The Kelat is the oldest of the 1942 raid wrecks. She was built in 1881 by Duck and Company at Stockton on Tees as a three-masted, iron-hulled, fully rigged sailing ship of 1,894 gross tons and 80 m length, and worked the London-Australia trade. She was sold to Norwegian owners in 1903 and renamed Hovding, was condemned in Melbourne after storm damage in 1914, and became a coal hulk, later regaining her original name.

The Royal Australian Navy requisitioned her in 1941 and she was towed from Fremantle to Darwin with a full cargo of coal, arriving in February 1942. During the raid Zero fighters machine-gunned her at her mooring; she took on water and sank a day or two later. DSAC notes that in the confusion after the raids nobody may have remembered to keep her pumps running.

The 19 February 1942 raids - two waves of Japanese carrier and land-based aircraft, the first and heaviest attack ever made on mainland Australia - sank eight ships in the harbour and killed more than 230 people. In 1959-60 the Japanese firm Fujita Salvage cut most of the wrecks down to or below the waterline for scrap, so what divers find today is usually the lower hull, machinery that was too heavy to lift, and the cargo that the salvors were not permitted to remove. Today the Kelat is a gentle 12 m dive over a jumble of small relics spread across an area about 100 m long and 20 m wide.

There is little recognisable ship structure, so the interest is in close searching - iron fittings, coal, rigging remains - and in the small marine life that has colonised the debris. Its shallow depth makes it the best option on the WWII trail for newer divers, for a long second dive after one of the deeper wrecks, and for divers who prefer to take their time. The Australian War Memorial holds photographs of the hulk lying half submerged in the harbour after the raid.

Boat only. Darwin's charter operators leave from Cullen Bay Marina or the Darwin Waterfront precinct and run across the harbour to the site in well under half an hour on a calm neap-tide morning. Private boats can launch at the Cullen Bay public ramp (west of the CBD off Marina Boulevard), the Stokes Hill / Frances Bay ramp beside the Waterfront, or the East Arm ramp for the southern anchorage.

Mark the position on GPS before the dive - the wrecks lie in open water with no surface marker - and drop a shot rather than anchoring into protected structure. Parking and trailer bays are at all three ramps; air fills and hire through the Darwin dive shops.

Tide is everything in Darwin Harbour: the spring range is 7-8 m and tidal streams run hard through the harbour, so diving is generally only possible on neap tides (range under about 3-4 m), timed to the slack at high water when clearer ocean water sits over the site. Spring tides bring strong currents and silt-laden water with near-zero visibility. The dry season (May-October) gives the most consistent conditions; the south-east trade winds can chop up exposed water in the afternoon, so mornings are best.

In the wet season (November-April) run-off from the rivers and creeks drops visibility, afternoon storms build quickly, and the harbour is in cyclone season; box jellyfish are present October-May.

A shallow, relaxed dive. Descend the shot at neap slack and sweep the 100 m by 20 m debris area in a series of parallel passes, looking closely for small relics and the marine life sheltering among them. Long bottom time is possible at 12 m; ascend on the shot.

Darwin Dive Centre and Dive Darwin run harbour wreck charters only on neap-tide windows (typically a few days either side of each neap, weekends favoured); Darwin Sub Aqua Club dives it on club neap-tide days (members plan dives at Thursday meetings at the Darwin Ski Club). No daily schedule.