Iolanthe 42 m

The Iolanthe was sunk by a torpedo from UB-75 in January 1918. She was carrying a cargo of railway trucks and hay, she is known locally as the railway wreck. The shot was snagged in a set of bogies from a railway truck, a good start on the ?railway wreck?. The bow and stern remained upstanding but the wreckage between them had ?flatpacked? to the sea bed, with some of the cargo of trucks spilt across the sea bed. In places the deck still stood a few metres off the sea bed allowing a swim through between holds. 

The structure of the stern section was still in good shape though the plating was deteriorating. The stern lay on its port side, the steering gear was still attached but there was no sign of the prop. The stern was covered in soft corals and anemones. The wreck was generally at about 40m with the scour at the stern being 45m and the scour at the bow being 49m. Once again it was a case of the ?usual suspects? as far as life on this wreck. Anemones, soft corals, fan and rose coral growing on the wreck, crabs, lobsters and congers in the wreck and a shoal of bib and pollack around the wreck.