Updates

AN UPDATE ON THE CONTINUING SEARCH FOR AE1, 2009

 The Project AE1 team conducted two recent searches in 2009. These were instigated after locating new information in the Australian Archives Sydney, revealing that the submarine would have probably returned directly to its mother ship, Upolu, anchored in Simpson Harbour Rabaul. This placed more credibility on the report by former salvage diver George Tyers, who has always maintained that he sighted a submarine in 1971 in Simpson Harbour and later identified it as AE1 after seeing her photographs.

 After his anchor drifted off the Japanese wreck on which George was salvaging, George dived to a remarkable depth of over 100 metres and found it hooked onto what he believed to be a submarine. As he was conducting what is known as a “bounce” dive, i.e. down and up with minimal bottom time, he did not see the vessel completely, but described the conning tower and deck rails.

 Led by John Foster, the team decided to conduct a search in April, taking up George Tyers and two deep- sea divers. The chief divers was Dr Mark Spencer who previously dived on the wreck of our second submarine, AE2, which was scuttled in the Dardanelles, Turkey, during the Gallipoli Campaign in 1915. The second diver was Samir Alhafith of Sydney, a fearless and most experienced wreck and research diver. 

An interesting part of the research has shown that the site where the Japanese wreck lies, is at the end of the most likely course that AE1 would have taken as it entered Simpson Harbour and failed to alter her course to the north where her mother ship was anchored some 3 kilometres away.

 Using depth sounding and fish finding sonars, the survey vessel Barbarian set out to first of all locate the Japanese wreck, Keifuku Maru, or what is called locally as the “upside down wreck”. During the dives over the vicinity, all that could be found was a significant mound of pyroclastic matter and rocks that came from the 1994 eruption of local volcano Kalamanagunan, or Vulcan as it is more commonly known, No positive signs of either the Keifuku Maru or AE1 were found This expedition was filmed and broadcast on Mike Munro’s Sunday Night Program.

 It was decided that there was a need to follow up this search using magnetic detection devices to determine what lay beneath the new harbour floor. Reconstruction of the search area showed that the old shoreline had extended into the harbour by over 130 metres.

 A small team again led by John Foster, conducted a new survey in July. Associate Professor Jeremy Green of the Department of Maritime Archaeology          accompanied him, as well as wreck hunter John Riley of Sydney who is well known for his search methodology and who also dived on submarine AE2. John Riley was available to dive on any interesting contact.

 Jeremy Green, a methodical and most experienced remote sensing expert, used an Elsec 7760 Proton Magnetometer, which in technical terms provided a RS232 data stream of magnetic field intensity at a rate of 1 reading per second. The location of the Keifuku Maru was determined with difficulty as there were both significant magnetic anomalies and seabed magnetism in the site area. However, it was found that the Japanese wreck was now lying under some 30 metres of pyroclastic matter and ash, originating from both the eruption of Vulcan and the continuous ash from the volcano on the other side of the harbour, Tavurvur.

 But Jeremy Green felt that there was no reason why the survey should not have detected the AE1 However as Jeremy observed, there were complicating factors, namely the geometric field caused by volcanic ash and the influence of the nearby wreck of Keifuku Maru.

 Therefore evidence suggests that the submarine is not in the search area.

 What seems to be called for now is the use of a totally different system such as a sub bottom profiling sonar or in the worst case scenario, a deep water search in the St Georges Channel or waters surround AE1’s likely return track if profiling sonar reveals nothing.

 Project AE1 will now take a breather, look towards the establishment of a suitable memorial to the brave men of AE1 and monitor future opportunities.