of silt and becoming home to several schools of fish. The helicopters are perhaps more interesting due to their more open, exposed bodies. although you can go inside both the copters and the bombers.

Despite the viz being so poor on both dives, Ayesha still enjoyed our time on the planes, even if only for the comedy value of trying to take photos in such bad conditions. Jub and the Pearl Andaman team certainly made the experience good fun too – when we went back to the dive shop after the trip, the guys broke down all our dive gear and washed it for us ready for collection when we left the next day. The only hiccup we had was that they told us we could have dived on Nitrox for free – but they didn’t mention this when we signed up for the dives! D’oh!

I’m hoping to get commissioned to write a story about the planes so that we can go back and spend a few days there and next time maybe get some better conditions to get some better pictures – and it will be interesting to see how well the sea reclaims these planes. Apparently there is some controversy about the location of the wrecks as there are strong currents and poor viz in that area generally, which might actually make the planes disintegrate fairly quickly. We’ll have to see.



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My Recent Dive Trips

  • February 2023: Similan Islands liveaboard, Thailand
  • December 2022: Raja Ampat liveaboard, Indonesia
  • December 2022: Similan Islands liveaboard, Thailand
  • August 2022: Komodo liveaboard, Indonesia
  • June 2022: USAT Liberty shipwreck, Bali, Indonesia
  • April 2022: Stonehenge, Koh Lipe, Thailand
  • March 2022: Manta Rays at Koh Bon, Thailand
  • January 2022: Richelieu Rock liveaboard, Thailand
  • March 2021: HTMS Chang and Alahambra Rock liveaboard, Thailand
  • February 2020: Similan Islands liveaboard, Thailand
  • December 2019: Raja Ampat liveaboard, Indonesia
  • October 2019: Malapascua, Philippines
  • June 2019: Sogod Bay, Philippines
  • April 2019: Tulamben, Bali
  • December 2018: Sogod Bay, Philippines
  • December 2018: Anilao, Philippines
  • October 2018: Moalboal, Philippines
  • October 2018: Malapascua, Philippines
  • July 2018: Tulamben, Bali
  • May 2018: Raja Ampat, Indonesia
  • April 2018: Sogod Bay, Philippines
  • May 2017: Apo Island and Dumaguete, Philippines
  • April 2017: Tubbataha Reef, Philippines
  • April 2017: Sogod Bay, Philippines
  • March 2017: Triton Bay, Indonesia
  • March 2017: Raja Ampat, Indonesia
  • September 2016: Tulamben, Bali at Alba Dive Resort
  • August 2016: Cenderawasih Bay on Damai 1
  • April 2016: Sogod Bay at Sogod Bay Scuba Resort
  • February 2016: Raja Ampat and Banda Islands on Damai 1
  • April 2015: Anilao at Crystal Dive Resort

My Less Recent Dive Trips

  • March 2015: Myanmar and Similan Islands on Thailand Aggressor
  • May 2013: Similan Islands on Thailand Aggressor
  • April 2013: Tubbataha Reef on Discovery Palawan
  • January 2013: Komodo, Indonesia on MSY Damai
  • August 2012: Cenderawasih Bay, Indonesia
  • April 2012: Similan Islands and Southern Thailand liveaboard
  • January 2012: Similan Islands liveaboard, Thailand
  • August 2011: Hanifaru, Maldives
  • June 2011: Tubbataha Liveaboard Hans Christian Andersen
  • April 2011: Similan Islands and Southern Thailand liveaboard
  • April 2011: Carpe Vita Liveaboard, Maldives
  • March 2011: Lembeh Strait, Indonesia
  • December 2010: Menjangan, Bali
  • July 2010: Tofo, Mozambique
  • July 2010: Sardine Run, South Africa
  • May 2010: Sangalaki / Derawan, Tambora
  • March 2010: MV Flying Seahorse, Similan Islands
  • March 2010: MV Orion, Southern Maldives
  • January 2010: Big Blue Explorer, Palau
  • November 2009: MSY Damai, Banda Sea Liveaboard, Indonesia
  • October 2009: MSY Damai, Komodo Liveaboard, Indonesia
  • October 2009: MV Orion, Maldives Liveaboard
  • September 2009: MV Scubanet, Koh Losin, Thailand
  • May 2009: MSY Seahorse, Banda Sea liveaboard, Indonesia
  • March 2009: Sachika Liveaboard, Maldives
  • February 2009: Daytrips, Koh Lanta, Thailand
  • January 2009: MV Jazz, Burma (Myanmar) Liveaboard

Back In The Day Bragging Rights Dive Trips

  • November 2008: Borneo Explorer, Visayas Liveaboard
  • September 2008: S/Y Siren, Komodo Liveaboard
  • August 2008: Ocean Rover, Sulawesi Liveaboard
  • August 2008: NAD Lembeh Resort, Indonesia
  • June 2008: Koh Tao
  • March 2008: Maldives, Bandos Island
  • February 2008: MSY Seahorse, Raja Ampat Liveaboard
  • January 2008: MV Jazz, Burma Liveaboard
  • October 2007: Bali Dive Safari
  • September 2007: Davao, Philippines
  • July 2007: Great White Sharks, Rodney Fox Liveaboard
  • June 2007: Big Blue, Palau Liveaboard
  • May 2007: Whale Sharks at Exmouth, Australia
  • April 2007: Borneo Explorer, Tubbataha Reef Liveaboard
  • December 2006: Komodo Dancer, Komodo Liveaboard

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