Wakulla Big Bend Regional Reef 2
Florida · Up to 6.7 m
Artificial reef built from 96 Pre-Fabricated Cubes 1M on a Side 50M Spaced Hexagon
Boat entry
United States Dive Sites
1,024 mapped sites
Explore on mapBest dive sites in United States
Showing 217–228 of 1,024
Wreck of the Wandby (Walker's Point)
Maine · 4.6–9.1 m
Shore-accessible remains of the British tramp steamer Wandby, which ran onto Walker's Point ledge in dense fog on March 9, 1921. The signature piece is an upright boiler roughly 15 feet around and 10-18 feet tall rising off a 25-30 foot sandy bottom, with a rudder, double-walled hull sections and scattered plates among ledge lines that run parallel to shore. The exposed site is effectively a single high-tide dive from a small seaside turn-out past the Bush compound.
IntermediateShore entry
Sea Girt - Capt. Etzel
New Jersey · 17.4–21 m
Artificial reef built from 110' Navy Deck Barge - (YC-1504) Open Lighter (renamed "Capt. Etzel") NJDEP deployment record: Ship, material: 110' Navy Deck Barge - (YC-1504) Open Lighter (renamed "Capt. Etzel"), deployed 1994.
IntermediateBoat entry
Pacific Beach Center
California · Up to 21.9 m
Artificial reef built from Quarry Rock
IntermediateBoat entry
Boatmen's
Texas · Up to 18.3 m
A dive site in United States. The site reaches a maximum depth of about 18 m. The site is reached by boat.
IntermediateBoat entry
Edmonds Underwater Park
Washington · 3–13.7 m
Edmonds Underwater Park (Bruce Higgins Underwater Trails) is one of the oldest and most famous shore-dive parks in the US: a 27-acre marine protected area and no-take sanctuary established in 1970 just north of the Edmonds ferry terminal on Puget Sound. Volunteers led by Bruce Higgins have built roughly 2.5 miles of rope-and-block underwater trails linking sunken structures - the Lopez pontoon, pipes, spools, a dry dock and more - all marked with quirky underwater road signs. Because no fishing or harvesting of any kind is allowed, marine life thrives, most famously the park's enormous resident lingcod. Maximum depth is only about 45 ft, making it a superb beginner and training site, but cold water makes a drysuit the norm.
Shore entry
Sea Girt - A Frame
New Jersey · 17.4–21 m
Artificial reef built from 140' Barge - "A" Frame NJDEP deployment record: Ship, material: 140' Barge - "A" Frame, deployed 1989.
IntermediateBoat entry
Micheal Golden Memorial Reef
Florida · Up to 6.4 m
Artificial reef built from 6 Florida Limestone Modules
Boat entry
NOSC Tower
California · 9–18 m
The NOSC Tower was a 100-foot steel research platform secured to the seafloor about a mile off Mission Beach in 1959 by the Naval Ocean Systems Center for oceanographic and acoustics experiments. A large winter storm toppled it in 1988, leaving a 40-foot-square base and a tangle of girders and beams in 30-60 feet of water - the only Wreck Alley structure not sunk intentionally. The open lattice is plastered with strawberry and yellow anemones, gorgonians, hydrocoral, sponges and mussels, making it one of the most life-dense and photogenic dives in San Diego.
IntermediateBoat entry
Deception Pass
Washington · 6.1–24.4 m
The narrow channel between Whidbey and Fidalgo Islands where Skagit Bay meets the Strait of Juan de Fuca, with tidal currents that can scream through at up to 8 knots. The huge water exchange feeds some of the most densely colorful invertebrate-covered walls in the Pacific Northwest, but the site is diveable only on a handful of minimal-exchange slack windows scattered through the year, and true slack can fail to materialize. Whirlpools, downwellings and instantly reversing current make this an expert-only dive, usually done with boat support and local knowledge.
ExpertShore + boat
Palawan
California · 27–37 m
The USS Palawan (ARG-10) was a 441-foot Liberty-hull internal combustion engine repair ship that served at the end of World War II. Substantially dismantled - superstructure and engines removed - she was scuttled in 1977 about two miles off Redondo Beach as part of California's artificial reef program and sits upright in roughly 120 feet of water, a 10-minute boat ride from King Harbor. The hull is now a vibrant reef draped in anemones and gorgonians; depth, currents and variable visibility make it a solid advanced dive.
AdvancedBoat entry
Lake Murray (Dreher Island State Park)
South Carolina · —
A 50,000-acre reservoir northwest of Columbia where scuba diving is permitted, with the most convenient access through Dreher Island State Park's shoreline and boat ramps. Local divers use it for training and exploration dives around points, old roadbeds and submerged structure (divers report a bridge and a sunken plane in deeper water), though visibility is usually under 10 ft. An active local dive community (Columbia-area shops and the Lake Murray Diving group) dives it regularly.
Shore + boat