Amirantes Group dive sites

Desroches Island is reached by a one-hour flight from Mahé International Airport on a small turboprop aircraft operated by the Islands Development Company. There is a single luxury resort on the island, which includes the only dive centre in the atoll. Alternatively, liveaboard expeditions from Mahé visit Desroches as part of multi-island itineraries through the Amirantes Group. There is no public ferry service. The resort must be booked in advance and operates seasonally, typically closing during the northwest monsoon period when conditions are less suitable for diving.

The inner granitic islands of the Seychelles, including Mahé and Praslin, offer good diving but are affected by higher visitor numbers, runoff from larger islands, and limited pelagic life. Desroches sits 230 kilometres southwest in the coralline Amirantes Group, where the underwater environment is dramatically different. The atoll structure provides channel dives with genuine current and shark activity, the reef is almost entirely hard coral rather than granite, and the remoteness means pristine conditions with minimal human impact. Fish biomass and diversity are significantly higher than inner island sites.

The channel dives involve moderate to strong current and are suitable for divers with drift diving experience and good buoyancy control. The dive centre assesses conditions and matches sites to diver ability, and the channels can be dived at slack tide for less experienced visitors. During incoming tides, the current pushes clean oceanic water through the channels, which is when shark and pelagic activity peaks. Dive guides carry safety equipment including surface marker buoys and GPS locators. The channels are not overhead environments and divers can ascend at any point.