devils throat

[BrettM]

Devil's Throat is indeed a very nice dive and worth the trip to Coz to see. It is probably one of the most asked for sites in Coz but as others have said it is best dove by folks with suitable experience and small groups because the small swim throughs can get silted up easily even by experienced divers. For the best visibility try to be the first in line to go through instead of the last and be as considerate as possible not to stir up sand or silt for those following you.

Another dive site I really enjoyed was referred to by the Aldora folks as "Daves Throat". Other operators may have their own name for the particular series of swim thru's for this site but the only op I know for sure that does this as a specific planned site is Aldora. I found it to be every bit as interesting as Devil's Throat. "Dave's Throat" was a series of swim thru's located on Columbia Deep. It is also a deep dive and expect to hit about 115 feet or so as you come out the bottom of the swim thru section and begin making your way back up the wall into shallower water. The nice thing about this dive on Columbia Deep was after the deep part of your dive you get to swim up the face of the wall and drift along the shallower part of the reef for quite a ways as you stage your ascent. This makes it like two dives in one whereas you tend to drift over sand flats that are a bit less interesting as you come back upward after doing Devil's Throat.

Get to Coz and do em both you won't be dissappointed!

 

[d33ps1x]

I must do this dive NOW.

 

[ggunn]

BrettM once bubbled...

... a series of swim thru's located on Columbia Deep. It is also a deep dive and expect to hit about 115 feet or so as you come out the bottom of the swim thru section and begin making your way back up the wall into shallower water. The nice thing about this dive on Columbia Deep was after the deep part of your dive you get to swim up the face of the wall and drift along the shallower part of the reef for quite a ways as you stage your ascent.

Get to Coz and do em both you won't be dissappointed!

I am pretty sure I have done this dive with Cozumel Equalizers, and they didn't try to name it after their owner.

 

[FredT]

The Throat is the location of The DIVE FROM HELL on the Diverlink 2000 trip.

To make a long story much shorter 10 divers down, 5 bent badly due to a strong down current and midwater vortexes. All recovered after several rides in the Coz chamber. The video of a large grouper energetically swimming up the wall, but decending tail first, indicated there were going to be bad things happening later in the dive.

Watch for unusual currents or sea conditons! The bottom of the wall there is a bunch deeper than any SCUBA diver needs to go.

FT

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

Yikes!

 

[MikeS]

I dove the Devil’s Throat last month. It was worth doing once for the experience but other than being an interesting test of buoyancy control it’s not all that. Since there is little to no sunlight inside the swim through, none of the coral inside is alive and everything is covered with a layer of silt resulting in little contrast. There were no fish inside either, not much to see. It is beyond what most consider recreational diving since you’re further than 130 feet from the surface. It was 126 feet deep at the exit so I’m guessing that at one point you’re 150 feet from the surface 25 linear to the exit and 126 vertical to the surface. There is also a point where you cannot see ambient light from the entrance or exit. The 10 Watt HID worked great.

I was diving with a group staying at Scuba Club Cozumel. There was little to no current when we swam through. We were diving AL 80s and did the throat and the chapel on a single dive and at no point was I within 5 minutes of the NDL, just don’t spend a lot of time in the swim through, there’s nothing to see anyway. I can see how a bigger group could get into trouble. With someone in front of you and someone behind you’d have no choice but to wait.

Mike

 

[FredT]

Surface contions gave a hint of the mixmaster below, but even several very experienced divers didn't recognise the danger signs.

Bends resulted from rapic ascents and decents when caught in a horizontal vortex on the final ascent from the top of the reef. They werere lucky nobody broke a lung during the ride (-50 to -10 and back again in a 10 to 15 second cycle) in the vortex.

Strange currents can happen anywhere off Coz, but seem to happen in the area of the Throat with some regularity. At least that is what the chamber riders got from the attendants. At the time they held the "record" for most folks bent on a single dive. I hope that "record" stands for quite a while. I definiteley don't want to wish the experience on anyone else.

FT

 

[DocVikingo]

(nt)

 

[raviepoo]

do they tend to happen more during a particular season of the year, or are they more random? Does anyone know?

FredT once bubbled...
Strange currents can happen anywhere off Coz, but seem to happen in the area of the Throat with some regularity.

 

[FredT]

These things can happen when two currents meet almost anywhere in the world, but the conditions off Coz are a good example so lets deal with those.

The normal current on the west side of Coz is a northerly at a usually reasonable pace. This is accelerated when going over the reef points as the water has to go somewhere and it's either faster or down. Where this faster current meets the slower deep water there is the possibility of forming an eddy similar to the pocket eddies in a white water stream. Combine those eddies with a downwelling from a falling tide or evaporation density current and you have the possibility of a mixmaster horizontal eddy.


Warning signs:

1. A weed or debris line on the surface generally means two water masses are coliding. If the currents on both sides of the line flow towards the line the water has to go somewhere, so a stiff downwelling can develop. It has been postulated that several divers a year are caught in downwellings and lost off Coz. A weed line is often a good dive, but be sure to check to see the current directions on both sides of the line. Once the current dissipates the line can remain for quite a while.

2. A "confused" sea with surface conditons not typical of the wind conditions is a big flag. An area with a short choppy sea in an area of longer period waves indicates a localized current problem is possible. Likewise an area of calm in an otherwise choppy sea can be a bad sign too.

3. "Standing" waves that don't seem to move often indicate a stiff current. Combine that with a rough high profile bottom and eddies can be a problem if a cross current from a density difference develops to flow over the wall.



FT