The dive
This is a free-standing bank half a nautical mile off Punta Papa, on the north-west side of Ponza, sitting on the transit line between the headland and the eastern tip of Palmarola. It is not part of the Punta Papa headland dives: the pin in this catalogue sits on the point itself, next to the two halves of the LST 349 wreck, while the bank is roughly 900 m further out to sea. Its existence was only established in 1994. VisitLazio's guide to the Pontine islands describes it rising from 55 m to a summit at 33 m; Ponza Diving puts the top at 33 m and the base at 58 m; Il Bucaniere's dive list quotes a maximum of 60 m. There is no permanent mooring, and Il Bucaniere describes the dive as a descent in open blue water with the ascent made on a reference line.
The northern flank is the reason to come. It carries a forest of Paramuricea clavata, some of the fans very large, with catshark eggcases hooked into the branches and lobster antennae showing from underneath. Following the wall in the direction of Zannone, at 40 m there is a cave mouth occupied by a dense colony of narwhal shrimp, Parapandalus narval, with a large forkbeard living in it permanently. Ponza Diving adds yellow sponges, large sea urchins, lobsters and a crevice holding part of a lead Roman anchor, with dentex and barracuda over the cap.
Ponza Diving runs it as a long technical dive rather than a recreational one, on open circuit or rebreather. Its published profile starts from the LST 349 wreck and uses a scooter to run west along a wall at around 45 m before reaching the bank, then returns to decompress on the wall and the wreck, with a total runtime of two and a half hours. VisitLazio is blunt about why this is an experts-only site: the depth is considerable, you are descending in open sea, and if it is not flat the decompression is unpleasant.
The occurrence records gathered around this pin are of no use here. They are shore taxa, intertidal crabs and splash-zone blennies from the headland, and the pin they were collected around is not where the bank is. Nothing in the species list below belongs to this dive, so we have named only what the written sources put on the bank itself.
- Forest of Paramuricea clavata on the northern flank, with some very large fans
- Catshark eggcases hooked into the gorgonian branches
- Cave mouth at 40 m holding a colony of narwhal shrimp, Parapandalus narval, and a resident forkbeard
- Part of a lead Roman anchor in a crevice on the bank
- Dentex and barracuda over the cap at 33 m
Please note before you go
- The whole dive is below recreational depth: the shallowest rock is 33 m and the base is 55 to 60 m
- Mandatory decompression; Ponza Diving's published runtime for the site is two and a half hours
- Descent is made in open blue water with the ascent on a reference line, not on a fixed mooring
- Fully exposed offshore position, where any swell makes the decompression stops difficult
- Overhead environment at the cave mouth on the wall at 40 m
SeaLog
