The HTMS Kood sinks into Pattaya Bay in September 2006.

The Royal Thai Navy is prepared to sink as many as five wrecks to promote Pattaya as a wreck-diving tourist destination, according to Chesta Jaipiem, a Navy private-sector liaison who attended last month’s joint Pattaya-Tourism Authority of Thailand-Navy seminar on diving in Pattaya.

According to Robert Camp, the owner of Pattaya’s Adventure Divers who attended the Nov. 28 event at the DusitD2 Hotel, public agencies want to work together to preserve Pattaya’s marine resources, promote the city as a diving destination centered around wrecks and promote the city’s dive operators to spur tourism.

To do this, the Navy is prepared to start sinking additional ships as artificial reefs. The first could be sunk by the end of 2011 and, should public- and private-sector organizations work together, as many as four more over the next 10 years.

“In the desire to work together, the Royal Navy wants to have suggestions from the Private Sector about the placements of these wrecks. These placements will be subject to the approval of the Royal Navy; the Department of Marine and Coastal Resources; the Department of Fisheries and the Marine Transportation Department. The private sector’s suggestions will be given fair consideration,” Camp wrote in an e-mail to other Pattaya dive operators.

Camp believes the city has already set aside a budget of 16 million baht for the project based on the possibilities of attracting more tourists to the city.

“My interpretation of what the various government agencies that were represented that night were trying to tell the private sector is that if we try to help ourselves they will try to help us,” he wrote.

Camp said Freddy Kruyt, owner of Neptune Dive Center, has suggested at the meeting that the Navy isn’t the only route to building the wreck-diving sector. He believes the industry could obtain some privately owned vessels and use some of the city’s budget to sink one before 2011.

“Other suggestions, such as trains to sink, maybe an underwater statue zoo are all things to be considered,” Camp wrote.

While there’s obviously some excitement among Pattaya dive operators, all talk of wreck placement or obtaining vessels will have to come after actual operation of the tentatively named Pattaya Dive Club and the opening of its website.