Miranda : Hi, Miranda here :) waiting to take your questions.
Jeremy : This is Jeremy the one who prefers dry land.
Jason : Jason here, I've just surfaced from underwater so I'm still wet!
Carla : You sound sensible Jeremy Jon : Hi, As the wrecks was in 30m, which isn't considered that deep nowadays, why didn't you do decompression dives to get longer on them??
George : Having done a little diving myself I am curious as to why you did not use enriched air (nitrox) to extend the bottom time of the dives as the depth are well within limits for 32% and if I remember correctly 36% Nitrox
Jeremy chuckles
nitrox 36 : so how come you were limited to 15 mins, surely you could have planned it better, maybe nitorx, or deco dives?
Diving_Dong : Why not use nitrox for the 30m dive? Would enable longer bottom time...
Jason : Basically we didn't dive under sports dive rules. Because we were diving as a job at work we had to dive under strict HSE guidelines which meant we weren't allowed to dive below 30m without a recompression chamber on the boat.
Patrick Lawford : Did you talk to the RN before making this program?
Jason : Yes we did and we also liased quite closely with the Survivors Association because of the war grave aspect.
Ant : Congratulations on the new series. Was it difficult to persuade the MoD to release the details on the damage sustained to British ships?
Jeremy : David Manley the damage assessment expert has excellent contacts in the MoD and can pull any number of strings.
Jason : But the truth is Jeremy had to put on his tuxedo and go in undercover 007 style.
Miranda : And I was Miss Moneypenny!
Derek : How did the German's know that it was the Lawford that they had sunk if the bombing took place at night?
Jeremy : Very good question! Because they had extremely good intelligence - they knew where all the allied ships were.
Jason : Yeah more intelligence than you jeremy ; ) Just kidding!
Miranda laughs
stormwarrior : hi the pic of the lawford that you had is it possible to get a copy? as my wifes uncle was lost on the lawford
Jeremy : Wow... contact emily.walton@rdfmedia.com and she will be able to help you, hopefully.
Mark : Why is the Lawford not a war grave? I have dived the A7 sub off Plymouth which got stuck in the mud of Whitsand Bay on a training exercise yet this wreck is classed as a war grave, so it makes a mockery of the status 'war grave', if the Lawford which was sunk in action does not get officially recognised as a war grave when a sub on a training exercise does. Not that I wish to be disrespectful to the sub mariners who lost their lives on the A7.
Jason : It's because it's in French waters basically.
Frankie : Why did you not discuss the possibility that it could have been an internal explosion due to an accident on the ship that caused the magazine to explode?
Jeremy : My view is that it seemed extremely unlikely, the ship was after all in a combat situation and we felt it reasonable to discount that possibility.
Jo : what happens to the items/information gathered on the wrecks?
Jason : It depends - on some of the sites we have to write up archaeological reports.
Miranda : And any artefacts are restored and preserved in local museums.
Patrick Lawford : Given the vast number of wrecks within easy reach of the UK, how do you choose which ones to look into?
Fred 250 : What do you consider a good wreck to investigate?
Miranda : It was important that we picked ones which were relatively easy to dive, it's hard enough to film underwater as it is. The bottom time has an awful lot to do with it.
Jeremy : It's amazing to see just how many wrecks in British waters do not have any mysteries surrounding them too.
Jason : And also the wrecks that we did cover a lot of work had already been done on them. It wasn't us doing all the work. A lot of people had spent a lot of time on them.
Jon Miller : With your last programme in the Sound of Mull why do you think no anchors were found?
Jeremy : I'm guessing that a lot of anchors are traditionally recovered from wreck sites and re-used.
Derek : Why did you not just look up the write up of the event by the German pilot before diving down to the wreck?
Jason : I think it is very difficult to get hold of those documents - we had a specialist archive researcher on the case.
Jeremy : The German account of the attack was a confirmation of what we had discovered with David Manly's help. The German report on its own would not have been so conclusive.
SGDavidson : Have you any plans for a second series?
RobB : will there be another series if so maybe you could go abroad
Miranda : Oh yes please!
Jason : I've heard there are a lot of wrecks in the Caribbean!
Miranda : Please ring Channel 4 and ask for a second series!
Les Pickstock : nice try Jason
Dave : What is the most memorable wreck you have been involved in?
Miranda : All of them are special in their own way, the Stirling Castle off Ramsgate (next week) was amazing because of the sheer amount of wreck that is left there. It was so well preserved.
Jeremy : The Earl of Abergavenny broadcast two weeks ago - primarily because of the Wordsworth connection.
Jason : I enjoyed the Lawford actually basically because of the presence of the survivors - it gave the dive much more resonance.
ashley : how do you get involved in all this?
Jeremy : I wrote a book about a Cornish shipwreck which apparently gave me some expertise, screen tests followed...
Jason : Numerous!
Jeremy : Heh, yes! Then the production company signed me up the rest is maritime history!
Miranda : I had a broken foot when I screen tested with Jeremy and we spent twenty minutes talking about potatoes and we just hit it off so it must have been the great chemistry and the fact that I'm a diver.
Jason : I had been diving for sixteen years and it was... well, my idea :)
Mark : Do you feel that the edited version of your show does not give us the full story? I do feel sometimes the show seem to just skim the surface.
Jason : Definitely.
Miranda : It's impossible in an hour to go through what we filmed in a week and to include all the research we do in the weeks before. Hopefully if we do a book with the next series then we can go into more detail then.
Miguel : What was your greatest obstacle to get this project underway?
Jason : The British weather!
Miranda : We were very lucky with that actually.
Jason : Organising eight expeditions over one summer is a huge logistical nightmare - it was only blind luck that got us through it and sheer hard work.
Jeremy : And blind loyalty to the project.
Chat Ed : Our half hour with is almost up, so last three questions now...
charlie : How easy is it for amateur divers to visit the sites in the series?
Jason : There are just two sites that you can visit because a lot of them are protected. So, for example the Hazardous which is the last in the series - you can go on organised diver trails to that, which are a lot of fun. The Lawford is the other one you can dive.
Diving_Dong : Were there any accidents in the making of the series?
Jeremy : We dropped a camera - it was expensive! Not my problem!
Jason : And we had a football match between the divers and the rest of the crew and Dave broke a couple of ribs on Jeremy's knee and so did Jeremy!
Jason : To be serious we were very strict and cautious on the diving side of things.
ME : Will there be a book, dvd or video available? This is a great series which i would love a copy of.
Jeremy : Ah fantastic. We looked at compiling a book but there was simply not enough time between ending making the series and it being broadcast. Maybe there will be a book for the second series, should there be a second series. We're not sure about the dvd or video as yet :) It's been a pleasure. I hope you enjoy the rest of the series.
Jason : Same from me cheerio!
Miranda : Thank you everyone, goodbye.
Les Pickstock : thank it was cool
ME : Thank you and cant wait until next week
Nick : bye Miranda
