Nov 12, 20224 min read

The Kedge Anchor from the Loch Ard

Updated: Jan 17, 2023

According to the web page found at http://vhd.heritage.vic.gov.au/shipwrecks/heritage/417, “One of two located anchors was raised for the Loch Ard centenary year in 1978 by a consortium of dive groups”.

Divers inspecting and photographing the anchor from the Loch Ard at the surface

According to the web page Loch Ard Shipwreck, 1878, “The Loch Ard was an iron clipper ship, which was built in the Clyde by Barklay, Curle and Company in 1873. She was described as being 1693 tons gross weight, and was 263 feet 7 inches long, 38 feet 3 inches wide (beam) and 23 feet depth. Her masts were almost 150 high, and she was launched on 8th November 1873.

“She set out on its 7th voyage from Gravesend, England on 2nd March 1878. …… After thirteen long weeks, the ship was finally within days of arriving in Melbourne. One night, there was bad weather, and a thick mist off the coast of what is today Port Campbell National Park on Victoria’s notorious Shipwreck Coast. The ship drifted about 100 miles off course and instead of sighting the Cape Otway Lighthouse the ship struck land.

“When the mist lifted, the captain saw that they were only two kilometres from the jagged cliffs at the edge of the water. The captain tried very hard to avoid the cliffs, heading out to sea, and dropping anchors, but it was no use. At approximately 5am on Saturday 1st June 1878. there was a terrible crash, and the ship ran into a small island, Mutton Bird Island, east of Sherbrooke River near Port Campbell. The Loch Ard sank in only fifteen minutes.”

The Loch Ard's anchor display

Paul Tipping wrote The Raising of the Loch Ard Anchor in “Celebrating VSAG@60 1954–2014”. The VSAG is the Victorian Sub Aqua Group. They celebrated their 60th anniversary in 2014, having formed in 1954. They say that they are “one of the longest running dive clubs in the world”. They are now some 68 years old.

A cropped version of this photo features at the end of Paul’s article: -

The Loch Ard's anchor at the surface

Jane Andrewartha reported the raising of the Loch Ard anchor in the June/July 1978 issue of “Skindiving in Australia”. The Victorian Premier’s Department had approached Peter Stone, Secretary for the Scuba Divers Federation of Victoria in 1977, asking him to raise the Loch Ard’s anchor. They wanted to preserve and display it as part of the Loch Ard Centenary Commemoration. The commemoration was described as “a large program designed to promote an interest in Victoria’s maritime heritage”.

The wreck site

The wreck site

Several months of terrible weather followed the request, and it got to the point that the anchor had still not been raised with just two weeks to go before the scheduled display. Things were getting desperate, and the weather conditions were still ‘unfavourable’ on the day that a dive was planned. The dive had to be delayed until late in the day when conditions improved slightly.

The wreck site

Twenty-one divers from three different dive clubs are said to have participated that day. They came from the Torquay Scuba Club, the Victorian Sub Aqua Group and the Black Rock Underwater Dive Group. The whole operation took some nine hours if you include the 2-hour tow of the large anchor back to the Port Campbell jetty.

The ¾-tonne, 7-foot anchor (apologies for the mixed measurements) was then left in 20 feet of water at Port Campbell from where it would be raised again on Easter Saturday. The Flagstaff Hill Maritime Village at Warrnambool was going to preserve the anchor before returning it to Port Campbell for display.

The preserved Loch Ard anchor

This sign is displayed alongside the preserved Loch Ard anchor: -

It reads: -

“LOCH ARD ANCHOR

The event which sentenced this anchor to a 24 metre deep grave for almost a hundred years was a dramatic one, as you’ll discover inside. It’s resurrection was equally so. A few weeks before Easter 1978, it rocketed it up from the depths, shooting almost two metres out of the water. The surfacing wasn't spontaneous. A team of divers from the Scuba Divers Federation of Victoria made good use of suitable weather to break free the encrusted anchor using an inflated rubber lifting bag*. This particular anchor is a kedge, a second anchor used in shallow water. It's believed that the Loch Ard carried four such kedges, apart from her two main 3.6 metres long anchors. Readjusting to an out-of-water existence after such a long submergence has been a lengthy process. Curators from Warrnambool’s Flagstaff Hill Maritime Museum (Village) kept the anchor in an observation bath for over 18 months. To halt corrosion brought on by the sudden change of environment, they regularly changed the caustic soda ‘bathwater’ which leeches out salts in the metal. If not treated, the anchor would quickly deteriorate, as salt absorbs water from the atmosphere, triggering corrosion.”

* (That lifting (lift) bag was described as "an 8-foot reinforced rubber lifting bag with capacity of 3 tons".)

The Loch Ard features in both “Wrecks and Relics” and “Shipwrecks along the Southern Coast” by GA (Geoff) Nayler.