Junkers Ju 88 (South)
The deeper of Malta's two Ju 88 bombers, sitting upright and almost complete on sand at 106 metres off Marsaskala. Trimix only, permit only, and one of the finest preserved aircraft wrecks in the Mediterranean.
Wreck
AircraftSea conditions
Stay dry right now
Sea is up (3.4 m NW) · Fresh W wind (34 km/h) · Gusts to 47 km/h
Done for today. Tomorrow: not looking good. Best it gets is 16 at 17:00: Sea is up (1.4 m NW)
Forecast for the site, updated 19:45 · Models disagree
Measured at Delimara (12 km away, 20:29): 25 km/h from W, gusts 40. The next hours lean on it.
- Waves
- 3.4 m
- from NW, biggest 5.4
- Wind
- 34 km/h
- W, gusts 47
- Swell
- 0.7 m
- 11 s period
- Sea temp
- 22 °C
- air 19 °C
Hour by hour
Next 7 days
0 3.4 m57 W
0 3.4 m54 WNW
41 1.0 m22 WNW
79 0.5 m17 ESE
71 0.6 m17 E
60 0.6 m25 NNE
66 0.5 m25 ENE
Sunrise 06:24, sunset 17:04
Waves: Copernicus Med-Waves 4 km + MFWAM 8 km + EWAM 5 km + ECMWF WAM 9 km. Wind: ICON-2I 2 km + ECMWF IFS 9 km + ICON-EU 7 km + UKMO 10 km + ARPEGE 11 km. Read a few km out on the side the site is open to, then blended.
Exposed to wind and swell from: NE (45°), E (90°), SE (135°), S (180°). Fully offshore on the southeast approaches, sheltered only from the west by the island. Given the decompression obligation, teams wait for genuinely flat water rather than merely diveable water, so the window is small even in high summer. Visibility at depth is usually excellent, and it is completely dark down there. Best season: July to September, on a flat calm forecast.
The dive
If the northern Ju 88 is the accessible one, this is the prize. At one hundred and six metres off Marsaskala, the aircraft sits upright on flat sand looking very much as though someone parked it there, which is more or less what happened: the intact posture points to a controlled ditching rather than a crash.
The airframe is close to complete. The nose shows some damage and the tail carries marks that may have come from gunfire, which together sketch a plausible last few minutes: hit in the air, still flyable, brought down onto the water by a pilot who knew what he was doing. Whether the crew got out is not recorded.
This is a serious dive and should be treated as one. One hundred and six metres means hypoxic trimix, closed circuit for most teams, several hours of decompression for a very short look, and a level of support that few holidays accommodate. It was found in a 2019 survey, identified by divers, and opened on 1 August 2020 under Heritage Malta with a permit requirement. For everyone who will never make that depth, the virtual model is genuinely worth an evening.
- Upright and close to complete, one of the best preserved Ju 88s anywhere
- Evidence of a controlled ditching rather than a crash
- Protected under Heritage Malta since 2020, essentially untouched
- A benchmark objective for Maltese trimix divers
Typical plan
Closed circuit hypoxic trimix, a shot descent to one hundred and six metres, twelve to eighteen minutes on the aircraft, then two to three hours of decompression under a live boat. One circuit of the airframe is all the gas budget allows, so plan the route before you get in: nose, port wing, tail, starboard wing, back to the line. This is expedition diving, not a day trip.
What the bottom looks like
- 1Fuselage sitting upright on the sand106 m deep · under the boat
- 2Cockpit and damaged nose section105 m deep · 6 m from the boat
- 3Wings with engine nacelles106 m deep · 18 m from the boat
- 4Tail with possible gunfire damage106 m deep · 33 m from the boat
- 5Featureless sand plain around the aircraft107 m deep · 68 m from the boat
Flat, fine sand with a thin silt layer, undisturbed apart from the aircraft itself.
Who you might meet
Almost always
Marked ones can hurt you. What they do and what to do about it is under Getting in and staying safe.
Getting in and staying safe
Boat only, a few kilometres out of Marsaskala, and only through a registered dive centre or club holding a Heritage Malta permit. Support is the serious part: a shot placed accurately, deep and shallow stage gas hung on the line, live boat cover for a drifting decompression, oxygen and a proper evacuation plan on the beach.
Where the boat stops
Permit only. Dived only through a centre registered with Heritage Malta, from a boat with AIS and clearance from Valletta or Marsaxlokk VTS. Nobody else may stop inside the protected area around it.
Positions as charted (WGS84) in Transport Malta Notice to Mariners 02 of 2024, archaeological zones at sea . Check the latest notice before you rely on them.
- 106 metres, hypoxic trimix and hours of decompression
- Very short bottom time for the effort and risk involved
- Isobaric counterdiffusion and gas switching complexity
- Cold and darkness at depth, redundant lighting mandatory
- Fragile corroded aluminium, nothing takes a handhold
- Offshore surface with shipping and fishing traffic
- Protected site with strict no touch, no recovery rules
- No realistic in water rescue option from that depth
Marine life to respect
Blackbelly rosefish · Ċippullazza tal-għajn Can hurt you
Venomous spines, like a scorpionfish. Do not handle it; hot water if stung.
Common stingray · Boll Can hurt you
Whips a barbed tail if stepped on or cornered. Stay off the sand and give it room.
Conger eel · Gringu Can hurt you
Crushing bite if a hand goes into its hole. Look in from a distance and keep fingers out.
A bit of history
A German twin engine Ju 88 bomber, roughly fifteen metres long with a twenty metre wingspan, lost during the Axis air campaign against Malta. The wreck was discovered during a remote sensing survey in 2019 and confirmed as a Ju 88 by a visual diver survey. It rests upright and largely intact on sand, damage being limited mainly to the nose section with possible weapon strikes visible at the tail, a pattern that supports a controlled ditching. Heritage Malta opened it to permitted diving on 1 August 2020, making it the deeper counterpart to the Ju 88 lying off Bahar ic-Caghaq at around 55 metres.
Divers say
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Further reading: Underwater Malta: Ju88 South · Malta Dive Sites: Junkers Ju 88 (South) · Heritage Malta: JU88 and the permitted wreck scheme · Wrecked in my rEvo: JU 88 Malta at 185 fsw