Dennis Bakhuis

Dive site · mine · German quarries, pits and mines

🇩🇪 Schieferbergwerk Nuttlar

Bestwig, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

The largest diveable mine in Germany — flooded slate workings in the Sauerland, dived on a fixed line through square-cut galleries.

Dives here
6
Deepest
14.1 m
Water
fresh
First · last
2021 · 2022
Getting in
Roadside on L 776. (51.3705, 8.4248)
Also known as
Nutlar

Revision 1 · changed 10 Oct 2026

History
  1. r1 10 Oct 2026 Imported from the personal log · Dennis Bakhuis

Site data © divelog-sites contributors (ODbL), descriptions and maps CC BY-SA 4.0 · 53edcaf

1 map

Zugangsstollen (trocken) · 265 m17 m28 m20 m26 m21 m22 m17 m17 m22 m26 m17 m40 m17 m27 m26 m27 m19 m20 m29 m26 m27 m36 m23 m55 m31 m20 m22 m20 m23 m19 m28 m17 m22 m18 m21 m55 m18 m19 m17 m19 m23 m24 m36 m34 m21 m26 m18 m27 m20 m19 m18 m20 m20 m13 m · Kaiser Wilhelm – Katze↓9 moffenes Wasser↓13 mSchacht↓14 m↓21 mzur Tiefen Förderstrecke↓6 m↓8 m↓6 moffenes Wasser↓3 m↓5 m↓23 mSchacht↓8 mEinstieg Hauptstollen↓0 m↓9 m↓2 m↓9 m↓17 m↓8 m↓3 mWasserspiegel Zugangsstollen West↓0 m↓2 m↓8 m↓8 m↓6 m↓2 m↓18 m↓13 mzur Tiefen Förderstrecke↓4 moffenes Wasseroffenes Wasser↓0 moffenes Wasserzur Tiefen Förderstrecke↓1 m↓1 m↓5 moffenes Wasser Katze↓7 m↓14 m↓4 m↓11 mWasserspiegel Zugang Katze↓12 m↓10 m↓5 m↓14 m↓4 m↓10 m↓9 m↓12 m↓5 mN20 m
  • Entrance
  • T
  • End of line
  • Air
  • Dive path
  • Depth
  • Along the line
Stick map · 256 stations · 3056 m of line · max 23 m

Passage centrelines of the flooded middle haulage level (Mittlere Förderstrecke): the Kaiser Wilhelm system and the Katze system, traced by skeletonising the GUE survey plans by Torsten Schnitter (2013-2018, published on bergwerktauchen.de) and aligned on their Gesamtplan; depths are the plan's water-depth badges put on the nearest station. Lines are passage centres, not the actual guideline; where passages of different levels overlap in plan the drawing shows false junctions. The Einstieg is assumed to be where the main dry access adit meets the water; the deep level (Tiefe Sohle, to 38 m) is left out and only its connections are marked. The site's coordinates are the village centre of Nuttlar, so the map is placed only approximately. Origin placed on the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Stollen adit (OSM node/2462086596); the plan is not georeferenced beyond that.

A slate mine at Bestwig in the Sauerland, worked out and flooded, and the biggest diveable mine in Germany.

It is not a cave. The passages are galleries: rectangular in section, cut by people, with the extraction faces and the tool marks still on them, and pillars of rock left standing to hold the roof up. There is no karst here and no cave system, which is why the system field is blank in the workbook — the reason is recorded in the site notes rather than left as a gap.

Diving is on a fixed guide line through the workings, in cold, still, extremely clear fresh water. Depths in this log run to 14.1 m.

Six dives between September 2021 and October 2022.

Dived here with

Daan Kim

Nearby sites

6 dives at Schieferbergwerk Nuttlar

Dives per year

Water temperature by month

Mean water temperature in °C; an empty month had no dives.

Mean water temperature per month at Schieferbergwerk Nuttlar
MonthMeanDives
Januaryno dives0
Februaryno dives0
Marchno dives0
Aprilno dives0
Mayno dives0
Juneno dives0
Julyno dives0
Augustno dives0
September7.0 °C2
October7.0 °C3
Novemberno dives0
Decemberno dives0
  1. 28 Oct 2022 with Kim cavemine date28 Oct 2022 depth14 m time26 min water7 °C
  2. 28 Oct 2022 with Kim cavemine date28 Oct 2022 depth14 m time32 min water7 °C
  3. 28 Oct 2022 with Kim cavemine date28 Oct 2022 depth14.1 m time37 min water7 °C
  4. 10 Sept 2021 with Daan cavemine date10 Sept 2021 depth14 m time69 min water7 °C
  5. 10 Sept 2021 with Daan cavemine date10 Sept 2021 depth14 m time24 min water—
  6. 10 Sept 2021 with Daan cavemine date10 Sept 2021 depth13.9 m time49 min water7 °C

Sources

  • First-hand observation (Dennis Bakhuis)