The RMS Rhône dive is an iconic dive. It has a lot of history. It has an interesting story, and for a wreck that has been down for over 150 years it still has quite a bit of structure to see and photograph.
The first time I dove the Rhône, the weather was poor and getting in and out of the dingy was a real challenge. But once we got down below 15 feet the water was clear and the wreck was a lot of fun to explore. The wheel house was still intact and it still had a world class lobster living in it. Between 2010 and 2018 a hurricane went through BVI and damaged the wheelhouse and made it unsafe to enter, and did further damage to the rest of the remains of the wreck.
The last time I dove the Rhône, we had pretty good weather but the visibility was not quite as good, but still at least in the 80 foot range.
The remains of the wheelhouse, are not safe to go inside of today, but there are more schools of fish around the wreck site because no fishing was allowed in 2018.
If you were wondering how powerful the hurricane was that hit BVI, consider this this part of the Rhone was in about 90 feet of water. Twist iron ribs in 90 feet of water, that seems to me to be a lot of force.
The remnants of the checker board flooring with red rope sponges.
I’m hopeful to get back to the Rhone wreck again in 2022. If I could get enough dives on the wreck, I might even consider doing one of the dives as a macro dive because there do appear to be quite a few small critter that have taken up residence.