In September 2001 Steve Westall generously arranged a “Cocos Island Reunion Party” in Brighton, inviting everyone who had travelled there with him just four months earlier aboard MV Okeanos Aggressor. During a visit ashore at Cocos Island, Steve had fallen, breaking seven ribs and sustaining a fractured pelvis, a neck injury and many cuts and bruises.

Four months later he was able to walk again albeit with crutches. Steve’s guests included Ian Batley, Danilo Croci, Carren and Mark Holden, Del Webb and Jerry Weeden. Steve had also laid on some local dives from Buccaneer, a dive charter boat based in Shoreham-by-Sea.

I dived two wrecks (my dives 407 and 408) with Ian. We arrived at the first dive site, the wreck of the City of Waterford, about half an hour before slack water and even though there was only a slight swell I soon felt seasick. I was relieved when after 30 minutes I was finally able to get off the boat! Ian and I dropped down the shot line, the visibility being about 4 metres and made our way to the deepest part of the wreck. The City of Waterford was a 1,334 ton British steamer built in 1921 and which collided in fog on 14th April 1949 with Marpessa, a 5,500 ton Greek steamer. The City of Waterford sank to the bottom and is still largely intact. Apparently blue ceramics tiles are still in place on the floor of the galley together with lead-lined sinks and cooking pots but Ian and I missed these! We also missed a pair of conger eels but we did see a spider crab, bass, bibs and pollock before making a free ascent back to the surface.

Our second dive was a wreck known only as “The Steam Trawler”. This wreck stands upright and is 98 feet long and has a beam of 31 feet. Most of her superstructure has gone. In visibility of 3 metres Ian and I descended down onto the wreck again seeing bass, bibs and pollock. There was quite a strong current running and when Ian and I ascended up the shot line at the end of the dive, the strength of the current caused us to hang at right angles off the line as we completed our safety stop.