Divers head for the Toa Maru

Early in 1943, the Japanese transport Toa Maru was attacked by American dive bombers and their fighter escort while on a trip to Kolombangara Island near Gizo.  The ship was carrying a cargo which included fuel, timber, trucks, bags of cement, bottles, steel girders, ammunition and a two-man tank.  With a big hole in the bow and the fuel in the stern hold on fire, it appears that the captain tried to run the ship aground. The ship is about 140m (450 ft) long and lies on its starboard side on a sandy bottom in the sheltered Kololuka Bay, about seven kilometres north of Gizo. You could not hope to find a better wreck site!

We slid over the side of the Adventure Sports dive boat into 28 deg C (83 F) water that felt like a warm bath.  About 12 metres below was the port hull and midships superstructure of the Japanese transport Toa Maru. Dive guide Lucas and I descended over the aft part of the ship heading towards the stern.  As we swam past the sterncastle, my computer started beeping a 30 metre depth warning at me. In the interest of maximising bottom time, I decided not to go down to the stern gun which stood on the sand at 37 metres.  The ship has a beautifully curved stern so I swam around it to see the rudder and shaft. The propeller itself was salvaged over 30 years ago.

I swam past the load of fuel drums in Hold 6 and into Hold 5 which is cluttered up with timber beams and logs.  There are a few vehicles on the sand below including a fuel tanker, and two trucks.  I swam through the interior to Hold 4 and emerged behind the midships superstructure.

There was insufficient time on this dive to explore the crew quarters, engine room, medical supply room and bridge, so we swam past the engine room skylights, lifeboat davits, funnel and bridge structure.  In front of the bridge, Lucas disappeared and came back with a collection of artefacts including a 1940’s telephone handset and medical supplies.

We moved forward past the kingpost where Lucas pointed to what looked like a pile of junk on the side of the hold.  Going in closer, I realised that this was a two-man tank, tipped upside down.  It is similar to those that I had seen on the Nippo Maru and the San Francisco Maru in Truk Lagoon.  I stood on my head and poked my torch up into the turret.  There is not a lot of room in there!  If you go into Hold 2, you will see steel girders, lots of bottles and some live ammunition. Down on the sand there is a wheeled vehicle which might have once been a motorcycle.

We swam past the mast and into the forward hold which contains many rather solid bags of cement.  The forward gun is missing so we drifted out onto the port hull which is covered in coral.  From here we moved over to a large field of staghorn coral and commenced our safety stop.

Details and drawings of the Toa Maru are available on the Adventure Sports website.