Loch Ard

Meet the site

The Loch Ard is Victoria's most famous shipwreck. A three-masted iron clipper of 1,693 tons, built by Barclay Curle in Glasgow in 1873 for the Loch Line, she left Gravesend for Melbourne on 2 March 1878 with 54 passengers and crew under Captain George Gibb. In fog before dawn on 1 June, on what should have been the last day of the voyage, she found herself under the cliffs east of Port Campbell; she struck Mutton Bird Island and sank within fifteen minutes. Only two survived – the apprentice Tom Pearce, who was washed into the gorge that now bears the ship's name, and the passenger Eva Carmichael, whom he swam out to rescue. Fifty-two died and few bodies were recovered; four are buried in the cemetery above the gorge. Cargo washed ashore for weeks, including the famous Minton porcelain peacock now in Flagstaff Hill museum, and the wreck was heavily salvaged in the 1970s before protection.

The wreck lies against the western and southern base of Mutton Bird Island in 10–25 m, and it is a large, scattered site. The bow section is the most coherent piece, relatively intact with the bowsprit jammed under a rock, and a long line of hull plating with deadeyes still attached runs from it along the base of the cliff. Where the hull leans against the island it has formed a cave that divers can look into. Railway irons from the cargo lie concreted to hull sections, and the sand and gullies hold rolls of lead and zinc sheet, ceramics, pewter mugs, ink wells, lead shot and bottle fragments. The stern has never been found and is assumed to have broken up. One anchor was raised for the 1978 centenary and stands at the Port Campbell visitor centre. Marine life on the site is rich – the island's cliffs carry sponges and kelp, crayfish shelter in the plating and schools of sweep and salmon work the water column – but the artefacts and the setting are the point. It is a demanding, rarely possible dive for experienced divers who can handle surge and a hostile boat pick-up, and a genuinely important one: an archaeologically and recreationally significant site inside the Twelve Apostles Marine National Park where nothing may be touched.

What you might see

Southern rock lobster in the plating, sea sweep and Australian salmon schools, blue-throat wrasse, magpie perch, zebrafish, sponges and kelp on the island walls, occasional Australian fur seals, short-tailed shearwaters nesting on the island above

Location

Iron clipper wrecked in 1878 at the base of Mutton Bird Island, immediately south of Loch Ard Gorge and 5 km south-east of Port Campbell, in 10–25 m.

Facilities nearby

Port Campbell jetty crane (permit holders), Port Campbell township with toilets, cafes, visitor centre and fuel; no air fills in Port Campbell – nearest Warrnambool.