Malapascua trip report (Part 4)

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Makhno

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Scuba Instructor
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Location
Taiwan
Advanced Trimix Course


I didn't start out choosing Evolution as the dive center to use; instead, I chose one of Evolution's owners, Matt Reed, to be my instructor for my trimix course and then for convenience I used Evolution's services for my recreational diving too. Prior to the course I hadn't met Matt in person, but I knew him by reputation. Other technical divers had spoken highly of his experience as a diver and his skill as an instructor, either from their own experience or by word of mouth. I gave serious consideration to a few other very good instructors—including one who had taught me in the past—but none were offering the trimix course in a place I wanted to go (choices included Puerto Galera, Subic Bay, Pattaya, Phuket, Thailand's caves, etc.). Matt's solid reputation as an instructor plus his location on Malapascua prompted me to send him an e-mail, and after a fairly lengthy correspondence I made up my mind. I figured that if I were disappointed with him or with the course, I could just call a halt to it and go diving for fun on shallow reefs. I wasn't disappointed.


TDI's Advanced Trimix Diver course is comparable to IANTD's Trimix Diver course or ANDI's Trimix Diver course or CMAS' Advanced Trimix Diver course, and is roughly comparable to some other agencies' courses insofar as it trained me to dive as deep as 100 meters with hypoxic gas mixes (I think DSAT/PADI's max is 90 meters. NAUI, PSAI, GUE, and some other agencies do their own things a little bit differently). Hypoxic mixes are mixes with too little oxygen to keep a diver alive at the surface or in shallow water, so one needs to breathe a “normoxic” travel mix—with 18% to 21% oxygen—from the surface until the switch to the hypoxic back gas. Willing to do all the training for full trimix, I didn't need a “normoxic” or “intermediate” or “65m” trimix course as a prerequisite (which tend to limit the maximum depth to around 65 meters or so, depending upon the training agency). For a diver prepared to do all the training needed for diving hypoxic mixes, a deep air tech diving course such as “Extended Range” or "Tec Deep" or equivalent tech diving certification to 55 or 56 meters—with switches to 2 different deco gases—will suffice as the prerequisite to TDI's advanced trimix course. Other agencies might require a normoxic trimix course as a prerequisite.

All dives were done with the standard tech diving equipment configuration—“north Florida cave rig,” or whatever you want to call it—using AL80 (11 liter) doubles, an AL80 travel bottle, an AL40 (5.5 liter) deco bottle with EAN50, and another AL40 deco bottle with pure O2. Having already learned most of the other requisite skills and theory in my previous technical diving training, I found that managing all those bottles was the hardest part of this course: clipping and unclipping them to/from the D-rings, moving them around, stowing one on a leash dangling back behind me, etc. I still need to practice those motor skills to get them 100% committed to muscle memory.

Day 1 of the course was spent in the classroom going over theory, physics, physiology, decompression models, etc. We did additional academic sessions of varying lengths every day. I was already rather well-read about most of these subjects so some sessions went relatively quickly, whereas some other subjects were ones that we had to spend more time on (for example, the theoretical and empirical debates about isobaric counter-diffusion). I found all of Matt's classroom presentations to be very thorough and informative. He's a smart guy who understands some complex, arcane stuff and is able to explain it in a way that helps other divers understand how that stuff should affect their dive plans.


Day 2 was a couple of lengthy 5-meter dives to work on bottle movement and bottle repositioning, gas switches, frog kicks, helicopter kicks, back kicks, out-of-gas scenarios, valve management (shut-down drills on the twinset/manifold, "feathering" a free-flowing deco reg (i.e , opening the valve when inhaling and then closing it while exhaling to conserve gas)), wing failure, deploying an SMB and ascending with it through stops and gas switches, etc.


I found the bottle movement and bottle repositioning exercises to be challenging, because my left hand had trouble finding the correct places to clip the boltsnaps onto the left hip D-ring (the leash should be under the SPG, this bottle here, that bottle there, and so forth). Matt had to work with me on that all throughout the course, and although it's passable now it still isn't perfect.


The wing failure exercise was useful because I have a single-bladder wing which I bought for the sole reason that I could get it really cheap from a Halcyon dealer I knew. (Was that the first time you've ever seen the words “Halcyon” and “cheap” used in the same sentence?) I had always been just a little worried about a wing failure at depth, and wasn't very comforted by the DIR “you can swim up a balanced rig” argument against a redundant bladder/hose system in my wing. And in fact, I tried it—and swimming up the whole thing with all 5 bottles full of gas was hard work, and I'm not sure I could maintain that degree of effort through a long series of deco stops. However, an SMB or a lift bag can be used as redundant buoyancy: simply fill it with a breath or two to achieve neutral buoyancy, then hold it (mostly still rolled-up) so all the gas in it is gathered just under the dump valve, and then slowly ascend and pull the string on the dump valve to vent a bit of gas as necessary. Really easy: problem solved; single-bladder wing's OK. Even after all these years of diving, using my SMB like that had never occurred to me, and this was the first time that anyone had bothered to show me how it's done. Of course, it's very obvious in hindsight, but it wouldn't necessarily be the first idea that would come to my mind in an emergency . . . if it hadn't been taught.


On Day 3 we did a simulated hypoxic trimix dive to about 30 meters, and did all the bottle movement and repositioning, gas switching, SMB deployment, deco stops, etc. that we were practicing to do on a real hypoxic trimix dive with a travel gas—plus simulated problems like regulator failures, out-of-gas, etc. Then we did some rescue exercises in shallow water. Those were very difficult. Doing rescues underwater is much, much harder when both divers have 5 bottles to carry than when they have just 1, and when there are deco stops and gas switches to do on the way up. I think it was Day 3 when we also did the 20- or 25-meter swim with neither gas nor mask, ascents guiding a blind (maskless) teammate through deco stops and gas switches, and maybe a few other problem scenarios I've forgotten about.


