AH-WR-1263

Hermes

Freighter · Panama · Lost 1985 · Bermuda

A former Coast Guard buoy tender abandoned with engine trouble and later scuttled as Bermuda's most popular intact wreck dive.

Become Captain of Record See Shipwreck on Map

Artistic recreation based on recorded historical documents. See the documented evidence.

Documented Likeness. Drawn from surviving builder's plans or clear photographs of this vessel. See the documented evidence.

The Vessel and Her Loss

Built in Pennsylvania in 1943 as a US Coast Guard buoy tender, the vessel later became the Panamanian freighter Hermes. In 1983 she suffered engine trouble en route to the Cape Verde Islands and was abandoned by her unpaid crew in Bermuda. The Bermuda government sold her to the Bermuda Dive Association for one US dollar, and she was cleaned and scuttled off the South Shore on May 15, 1985, to become an artificial reef.

Vessel

Built: 1943
Builder: Not established
Yard: Pennsylvania, United States
Material: Steel
Length: 165 ft
Beam: Not established
Tonnage: 254
Propulsion: Diesel, single screw
Owners: Formerly US Coast Guard; later a Panamanian-registered freighter

Loss

Date: May 15, 1985
Cause: Intentional sinking
Location: About one mile off Bermuda's South Shore near Horseshoe Bay
Water: Atlantic Ocean, Bermuda South Shore
Voyage: Rhode Island → Cape Verde Islands
Cargo: Second-hand goods
Aboard: 0
Lives lost: 0
Master: Not established

The Wreck Today

Depth: 75-80
Condition: Fully intact, upright on a flat sand bottom, listing about 10 degrees to port.
Orientation: Upright
Discovered: Not established
Protection: Not established