Wreck of the HMCS Saskatchewan

Description: MacKenzie-class Destroyer Escort
Date Sunk: June 14, 1997
Depth: 60ft-130ft
Length: 366ft
Location: Snake Island, a short boat ride from Nanaimo

The Saskatchewan was launched by the Victoria Machinery Depot Company (hull and superstructure), and completed by Yarrow Ltd. in Esquimalt. She was commissioned on 16 February 1963, at Esquimalt, the second of the Mackenzie class to enter service. She transited the Panama Canal on 30 April, 1963, en route to Halifax where she arrive on 3 June, but left again for the west coast on 20 October, arriving at Esquimalt on 29 November.

It was a busy year for Saskatchewan, with two transits of the Panama Canal, four Atlantic crossings and participation in a major NATO exercise.

Late in 1965, she was fitted with an eight-foot square bridge (made of aluminum and glass) atop her regular bridge, as part of an investigation into improved ways of conning a ship.

In February 1970, she returned to Atlantic command with the crew of Kootenay, relieving Nipigon as flagship of the

 (NATO) Standing Naval Force Atlantic. Mike Young, her executive officer during this period, recalls a social gaffe when the pre-wetting system was inadvertently turned on during a quarterdeck cocktail party in St. John’s!

Saskatchewan returned to the West Coast in 1973. She commenced her DELEX (Destroyer Life Extension) refit on 27 May 1985 and returned to service on 17 June 1986. That August she was part of a Canadian squadron, which visited Australia for the RAN’s 75th birthday celebrations. In her final years, Saskatchewan was a member of Training Group Pacific, instructing as many as 40 officer cadets at a time in the finer point of ship-handling, navigation, and marine and combat systems engineering. The ship completed a minor refit in 1990, which included the installation of an environmentally safe black-water system designed to reduce ship-generated pollution.

She was decommissioned on 28 March 1994.

All information and photos taken from the ARSBC website with permission.