Cedar Pride Wreck tide times

The Cedar Pride is one of the most accessible and photogenic wreck dives in the Red Sea — a 74-metre Lebanese cargo vessel deliberately sunk in 1985 by the Royal Jordanian Diving Club, with the blessing of King Hussein I, to create an artificial reef at a time when intentional wreck scuttling for dive tourism was a relatively new concept. The King's involvement reflects how seriously Jordan took its dive tourism ambitions for Aqaba even in the mid-1980s, decades before the Aqaba Special Economic Zone reshaped the city.

The Cedar Pride sank with a slight port list and now rests on her port side in 5–27 metres of water, oriented roughly north-south along the slope of the Jordanian reef. The shallowest part — the starboard hull side — is at around 5 metres, making this a wreck accessible to snorkellers at the top and to experienced divers all the way down the deepest sections near the propeller at 27 metres. Soft coral encrustation on the hull is spectacular: large pink and orange sea fans cover significant sections of the superstructure, and the wreck has been colonised by lionfish, glassfish schools, grouper, and moray eels that shelter in the interior spaces.

The combination of shallow entry and significant depth range makes the Cedar Pride suitable for almost every level of diver. Beginner divers typically explore the superstructure and cargo holds in the 10–18 metre range under guide supervision. Advanced divers work the deeper stern section and the propeller. Night dives on the Cedar Pride are exceptional — the hunting behaviour of lionfish and moray eels is more visible after dark, and the soft coral polyps open fully, turning sections of the hull into a fluorescent garden.

Tide and current at this site are consistent with the wider Aqaba Gulf: semidiurnal with a spring range of 0.7–0.9 metres. Current along the wreck tends to run north-south following the tidal cycle, with ebb pushing south (toward Saudi Arabia) and flood running north (toward the city). The current is rarely strong enough to be hazardous at Cedar Pride, but it does affect glassfish schools — they bank and cluster against the current direction, which changes the photographic opportunity depending on tide state.

Mooring buoys are maintained above the wreck by the Aqaba dive operators' association, preventing anchor damage. All the established Aqaba dive centres visit the Cedar Pride regularly; it is one of four or five sites that appear on virtually every two-dive-day itinerary in Aqaba. Surface conditions follow the Shamal pattern — calm mornings, building northwest wind from mid-morning. Most dive boats clear the Cedar Pride site by 10:30 to avoid running back to the marina in the Shamal chop.

Predictions on this page come from Open-Meteo Marine. For Cedar Pride conditions including current strength and visibility, the local dive operators provide daily updates based on actual site checks — consult one of the Aqaba dive centres for current-day conditions before booking.

The wreck's position on the reef slope means that the sand bottom around the hull at 20–25 metres occasionally hosts rays — blue-spotted stingrays rest in the sand patches adjacent to the Cedar Pride's deepest sections on calm mornings, often visible during ascent from the stern. The sandy margins are also where juvenile reef fish shelter when the Shamal has pushed choppier conditions overhead — the habitat diversity created by the wreck's different surfaces (iron hull, encrusted superstructure, open sandy surrounds) is part of why it supports such a wide species range.

For photographers, the Cedar Pride is one of the easier wide-angle reef photography subjects in the Red Sea: the encrusted hull provides foreground interest, the blue water overhead gives depth and colour, and the fish density means there is almost always action in the frame. Strobes or video lights significantly improve the colour rendering of the sea fans and soft corals on the superstructure.