Shipwreck Treasure Hunter

TV favourite and award-winning documentary maker Ross Kemp is showcasing the fantastic wreck diving around our coastline with his new TV series, Ross Kemp: Shipwreck Treasure Hunter

Photographs by A+E Networks UK and Sky History / Ed Taylor Honey Bee Media / Johnny McDevitt

The four-part series, which is available on demand

Through the four episodes he dives with advanced technical diver Emily Turton, skipper of MY Huskyan up in the Orkney Islands, and maritime archaeologist, commercial diver and technical diver Mallory Haas.

Kemp was well placed to film the series, as he was already a diver – he did his Open Water Diver course in Cyprus back in the mid-1990s, and then he went diving on a holiday in the Maldives with his then-girlfriend. However, being left adrift on the surface for some six hours after the dhoni crew mis-counted the guests put him off the whole diving scene – until the opportunity arose for this series, which came about after a discussion revolving around the wreck of the Victory in the Maldives. However, he had no experience of diving in a drysuit or with a full-face mask.

In preparation for Shipwreck Treasure Hunter, Kemp spent two months brushing up on his diving skills in the waters of Wraysbury and NDAC. He underwent various SDI training courses with Mark Powell, Director of Global Development for TDI, SDI and ERDI, to get a solid foundation of moreadvanced diving techniques, moving from his OW cert through Advanced and on to Rescue, and then took a demanding HSE Scuba course with Neil Brock at Bristol Channel Diving Ltd (Neil also served as the Dive Supervisor for the series).

Talking about the HSE course, he said: “It was a bit like Reservoir Dogs turning up to a reservoir, all these serious-looking guys kitted up in all the gear. People were wondering ‘who are this lot, and how did they get privileged parking?’.”

Kemp continued: “It was a seriously sharp learning curve. It is a tough course, and I can’t remember the last time I’d had to sit a fivehour exam! At one point, when I was knelt at 20m calling for scaffolding pole to be sent down on a rope to build a frame, I did question why on Earth I’d spent three years as a ‘luvvy’ drama student to end up building scaffolding underwater!”

Filming Shipwreck Treasure Hunter proved a real eye-opener for Kemp, who commented: “I had no idea about British business interfering in the war of the Confederacy.

By diving on the Iona II off Lundy, I found out that British businessmen, 30 years after the abolition of slavery in the United Kingdom, were very happily supplying guns and aid to the Confederacy.

“Had they not done that, the war between the North and the South could have been resolved some two years earlier, ending slavery two years earlier in the United States, saving thousands and thousands of lives – it was just the pure greed of some people in this country that helped to prolong that very violent civil war.” Kemp was also able to get truly hand’s on with marine archaeology during a dive on HMS Amethyst. He explained:

“HMS Amethyst was a star of its day. It fought in the

American War of Independence, and it sank numerous

American, Spanish and French ships. It was considered one of the luckiest ships of its day. It was incredibly manoeuvrable, very fast and carried a lot of guns. “Bear in mind in those days the Navy encouraged crews to keep a percentage of the booty if they took cargo vessels. So, it was a ship that people wanted to be on because not only was it the fastest and most heavily gunned, but it was also considered very lucky and very profitable to be on. “She sank by mistake in Plymouth Sound, and she was buried in very shallow water but it’s very dangerous water to get into. I personally found, with the help of Mallory and a metal detector, part of the ship’s copper hull. In those days to make vessels quicker, they covered the hull in copper, and any vessel or anything belonging to the Navy in those days had an insignia on it. “I know that sounds like ‘Ross, you found a little bit of copper that was off the side of a boat’ but when you’re the person that finds it, you understand why people go off metal detecting every weekend.

Along with his fascination for seafaring history, Ross has a personal reason for undertaking this adventure as members of his family served at sea, with some being shipwrecked and not surviving to tell their tales.

Ross is joined in his adventures by expert diver Emily Turton, maritime archaeologist and professional diver Mallory Haas and dive supervisor Neil Brock as they delve down into Britain’s incredible shipwrecks!

There is an incredible sense of connection with your country’s history. For me, connecting with history like that makes it incredibly real. “We were looking at the edits and we had to take the ‘whoas’ out, because I’m going ‘whoa, whoa’ all the time! Although one of my most-memorable moments didn’t even involve a wreck – it was when a cormorant swam between my legs at 25m!”

Kemp is hopeful that the series will encourage more young people into the hobby, and be enjoyed by both divers and non-divers alike. He acknowledged that elements of drama had been added to ensure that its engaged with a more-mainstream audience, but said that they did have some moments of ‘genuine jeopardy, but that it goes with the territory’. The actor and film-maker has a fascination for seafaring history anyway, but he had a personal reason for undertaking this endeavour as members of his family served at sea.

Kemp said: “My great-grandfather ‘Pop’ joined the Royal Navy during World War Two at a very young age, maybe 12 or 13, and did that for two years, then he joined the Merchant Navy, where he stayed until he was in his early 70s. He survived being shipwrecked twice during World War Two and survived to tell the tale. I have a picture of him when I was very young, being on his knee. Apparently I was fascinated by him because he smoked a pipe, hence his name ‘Popeye’. “My great-uncles Bertie and Albert both served and perished aboard HMS Hood when it was sunk by the Bismarck in May 1941. I think there were 1,300 sailors on

board at the time, only three survived.”

Being involved in the TV series also highlighted to Kemp how fragile the ocean environment is, and how divers can do their bit to help protect it. He explained: “Mallory works on a project called 1000 Tyres, that aims to remove 1,000 tyres out of Plymouth Sound. I think that should be taken up globally.

“Sadly, tyres are just some of the things that we managed to pull out of the water; that is not treasure, that is pollution.”

However, it wasn’t all negative – it brought home to him what dwells in our waters: “I’m very lucky to have dived in the Maldives and a barrier reef in the past, but I was honestly surprised at the amount of marine life that we do have in our waters, and you know, it’s something that we should treasure, something that we should look after, and not something that we should pollute.

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“Some people might say that those rusty wrecks are pollution, but they’re there for a reason. They’re part of the history of the story of these islands, but rubber tyres for me certainly aren’t.”

Kemp initially became a star for his role in EastEnders and other TV and film work, but in more-recent years, it is his award-winning documentaries that have hit the headlines. Asked how Shipwreck Treasure Hunter compares, he commented: “I’ve always been a team player, and in previous documentaries I’ve had to rely on my colleagues to some extent, but in diving, you really rely on your buddies and dive team. We only had a limited period for filming, so we had to take what we could get weather-wise, but I was with an amazing group of people, and I couldn’t have got through it without them – it was an honour to work with them all.“

Kemp continued: “Shipwreck Treasure Hunter will stand out to me as one of the most-enjoyable documentaries I’ve ever made, and there is plenty to explore in a second series of the show. This country is absolutely littered with shipwrecks because of our maritime past from all over the world, and undoubtedly there is still a lot to explore despite the amount of diving that’s been done around the islands.

“The bravery of those on board, the deviousness of those on board, and the cruelty of those on board, they’re all stories that need to be brought to the surface. And I think diving on wrecks is a great way of bringing history to life – it is a tangible way of telling the history laid out before you. I had some very personal moments on those wrecks, thinking about the lives on board, and in some circumstances that were lost.”

He jokingly concluded: “There is no shortage of wrecks all over the world, and I do hanker for somewhere a little warmer than the North Sea… That’s a big indication to those at Sky History!” n