Winnipesaukee Wreck Site List
 

After long consideration I have decided to post a number of wreck and some non-wreck sites for Winnipesaukee; Senter Cover Guy is responsible for some of the entries and helped me decide which to post because I still have reservations about doing so. The attached spreadsheet lists them.

A few things you need to know:

- For various reasons I have not posted all of the wrecks and non-wrecks of interest I have found; there are about 70 +- wrecks total to date; these include but are not limited to very old cars, 9 sections of the old Mt. Washington and old wrecks with beautiful features, with hull and hardware still intact including red/green running lights, steering wheels, lettering etc.; some are in places just too dangerous for many divers and I won’t post their location for that reason alone; how someone chooses to dive is not my responsibility but I still won’t do it;

- Some of these wrecks are deep and dark (as in no light at all), and the water can be ice cold, as in the mid to high 40’s; unless you’re well prepared in every respect for such conditions don’t dive them; some are not deep but are still very dark depending on site conditions (for example, Lees Mills and Moultonboro Bay can be the color of ice tea at the surface and near black out conditions at only 30 to 40 feet down, all normal conditions for the area); again-unless you know exactly what you are doing based on experience-my advice is don’t do it;

- I assume zero responsibility for any and all issues that may arise from anyone’s diving on any of these sites now or in the future; I am not trying to frighten anyone, just trying to get them to pay attention;

- For some divers it needs to be said: do not trash the wrecks; I can only ask of course, that you respect the wrecks;

- I do not use a hand-held GPS for finding anything because I have found my Garmin to be problematic (not accurate enough, probably because it’s 10 years old); instead I use the outstanding GPS that came with my Humminbird 1197 side-scan-sonar/chartplotter; it’s accuracy is remarkable; if you have trouble finding a wreck it might be your GPS or your boat is drifting too much as you drop a marker flag;

- Stay out of the path of the Mount and other such traffic; for example the ChrisCraft in Weirs Bay at about 72 feet down is directly in the path of the Mount as she comes through Eagle Channel to the Weirs and back out; anchor there at the wrong time and you are asking for big trouble; I carry the Mount’s schedule in my boat so I know exactly where she will be and when, and of course I don’t ever dive in her path knowing she will be passing by while I’m in the water or even getting ready to do a dive; in cases such as this I hope Marine Patrol shows up and takes control of the situation;

- One technique I came up with with Senter Cove Guy that has worked really well for us and adds a priceless margin of safety is described below; If you are in a wind that could drag your anchor, and even if you’re not in such a wind:

o Drop a dive flag on the wreck to mark it; generally you won’t hit the wreck directly but come close enough allowing you to find it once you’re on the bottom;
o Drop anchor nearby and back off the boat to set the anchor if it can be set;
o Put up a dive flag on the boat too; I use a 2’ x 3’ dive flag mounted on a 7 foot pole on the stern;
o Enter the water and clip a wreck reel with a heavy clip on the end, to the anchor line and swim on the surface to the dive flag/marker flag letting out the wreck reel line as you go; the heavy clip will go down the anchor line by itself under its own weight;
o Once at the dive flag descend to the wreck with wreck reel in-hand of course; if you can’t find the wreck at that point do a circle-search;
o When you return to the boat, reel in the wreck reel line by swimming on the bottom to the anchor to which it is clipped, remove the wreck reel from it, then ascend the anchor line and you will come up right at the boat not out in potentially dangerous water with no flag marking your position as you surface etc.;
o This technique worked for us quite well recently on a dive to 88 feet (46 degrees on the bottom); after setting the marker flag the boat was about 100 feet away from the flag, and the boat was clearly dragging a bit as we were gearing up for the dive; because of this SCG swam out to the flag with the wreck reel while I went down the anchor line to set the anchor; once on the bottom I encountered silt so deep that when I set the anchor into the bottom my arms went into the silt up to about my shoulders; I then followed the wreck reel line from the anchor on the bottom to SCG who was waiting for me on the bottom at the site we wanted to dive;
o This technique is generally not needed in really shallow water or water clear enough to see say, 20 feet; you probably still want to drop a flag on the wreck;

I don’t have a camp on the lake this year so I can’t spend as much time as I’d like on Winni. In the meantime I have been ocean diving and have some river diving planned. As I find new things in Winni I will give them due consideration and post them as I can for the public to dive. I have been up to Winni quite a few times this year scanning and diving and have a lot more to explore and search for.

