Located 90 nautical miles west of Kawthaung, the Burma banks are far from shore and exposed to wind and waves. Getting to the banks is a time consuming and diesel guzzling operation that was once worth the effort for the large quantity of very big sharks that could be seen here.  Unfortunately the Burma Banks, like many other Mergui archipelago dive sites have been overfished in the early years of this century and are not as impressive as they once were. Many dive liveaboard safari operators in Burma prefer not to visit the Burma Banks these days.
The Burma banks consist of a series of submerged sea mounts with flat plateaus around 15-25m below the surface and drop offs over the sides down beyond 300m. They were discovered by exploratory Thailand based dive boat operators and were sensational dive sites in the late 1990’s when divers could be guaranteed to see several species of shark most notably large silvertips. Also present were white tip reef sharks, large tawny nurse sharks, leopard sharks plus occasional sightings of scalloped hammerhead sharks and tiger sharks.
This was high adrenaline diving for divers that did not mind rough seas and occasional strong currents. A dive consisted of nothing more than descending the anchor line to the plateau and sheltering under a bommie until deco time or air ran low. Sharks circled the plateaus (they were previously fed by dive boats) and were a fine example of natures power and grace. Descending over the drop off and drifting along the wall sometimes produced sightings of hammerheads and tiger sharks. Continued >>
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