Turkish photographer Savaş Karakaş was one of the first to board a motorboat and then dive to the seabed grave when the park opened on Saturday. There, he says, he was able to reconnect with his grandfather who fought in the Gallipoli campaign of 1915.

"My grandfather's hands were disfigured and burned in action, and I was always scared of them," said Karakas, who lives in Istanbul and whose given name means "war", after the battle.

"But when I come to Gallipoli and dive, the rusted metal and steel of the wrecks reminds me of my grandfather's hands and I hold his hand under the water."

The Gallipoli Historic Underwater Park opened 106 years after Ottoman and allied German forces halted an invasion by British, French, Australian and New Zealand troops.

The Ottoman resistance remains a point of deep pride in modern Turkey. At the time, it thwarted the Allies' plan to control the straits connecting the Aegean to the Black Sea, where their Russian naval allies were penned in.