Torvore

Descend the anchorage line off Sagres, at Portugal's south-western tip; the current runs fairly strong here, so divers use the mooring to get down and back rather than swimming it freely. The hull sits alone on sand at 27 to 32 metres, bow to the south and stern to the north, still recognisable as a ship rather than scattered plate. Along the port side, an intact boiler and engines rise from the wreckage, with part of her cargo of coal still visible where the hull has opened. Nudibranchs and coral growth cover the metal, and crustaceans work the crevices, worth a look with a torch. White and zebra seabream move over the structure in loose schools, damselfish hold closer to the plating, and conger eels use the larger gaps. Watch for loose fishing net caught in the plates as you move around the hull; this is not a penetration dive, so there is no need to go inside to find any of it.

On 24 April 1917, the German submarine U-35, commanded by Lothar von Arnauld de la Perière, who sank more tonnage than any other submarine commander in the war, surfaced off the western Algarve coast after running out of torpedoes and used its deck gun and demolition charges to sink Torvore alongside the Danish freighter Nordsoen and the Norwegian Vilhelm Krag, then sank the Italian sailing ship Bienaimé Prof. Luigi later the same afternoon: four vessels lost in one raid.1 The only Portuguese defence present, the steam tug Galgo, was in Lagos harbour when the attack began and could do little. A research team led by naval commander Augusto Salgado and historian Jorge Russo surveyed the wrecks by ROV in 2014 and 2015, work that won the Nautical Archaeology Society's Adopt a Wreck award; the survey found Nordsoen lying shallowest at 6-8 metres and never located the Italian sailboat at all, while rating Torvore the best preserved of the three steel-hulled losses despite salvage crews having stripped much of her metal in the 1970s. A 2017 centenary account describes the site as carrying protected status as underwater cultural heritage under the UNESCO convention on submerged sites, and a formal centenary dive marked the sinking from Sagres that April.

Loose, abandoned fishing net is caught in parts of the wreck's plating; keep clear of it rather than working close to the structure to look inside. The current adds to the case for a planned, computer-tracked profile on a dive already close to recreational no-decompression limits at this depth. Entry is by boat only, typically from Sagres. No single dive centre is confirmed to run trips specifically to Torvore; Sagres-based operators dive this stretch of coast, so check availability and experience requirements before booking. Bring a torch for the crevices around the boiler and engines; natural light alone will not find what shelters there.