If people have questions about a site or anything else feel free to email me at: info(at)sonarsar.com.

I will help you any way I can.

HH

Hans;

I would still like to search for that possible wreck site I told you about last year. I know it's there somewhere!

I have the boat / boats if you are up for the challenge someday. It would be fun!

Dan
Welch Island

I'm not a diver, but still interesting. Thanks for assembling the list and posting, and to SC G too.

Is there anything left of the Belknap? It used to be popular (50+ years ago) because it was shallow, but I know there was a lot of scavenging.

Thanks for sharing the list
Been wondering where some of these wrecks were.
Just need a diver interested in checking them out
Have a boat on Winnie

Correction to skiff off Shep's-Meredith
 

Aluminum skiff w/outboard off Shep's:

Depth listed as 14 feet-incorrect; it's closer to 50 feet.

I went out this morning and dove the structure on the north side of Diamond and empty pockets while I was out that way. Tomorrow will be the barge off Little Bear then the life raft. Should be a good week.

So I dove the wreck by Little Bear this morning. This is a really cool wreck, the numbers put me right on the bow which was very eerie looking seeing the bow come in to view. It looked like a ghost ship or something out Pirates of the Caribbean. Next I dove the life raft, was this something from the camp near by?

Empty Pockets
 

That was the name of my 37 Egg Harbor Sportfisher. Not on Winnipesaukee but on Nantucket Sound.

Adjustment to LatLon for Paugus 28 foot wreck
 

Senter Cove Guy and I have been discussing the Longitude for this wreck on the spreadsheet described as "Commercial Boat".

If the Longitude of 71 27.732 does not put you on the wreck use 71.27.719. Without calculating the spread in Google Earth I can say that the difference is about 40-50 feet or more. That's a big number in these conditions.

This is important because it is pitch black on this site at 88 feet deep and missing the target by even 15 feet can prove to be a problem in that you won't find it unless you do a circle search. Even then you may not find it.

One suggestion is to flag the target location with a dive flag then before a dive run either an Echosounder (Fish Finder) right next to the flag or better yet if you have Down Imaging/DI use that. DI is a hybrid between an Echo Sounder and Side Scan Sonar. I have gotten some great images using DI and other times it's just mush. And you need calm flat water.

Note that DI can produce a series of odd flat lines that seem to be stacked on top on one another-that's the wreck but it won't generally look like one Sometimes they do. It has almost no relief (height) but if the bottom has no rocks or other sonar "distractions"-like this site-this stack of lines will appear clearly-that's the wreck.

waypoint referencing
 

Hello Hans,
How can I tie into your coordinates? I have a new Humminbird w/ chartplotter. Is this the same system as yours or do I need to adjust into some waypoints at buoys in the lake. I am interested in the east side of the lake.

...upon further research since writing the above, and after reading the discussion you have had previously about lats/lons, I think I have answered my own question. I can assign cords to waypoints but I cannot assign coordinates to my built-in software's position of my unit.

Still I wonder how your Humminbird coords relate to Bizer's or Duncan's coordinates. I will be out on the lake tomorrow and I am going to stop at a couple buoys here and there to see how they match up out of my own curiosity.

I'll post what I find later in case anyone else is curious.

If I understand your questions:

- Yes you can of course assign Lat/Lons to a Waypoint, such as a place you want to get to such as a wreck or channel;

- As to your interest in "assigning coordinates to my built-in software's position of my unit", not sure what you mean; in the display on the chartplotter you will see the position of the boat (specifically, the position of the GPS antenna on the boat) so I don't know what coordinates you are trying to "assign"; the Lat/Lons will change as the boat moves of course and this is where your boat is at any point in time-just look at the screen;

- As to how the Humminbird's coords relate to Bizer or Duncan, they don't really because I use the Lat/Lon format of Degrees and Decimal Minutes (XX YY.ZZZ); the Bizer chart uses a different Lat/Lon format;

- If you are trying to check the GPS accuracy or play with it in general all you have to do is pull up next to a buoy for example then look at the Lat/Lon numbers on the chartplotter screen and see how they line up; bear in mind buoys drag so nothing is ever exact but you should be really close;

- I believe the Bizer chart uses True North so set the Humminbird for True North as well as opposed to Magnetic North;

Not sure this answered your questions.

