Just back from a couple of weeks diving the famous Japanese WWII wrecks at Truk Lagoon in the Pacific, the world’s greatest collection of Japanese wartime shipwrecks. It has been quite a long time since a new WWII wreck was located in the lagoon, but I was priviledged to be taken out by Truk Stop Dive Centre to a new wreck only found at the tail end of 2018 and only dived once before, when it was first located. The wreck turned out to be an intact 300-tonne Imperial Japanese Navy salvage and repair tug. Four were known to have been present at Truk at the end of the war, 2 have been located previously, Futagami and Ojima. There is no wartime damage to the new wreck – and I suspect it was scuttled by the Americans at war’s end. Although its identity has not yet been established a plate in the engine room suggest the tug was built at the Kawasaki dockyard, Kobe.

See the video here: