New Jersey Scuba Diving

Rockaway Belle (US Army T-1)

At Point Pleasant, 1981

Rockaway Belle is listed as Army tug-transport T-1, built by Simms Brothers, Dorchester MA, 1942. 'T-boats' were 65-foot, 45 ton diesel-powered, passenger-cargo boats that doubled as harbor tugs. 170 of them were constructed during WWII, and many more afterwards. From 1940 through 1951 all T-Boats were built of wood, thereafter steel. Rockaway Belle was T-1 of the T-1 class, sold as surplus in 1947.

Rockaway Belle sank some time after 1977, there is a record of her active then.

Sister T-47, wood hull

The photo above is a sister. It looks like a natural fishing boat. T-1s probably needed very little to convert them to side-trawlers, already having a sturdy-looking hull, tugboat engine and cargo boom. I can find no details or date for the sinking, but there might still be something down there, and the first person who gets to it is going to find a giant lobster.

251479

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Exposure Suits

Almost all diving activities, whether in the tropics or in colder waters, will require some sort of exposure suit. For local conditions, this means either a full heavy wetsuit or a drysuit. For the tropics, there are thinner wetsuits and fabric skins, but these are never warm enough for use around here. Water temperatures in the north Atlantic vary from just above freezing at depth during the coldest part of the year to the mid-seventies at the surface during the warmest. Typically, you can expect high-fifties to low-sixties at depth even over the summer.

More: Exposure Suits ...

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