60 Years After the Ship Wreck Let's take an Underwater Tour - SS Dominator Wreckage Adventure Part 2 By Tour Guide Andre Navarro of Ocean Earth Green
60 Years After the Ship Wreck Let's take an Underwater Tour-SS Dominator Wreckage Adventure Part 2
By Andre Navarro of Ocean Earth Green
Hello again !
I'm Andre Navarro, Southern California freediver and ocean life awareness media creator. Recently I created a short YouTube documentary on the SS Dominator Ship Wreck on Rocky Point of the beautiful Palos Verdes Estates. I've been hiking to this area since I was a kid. Now that I freedive and make videos of my adventures, I had to make a video explaining the history and showing what now remains. The original project took several weeks of dives, hikes and drone flights. The resulting SS Dominator Wreckage documentary was a culmination of several Palos Verdes diving videos I had made over the past year. After completing the project, it was still missing something major ! Footage of underwater ship remnants if it existed.
So I researched online for any recent dives to this location and was there more to see underwater ? Or has it all been battered and broken up over time by the relentless pounding waves. Happily to my surprise, I found photos from a scubadiving expedition of large sections of the ship still in tact underwater. One of the sections was large enough that a scubadiver was posing inside the structure. The photos were not too recent and I hoped that they were within the last 10 years. But it was enough to send me into action.
Next was trying to figure out exactly or roughly where these sections were located. I found a clue that one of the sections sticks out of the water at extreme low tide and the others were in the same area. So several weeks ago I paddle boarded out at low tide to the area of the wreck and searched. At this time the water was extremely murky and there was no visibility. I found what appeared to be a large rock protruding the surface covered in algae and seaweed. It did not look like a piece of the ship but I could not tell at the time for sure. But it brought me hope and closer to the location.
Last week finally the water clarity was good enough to make a first attempt at diving to the underwater wreckage. However, the clarity was still not very good, 5' to 8' at best which is really challenging to dive in. Basically, you can not see what is below unless you dive down and travel along the bottom and very close to objects. So that is exactly what I did. I started where the object was sticking out of the water previously. However is was no longer low tide so I had to work to relocate it from the vicinity. After 45 minutes of dives in a zigzag pattern to cover as much area as possible, I came across the large rock again and it was no large rock ! It was a large section of the ship ! Another 35 minutes later of searching I luckily came across another large section. Both are covered in algae and seaweed. From above they look like rocks of the local terrain and can't be recognized as ship sections unless you dive all the way down next to them.
This video is of this first attempt and finding these two large sections that day. I believe there are even more large sections, most likely deeper to find and I will make more dives soon to find more. Eventually I'll have enough underwater footage to add a part two to the SS Dominator Ship Wreck documentary video. So for now, here is what I found that day in all it's murky glory set to classical music and a special appearance of a cool Zebra Perch I named Fred.
Andre Navarro
I am Andre Navarro, Southern California adventurer and freediver. I was born in San Pedro California and grew up in Long Beach California where I graduated Millikan HS class of 93 and attended Long Beach City College for Art, Drawing and Painting. After obtaining an Associates Degree for Art and a semester away from transferring to Cal State Long Beach to continue in Art, I joined the LA County Sheriff's Department as a Custody Assistant (County Jail Guard). Approximately a year later I promoted to Sheriff Deputy where I worked custody and patrol assignments. After working law enforcement for roughly 9 years and having a son and daughter during this time, I came to the hard decision that long term this career was not for me. Shortly after ending the law enforcement chapter in my life, I began a new one in industrial machinery and conveyor belting distribution where I worked for 14 years in several positions including: fabrication and installation, purchasing, business development and sales management .
Recently in June of 2019, I left this position for another major direction change in my life. During my management years, I was sent to Mexico and the Ukraine to help recruit and train international employees. This is where I fell in love with traveling and experiencing different cultures. And this is also when I began freediving exotic locations on the weekends. I have always loved being in the ocean since a child and began bodyboarding young. Way later I began snorkeling on the downtime when there were no waves. This morphed into freediving which I do today. I also love to hike, camp and explore. In the last 3 years I began making videos of my explorations on land and now mostly in freediving. After leaving my last job of 14 years, I made the decision to spend approximately 1 year traveling, diving and making videos of my adventures while trying to figure out a possible way of making a living at this. I have realized there is an immediate and important need for ocean conservation and education while there is a major lack of understanding about our local coasts, ocean and it's life. Through my videos, my goal is to take everyone with me over land, air and into the ocean to experience all its beauty, life and importance.
Links
YouTube Channel (Full Videos) ~ Youtube.com/OceanEarthGreen
Facebook (Multimedia) ~ Facebook.com/OceanEarthGreen
Instagram (Mini Video Clips) ~ Instagram.com/OceanEarthGreen
Twitter (Mini Video Clips) ~ Twitter.com/OceanEarthGreen
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