Thanks Hans,

Thanks for the reply. I think, to re-ask my question, I need to study up on how HumminbirdPC software works on the computer. I have some experience in the survey field and I know that, on the computer, you can reassign your datum a new coordinate system base, such that the whole job is reassigned new coordinates. I now understand I cannot reassign my GPS antenna new coordinates on the unit, but possibly I can do it afterwards on the computer, after I have run a course and located a bunch of waypoints.

I was out last weekend on the lake but it was very rough and I didn't get a chance to experiment with the unit as I was hoping to. I spent my time off Plum Island in Roberts Cove swimming around in the danger zone eyeballing where the big rocks are for future reference.

If only I was a diver. It's nice to have you guys around to do the leg work and show us what's down there.

Since I'm wanting to dive a few places this summer I took a keen interest in the wreck list. I decided to port it into a map so people can visually see where the wrecks are

Attachment 13684

Link to click around on the map: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer...gn&usp=sharing

Wow, thanks for sharing the google map. I just spent 20 minutes clicking on each wreck and reading the descriptions.

Nice job thanks. Can you add a pop-up to show Lat/Lon?

This is one of those things that reminds me how cool technology can be. Thanks!

Sent from my Moto G (5S) Plus using Tapatalk

Nice job! Thanks for your time on this!

Can I have your permission to include this data on the www.WinniGas.com web site?

I know it's not directly related to gas docks, but as a diver, I'd love to support the info and to make it easy to find.

No worries if you prefer me not to do this, I won't do it unless I hear from you that it's ok.

Thanks!
Rich

Rich, by all means, go head. All the information is for the community at large.

I'm going to add the LAT and LONG here shortly also.

Edit: The lat/long were there, but not overly visible. Added them in and spaced everything out better.

There is a way to attach photos to these and I see there are some taken, so maybe we can add those also?

That being said, my replacement divemaster card just came in so I'll be ready to go come summer to hit a bunch of these spots with one of the outfits that goes around.


Carter

Thanks, I hope it will be useful and make it easy to locate.

Snorkle sites
 

Great info. Thanks for sharing. Any of these shallow enough to see snorkeling? I was looking for one off Little Bear today that bizer shows as shallow, but no luck.

The only one that might work for snorkeling is the Scamp in Paugus Bay in about 16 feet of water:

43 35.264N / 71 28.216W

I don't see any wrecks around Little Bear on Bizer.

sorry, i meant the one off Little Barndoor, on the Wolfeboro Bay side. Bizer says rowboat in 14 feet of water.

You can snorkel the one off Steamboat Isle.

I have been snorkeling a barge in the Scamp area of Paugus Bay for maybe 30 years. Three generations of my family have enjoyed it. It is only about 15' off shore and used to have a crooked white birch tree marking it. That tree is no longer there.

I'm 6'5" and I can stand on one of the corners of the barge and my head is out of the water. The deep end may be in 18' of water. Lots of fish, it is a great barge to snorkel.

So I don't really know if "my" barge is the Scamp or not, but it is fun to snorkel. I will post the lat/lons next time I go.

I took some time over the winter to implement the Wreck list into WinniGas:

https://winnigas.com/wreckmap


I'd appreciate if people could review this and please feel free to make suggestions and/or provide any feedback on the wreck list.

If you see any corrections needed to this information, feel free to use the "Contact US" feature of the website, or send me a message here.

I'll also be happy to add any new sites. The minimum information I need is the Name, Description (include depth if known), LAT/LON. See the current listings for examples.

Of course, this is a community project, I'm simply drawing from the work previously reported here on the forum.

My goal is to make this Wreck list an easy to find and use resource for boaters (and divers) on the lake. I hope people will find it useful.

I'm reporting this here first! After some review, feel free to spread the word about this.

Rowboat off Little Barndoor
 

I've scouted the area (from the surface) and have never been able to find it.

Dove It Today
 

I've known about this wreck for a few years but only got around to diving it today:
W. Little Bear Island wreck
N 43 38.448 W 71 19.850

GPS numbers are spot on. I dropped my marker flag 4 feet from the wreck.
Measured it at 24 feet in length with my marked wreck reel line.
It's on a slope with the bow in 37 feet and the stern in 35 feet.
Today at 37 feet it was 54 degrees.
It is a neat wreck, burned, very deep hold area. The engine, prop & rudder are still there.