HMS Cricket

Também conhecido como: HMS Cricket Wreck · HMS Cricket Shipwreck

O HMS Cricket foi uma canhoneira fluvial da Royal Navy durante a Primeira Guerra Mundial. O seu casco, sem equipamento, foi usado pela RAF como alvo para exercícios de tiro na baía de Larnaca; em 1947, afundou-se com mau tempo. O destroço, com 72 m de comprimento, jaz de cabeça para baixo a nordeste de Larnaca, a cerca de 27 m de profundidade, e o seu ponto mais profundo fica a cerca de 33 m.

Launched in 1915, the Insect class gunboat served in Mesopotamia, Russia, China and the Mediterranean before being mined in 1942 and broken up for spares at Alexandria. Her empty hull was towed to Cyprus, used as an RAF target and eventually sank, landing inverted on a silty bottom so that it looks more like a submarine than a ship. A sandy hollow under the hull lets divers swim beneath it, and escape hatches lead into her upturned rooms and corridors. The interior is covered in thick sponges and red and orange algae, and groupers, moray eels, lionfish, bream, octopus, nudibranchs and the occasional turtle are seen. Perfect buoyancy matters because of the silty conditions.