on 4 August, 1942, the crew unaware that
a minefield had recently been laid, and
was torn in two, killing three men.
At 104m with an 11m beam, she is set
in sand at 20m, broken into many pieces
but covered in marine life.
I did two dives, exploring fragments
that are now homes for fish, including
several semicircle angelfish, emperor
angelfish, large puffers and sweetlips.
The remains of metal were coated in
red and orange sponges and lots of coral.
My guide pointed out three
crocodilefish, all of which I had missed
because they blended in so well with their
surroundings.Million Dollar Point
Another dive on my list was Million
Dollar Point, and its story is often told
with a sinister tone.
After the war ended and the Americans
were leaving, they offered to sell the
machinery to the British and French very
cheaply. The colonial powers refused to
pay, figuring that the Americans would
leave it behind anyway.
In an act of spite, so the story goes, the
Americans pushed millions of dollars’
worth of perfectly good machinery into
the ocean.
In his book The Lady and the President,
Peter Stone does not relate the action as
spiteful, merely as the way of the world at
that time. The war was over; transporting
the machinery home would have been
costly and taken up valuable space on
ships that were needed by troops.
Besides, bringing all that equipment
back to be sold off cheaply would haveFar from discounting the reefs of
Vanuatu, our second dive in a different
location was pristine and with far fewer
crown-of-thorns.
I left the reefs feeling the same as I had
on the Coolidge– there is so much to see
and explore under water and just not
enough time.USS Tucker
Just a short boat ride from Luganville lies
the USS Tu c k e rdestroyer. It seems slightly
ironic that this ship was also sunk by a
friendly mine just three months before
the Coolidge.
She was leading a cargo ship into SantoAbove, clockwise from
top left: Crocodilefish on
the USS Tucker;fish inside
the wreck; Million Dollar
Point; view of the Tucker.Left: Healthy reef with
fewer crown-of-thorns.divEr 22 divErNEt.com