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Best Destinations for Wreck Diving — 2017 Readers Choice Awards

By Scuba Diving Partner | Published On January 25, 2017
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Best Destinations for Wreck Diving — 2017 Readers Choice Awards

Our annual Top 100 Readers Choice Awards are based on your real-world dives, and they let us take that journey right along with you. Since 1994, we’ve been presenting our ­readers’ picks for the best scuba diving in the world in our annual Top 100 Readers Choice Awards. It’s a feature that we love to put together, because we consider the results of our annual Top 100 survey a way for magazine readers, fans and online followers to share their most ­remarkable moments ­underwater. Below you'll find the winning destinations for best destinations for wreck diving.

How the Winners are Chosen:

Thousands of Scuba ­Diving subscribers and online users rated their experiences at dive destinations in a ­variety of categories on a scale from 1 to 5. Final scores are an average of the numerical scores awarded. A minimum number of ­responses was required for a destination to be included in these ratings.

Caribbean and Atlantic

scuba diving wrecks in the british virgin islands

A diver explores Chikuzen, in the BVI.

Mauricio Handler

1. British Virgin Islands

A ship’s overall length is less impressive when visibility doesn’t allow you to see it all at once. From nearly every vantage point of the Chikuzen, a 246-foot refrigeration ship lying off the island of Virgin Gorda, a diver can witness it all: goliath grouper huddling near the stern, schools of horse-eye jacks flowing over the midsection, and angelfish flitting about the bow. The RMS Rhone, split in two sections off Salt Island, and the Pat, Beata and Marie L. in Wreck Alley off Cooper Island, all allow for easy and impressive viewing thanks to the seemingly unending visibility.

2. Bahamas

3. Aruba

4. Cayman Islands

5. Roatan


North America

scuba diving wrecks in north carolina

Sand tigers on North Carolina's Proteus wreck.

Michael Gerken

1. North Carolina

Two wars saw German subs patrolling this stretch of the Atlantic coast, sinking dozens of Allied ships in the process — as well as four of their own, three of which lie within rec limits. Add to those the vessels that couldn’t navigate shallow hazards such as Diamond Shoals, and the tally rises higher than 150. Then consider the currents: The cooler Labrador ushers in Atlantic species, and the Gulf Stream brings in Caribbean marine life, resulting in a mix that can include queen angelfish and up to 300 sand tiger sharks on any given dive.

2. British Columbia

3. Great Lakes

4. Florida

5. California


Pacific and Indian Oceans

scuba diving wrecks in Chuuk Lagoon

There are many Japanese shipwrecks and planes waiting to be explored at the bottom of Chuuk lagoon.

Shutterstock

1. Chuuk Lagoon

2. Red Sea

The Sinai Peninsula ranks among the tec diving capitals of the world, thanks in no small part to its sunken underwater fleet, anchored by the SS Thistlegorm merchant navy ship sunk with room after penetrable room of World War II supplies, from motorbikes to cases of ammo. The second-most treasured site is an island — Abu Nuhas — that claimed four ships, including the 328 foot Greek cargo ship Giannis D., and the 295-foot Carnatic. With rebreather and mixed-gas support readily available, these ships are just the beginning.

3. Indonesia

4. Hawaii

5. Palau


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