On Day 4 we did a couple of dives on air to the wreck of the Mogami Maru at a depth of 50 meters (we didn't really need the travel gas, but we simulated the dive as if our back gas was hypoxic mix rather than air). EAN50 and O2 were the deco gases and we had EAN50 in the (simulated) travel bottles. The need for a travel mix was simulated, but with 30 minutes bottom time at 50 meters with a couple of required gas switches for accelerated deco, those were otherwise very real technical dives (bottom times of 30 minutes gave us total run times of between 70 and 80 minutes). The 2 dives on the Mogami Maru were really enjoyable, as I mentioned above.


On Day 5 we did a dive to 100 meters and then on Day 6 we did a dive to a little deeper than 70 meters, both on the wall at Monad Shoal and both on hypoxic mixes for back gas with a hyperoxic mix for travel gas (25/35 or 30/40) and EAN50 and O2 for deco gases. Diving to 75 or 100 meters is very easy; it's coming back up safely that's the difficult part, but I was ready for it by then. At this site there wasn't much to see down there at 100msw that you can't see a lot shallower for a lot cheaper. As I mentioned above, I saw a single thresher shark on each of those deep trimix dives, and I saw a devil ray on one of them, but you don't need trimix to see that stuff. Those were just training dives to help prepare me for diving those sorts of depths and those sorts of gas mixes on deep wrecks like the ones I plan to dive in the future.


Summation


Malapascua is a mellow little island about 5 hours from the Cebu airport and about a half-hour by boat from the northern tip of Cebu island. It offers some really nice diving that's well worth the trip. I think there aren't very many places where a diver can get such a great variety of underwater attractions in a single location: daily sightings of sharks, good wrecks, and abundant macro critters—all within an easy boat ride. As I suggested above, if a diver with diverse interests had to choose only one place in the Philippines to go, that variety of different types of good dives might make Malapascua the best choice. I recommend the island as a great destination for divers of all experience levels.


I was pleased with the quality of service I received from Evolution for my recreational dives and was pleased with the quality of my continuing tech diving training from Matt Reed. I recommend Evolution as a professionally-run dive center catering to discriminating divers of all experience levels.


Cheers and safe diving!
 
Thanks very much for your detailed trip report. I am currently considering a trip to Malapascua next month (June 2012). I am not particularly interested in the thresher sharks, but am interested in seeing some pretty reefscapes, i.e., soft coral vistas on walls, slopes etc.

Could you comment on how scenic the underwater world is in the vicinity of Malapascua?

Thanks,
Erwin
 
good question above. I'm heading there in October so was extremely pleased to see your set of reports. Thanks for taking the time to write this up, it's extremely helpful for me.
 
Great report and thanks for affirming that I will never have to go through that totally convoluted process that is tech diving! :cool2:

Erwin the drop off at monad is quite nice but it drops only at 22-23 m to deep so your light meter for shots will be low generally. But theres some nice corals on the wall. I cannot remember other significant coral reefscapes most of the dives around the island is mucky.. if you want beatiful corals go to Pescador island and the famous walls of Moalboal. There you will find amazing visibility and good light metering for your wide angles.
 
hey buddy great trip report, thanks for taking the time out to write it. Glad that the trip went well. Good job. I like Malapascua too, as you said it has a great variety of decent diving. Look forward to talking to you about it in the future.
 
Great report and thanks for affirming that I will never have to go through that totally convoluted process that is tech diving! :cool2:

Erwin the drop off at monad is quite nice but it drops only at 22-23 m to deep so your light meter for shots will be low generally. But theres some nice corals on the wall. I cannot remember other significant coral reefscapes most of the dives around the island is mucky.. if you want beatiful corals go to Pescador island and the famous walls of Moalboal. There you will find amazing visibility and good light metering for your wide angles.

Thanks for the Moalboal suggestion, but I have been there twice and wanted something new, so Malapascua came to mind. I might give it a shot, and hope for the best. A depth of 22m is no problem (have strobes, will travel and all).

Erwin
 
Thanks very much for your detailed trip report. I am currently considering a trip to Malapascua next month (June 2012). I am not particularly interested in the thresher sharks, but am interested in seeing some pretty reefscapes, i.e., soft coral vistas on walls, slopes etc.

Could you comment on how scenic the underwater world is in the vicinity of Malapascua?

Thanks,
Erwin

Hi Erwin,

Plenty of good dive sites around Malapascua, for instance the day trip to Calamangan island is a good sample. lovely wall dive.
Gato island and chocolate island are other good sites and th lighthouse for a night dive with the mandarin fish. I think you will have plenty of choices and good dives there.
 
Hey Makhno,

Great trip report! Very detailed and descriptive. Thanks for taking the time to write this one up. I found the part about your tec dives the most interesting as I have never done any tec diving. It's definitely on the to-do list for the (hopefully not too distant) future now! :wink:
 
Calangaman and Gato is a decent day trip and I think you would need to fill a boat and have favourable weather to get out there.. Monad wall starts at 22m and goes deep .. doable on eanx for extended time if you keep to your depth limits ..we didnt experience much current there.. On all accounts like the OP said MP is more reknown for tons of macro than flourishing coral reefscapes and dropoffs. Most sites are dived in 10-15m depths.
 
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