Drone Videos of Shipwrecks

Top contributor harispomonis created this stunning drone video of one of the world's top beaches.  It's called  Navagio Beach, aka Smuggler's Cove, and it lies on the north side of the Greek island of Zakynthos in the Ionian Sea.  It's famous in part because it's the home of the wreck of the MV Panagiotis, which ran aground here in 1980 after allegedly being chased by the Greek navy for suspected smuggling.  It became even more famous in 2018, when Lonely Planet named it the world's #1 beach.  

Lanai is the smallest of the publicly accessible Hawaiian Islands.  The location of the island creates strong winds and treacherous Pacific Ocean currents which have caused many shipwrecks over the years.  In this video, contributor iDrone Hawaii uses a DJI Phantom 4 drone to fly over a wreck off of Lanai's Shipwreck Beach, so called because of the number of wrecks which inhabit the sea bottom off the island's shores.

With its location along key shipping routes in the Mediterranean Sea, Cyprus has become the final resting place of many ships going back to the Antiquity.  Wrecks of both older and more recent vintage dot the waters surrounding the island, the third largest in the Mediterranean.  Contributor Iain Jordan used a DJI Phantom 3 drone to create this amazing aerial video of the Akrotiri Limassol (Three Stars) shipwreck which sank in the waters of the Mediterranean after catching fire in 1972.  

The roughly 700 islands of the Bahamas archipelago, which sit inside the Bermuda Triangle area of the South Atlantic, have always presented a navigational challenge to the many ships operating in the area.  Contributor and pilot msmember flew his drone over a Bahamas shipwreck, this of a molasses carrier which sank in the early 1900's.  The crystal-blue waters of the South Atlantic Ocean allow the aerial observer to clearly see the outline of the ship, making for an outstanding bird's eye perspective.

While most drone videos of shipwrecks are from stabilized camera drones, certain (very brave) first person view (FPV) pilots have begun to discover these sunken vessels as well.  In this video, contributor and FPV pilot Jab1a took some time out from a race in Spain to fly his FPV quadcopter over a wreck off the island of Ibiza in the Mediterranean Sea.  Prepare to be amazed by this one.

San Andres is an island in the Caribbean.  It is a territory of Colombia, the mainland of which lies 750 km (around 450 mi.) to its south.  Because of its location relative to busy shipping lanes, San Andres is the site of many shipwrecks.  In this video, top contributor la.drones flies a drone over one of these wrecks near Rocky Cay, producing an amazing aerial perspective through the deep blue Caribbean waters. 

By virtue of its position in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea's busy sea lanes, Malta has always seen more than its share of shipwrecks.  While most of the wrecks surrounding Malta and its subsidiary islands are old, some are quite new.  In this video, top content creator and drone pilot Chris Borg used his DJI Mavic Pro drone to create a short clip of one of these recent wrecks: the Togo-flagged Hephaestus.  This vessel ran aground during a storm at Qawra Point on February 10th, 2018; it's not been recovered.

Contributor Mariansteria created this epic drone video of one of the most famous shipwrecks in the Black Sea.  The Evangelia was a refrigerated cargo ship which was wrecked near the Romanian seaport city of Constanta (Costinești, home of the largest port on the Black Sea) in 1968.  The video contains some epic head-on and overhead shots of the extremely eerie looking 7k+ ton gross ton rusting ship, which stands nearly upright in shallow waters.  The wreck is easily accessible from the nearby Costinesi Resort.  

Drone Solutions Greece shot this excellent aerial video of one of Greece's many shipwrecks.  In 1978, the Captan Ismail Hakki sank in shallow waters near Lakonia, at the southern tip of mainland Greece.  The rusting hulk lies in 12 meters (about 40 ft.) of water just 100 meters (about 330 ft.) offshore.  For unknown reasons, the small (30 meter, 100 ft) ship sank carrying a supply of iron ore.  

The Caribbean Sea has always been a place of shipwrecks, particularly before the age of modern navigation.  With its position in the northeastern corner of the Lesser Antilles islands, and with numerous shallow spots and once-uncharted sand bars, Anguilla has seen more than its share of ships running aground or sinking off its shores.  In this video by Iain Jordan, you'll get an aerial view of some of these wrecks off of Sandy Ground Road Bay on the northern side of the island.   

If you think shipwrecks are a thing of the distant past, check out this amazing aerial view of a very recent shipwreck in Cyprus, courtesy of contributor Arsen Poshotian.  In December, 2011, the 80 meter (around 265 ft.) Sierra Leone-flagged ship Edro III was headed from Limassol on Cyprus to the Greek island of Rhodes (Rodos).  It hit a storm and ran aground near the port of Pegeia on the far western end of the island, with all crew members rescued.    The ship is off-limits to divers.  

Contributor and pilot Kyriakos - AnotherView created this drone video of a shipwreck in an area of Northern Greece.  Epanomi is a town on the Bay of Thessaloniki (an inlet of the Aegean Sea) in the region of Central Macedonia.  Located about a half hour drive from the great port city of Thessaloniki, it's one of the oldest cities in Macedonia.  Thessaloniki is the country's biggest seaport.  Given the historically heavy ship traffic on the narrow approaches to the port, it's not surprising that shipwrecks have occurred here.