SS Maori
Marker: recorded wreck position (Date not recorded).
Key facts
| Name | SS Maori | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Ship type | shoreline dive site, recreational dive site | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Cause of loss | Grounding or wreck on rocks | Keyword match in English Wikipedia lead sentence |
| Nationality / flag | South Africa | Wikidata P8047 country of registry |
| Sea / ocean | South Atlantic Ocean | Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon |
| Nearest coast | South Africa | Natural Earth (public domain); approx. 5 km from land |
| Position | -34.0344, 18.3132 | Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0) |
About the wreck
Maori was a British refrigerated cargo steamship built in 1893 by C.S. Swan & Hunter of Wallsend-on-Tyne for Shaw, Savill & Albion Co. of London with intention of transporting frozen meat and produce from Australia and New Zealand to the United Kingdom. The vessel stayed on this trade route through her entire career. In August 1909 while on one of her regular trips, she was wrecked on the coast of South Africa with the loss of thirty two of her crew.
Diving & visiting
The wreck lies in about 24 metres (79 ft) of water between granite boulders. Since the 1960s it has been popular with scuba divers, but it can be visited only when the weather is calm and the prevailing southwesterly swell is low. The hull has been vandalized and much of the general cargo that the ship carried has been removed by hunters of salvage and souvenirs over the years. In the 1970s divers dynamited her hull to search for non-ferrous metal.
The cargo included crockery, rolls of linoleum, champagne and red wine. In the 1970s it was still possible to find bottles of wine scattered about the wreck in the sand. Most of these used to explode when brought to the surface.
Location
- Recorded position: -34.0344, 18.3132 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
- Sea / ocean: South Atlantic Ocean
- Nearest coast: South Africa
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article SS Maori (1893) (revision 1347139544), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “Wreck”; condensed by selecting paragraphs; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
Nearby wrecks
- SS Oakburn and Bos 400 1994 · 0 km
- HMS Sceptre 1799 · 18 km
- HMS Pelorus 1994 · 26 km
- SS Thomas T. Tucker 27 km
- SAS Good Hope 30 km
- HMS Thames 1947 · 36 km
Browse more: Africa wrecks · wrecks off South Africa · South Atlantic Ocean