← All sites

Monad Shoal

Malapascua, Cebu, Philippines · 20–30m · advanced · exposed

Submerged plateau dived at first light, where thresher sharks come up to be cleaned. Early start and a deep profile.

Conditions today

Retrieved · refreshed hourly

marginal

Marginal — 0.5m effective waves made worse by short-period chop.

Limiting factor: period

Wave height
0.5–0.6m
Wave period
3.1–3.5s
Wind chop
0.3–0.5m
Sea temp
30.2–30.4°C

Ranges span today's hours. Wave height here is the raw sea state — the rating scales it for how exposed the site is. Exposed — open water with nothing to block the swell, so it is scored at full height.

Next few days

  • TodayMarginal — 0.5m effective waves made worse by short-period chop.marginal
  • FridayPoor — decent morning demoted one level because conditions deteriorate over the ride-home window.poor
  • SaturdayMarginal — 0.6m effective waves made worse by short-period chop.marginal

Each day is scored over its morning dive window, the same as today's rating.

Dive briefing

AI-generated

This is an advanced dive on a submerged plateau working 20 to 30 metres down. Conditions are marginal: short-period chop is making the swell awkward today, so expect a bouncy boat ride and a lively descent. You'll need an early start for the platform's main draw — divers commonly log pelagic thresher sharks here, often recorded during their cleaning behaviour. Whitetip reef sharks are also frequently seen.

The plateau rewards a thorough search of the structure. Divers often record tiger tail and spiny seahorses, Clark's anemonefish, mandarinfish, striped eel catfish, squat anemone shrimp, and other reef life tucked into the terrain. Water temperature is running 30.2–30.4°C. Plan a deep profile and manage your air accordingly.

Written by Claude (claude-haiku-4-5-20251001) from the rating, forecast, and sightings on this page — it has no other source and cannot look anything up. Treat it as a summary, not as local knowledge.

Commonly seen here

Most-recorded species near this site, ranked by research-grade iNaturalist sightings from divers, snorkelers, and naturalists.

Species come from iNaturalist — research-grade sightings logged by divers, snorkelers, and naturalists nearby. The ranking reflects what people photograph most, not guaranteed abundance. Ask a local operator what's actually being seen. Species names link to iNaturalist for range maps, seasonality and more photos. Photos by iNaturalist contributors under Creative Commons licences — individual credit on hover.