Hi All:
Well, FINALLY RadDiver and I made it out on the "unknown wreck" that I've posted about previously. Another ScubaBoard member, Pook 60, was going to go as well, but had a last minute work emergency and couldn't make it. We tried the same dive last week, but were blown out.
The wreck sits off Ocean View Beach in Norfolk in about 10 FT of water. According to my logs, I last dived it in 1986 so I didn't know what to expect. It's best dived on a hot summer day at high tide, with at least a week of minimal wind. 10 FT of visibility would be considered GOOD. I've seen 15 FT in ideal conditions. When Rad and I got to the beach at about 10:00 AM, the wind had just started to freshen out of the northeast. Waves were about 1 FT and close together and, typical for March, getting worse. But, DANG, we were there and just had to DIVE.
Along with wanting to find this wreck, we figured we would test out our new "offshore packages" on this dive for learning purposes. Rad was trying his new DUI drysuit and aluminum 100 doubles. I was wearing my new Viking drysuit and a steel LP 121. Rad had the float ball and line. I carried the bag with wreck tools. Off we went...
The 100 yard walk from the vehicles to the water in those doubles couldn’t have been easy, but Rad made it. He sorted out pretty quickly once in the water. Unfortunately, I wasn’t as lucky. As soon as I got in the water, I lost a fin. I couldn't believe it! This problem would repeat itself 5 more times (5!) during our dive and was caused by me wearing socks in my drysuit boots instead of wetsuit booties under the drysuit boots like I usually do (I used them the night before, they were WET!). Fortunately, I discovered a WONDERFUL property of OMS Thrust drysuit fins – they FLOAT! We soon found my fin on the surface instead of on the bottom where I thought it would be. Nevertheless, I struggled with this issue all day and it was a PAIN.
We started our dive by surface swimming out about 30 yards and a little "up current." The current wasn't too bad when we started, closer to the beach. Ocean View had changed significantly since 1986, so I had lost all of my shore landmarks to locate the wreck. Our plan was to use a line reel and swing an arc parallel to the beach close to where I thought the wreck might be. If the line crossed the wreck we would snag it. We submerged together and found the bottom when our masks ran in to it. Visibility was about 1 FT with the wave action causing a lot of sand suspension in the water. I drove a 14" orange plastic tent stake into the bottom, wrapped the reel and with Rad in touch contact, began to swim outward from the beach. At about 150 FT of line, we surfaced for a fix, decided to begin swinging the arc and dropped back to the bottom. 2 minutes later, my hand closed on what I now think was a metal mast and we FOUND the wreck. I moved Rad's hand to the object and we exchanged grins underwater (as best we could)! We tied the float ball into the wreck, wrapped the reel and started to explore. Within 30 seconds, Rad was finding large brass or bronze spikes (see pic below) that seemed to be everywhere. Even though I last dived the wreck more than 20 years ago, it looks like no one else had been on it. Finding artifacts THAT fast in almost zero visibility means there are a still a LOT of them down there.
We circled the wreck with me holding the collection bag and Rad's arm while he lead the dive. Along with more spikes, he also found a 1960's coke bottle (see the linked thread above with the older artifact pictures for how I think this happened). The wreck seems larger than I remember, it might be that storms uncovered more of it. Wave action started to increase during the dive and we were getting tossed back and forth pretty well. After about 10 minutes on the bottom, we surfaced to fix our position in relationship to the float ball. Immediately we got pushed by the tidal current and soon were more than 100 FT down current of where we needed to be. Rad made the swim pretty well, but I had to thrash about with my arms because I kept losing my fins. I didn't remember it being that HARD when I was 25! When we finally got back to the ball, I was done and called the dive. Rad (bless him) took it well, retrieved my reel, swam with the ball and dropped down to get the stake out of the bottom when we got closer to shore. By this point I had given up on wearing my fins and put them on my hands to do the "flounder" backstroke. How embarrassing!
Anyway, when we eventually got back to the beach and our vehicles we took stock of what we found and were pretty happy. We now have a "new" fix on this wreck and plan on visiting it again. "Virgin" wrecks are always AWESOME dives, no matter what the conditions. Even though it was a "tough" day, finding that wreck after 20 years more than made up for it.
Obviously, I need more learning time for my new gear. I'm sure glad I didn't try THAT little adventure in 100 FT of water 40 miles offshore. Live and learn.
Rad, you were GREAT, thanks for putting up with me! Pook, don't worry, it's still there and we can dive it again...
Hope ya’ll enjoyed this. I’ll post more next time we go on it.
Well, FINALLY RadDiver and I made it out on the "unknown wreck" that I've posted about previously. Another ScubaBoard member, Pook 60, was going to go as well, but had a last minute work emergency and couldn't make it. We tried the same dive last week, but were blown out.
The wreck sits off Ocean View Beach in Norfolk in about 10 FT of water. According to my logs, I last dived it in 1986 so I didn't know what to expect. It's best dived on a hot summer day at high tide, with at least a week of minimal wind. 10 FT of visibility would be considered GOOD. I've seen 15 FT in ideal conditions. When Rad and I got to the beach at about 10:00 AM, the wind had just started to freshen out of the northeast. Waves were about 1 FT and close together and, typical for March, getting worse. But, DANG, we were there and just had to DIVE.
Along with wanting to find this wreck, we figured we would test out our new "offshore packages" on this dive for learning purposes. Rad was trying his new DUI drysuit and aluminum 100 doubles. I was wearing my new Viking drysuit and a steel LP 121. Rad had the float ball and line. I carried the bag with wreck tools. Off we went...
The 100 yard walk from the vehicles to the water in those doubles couldn’t have been easy, but Rad made it. He sorted out pretty quickly once in the water. Unfortunately, I wasn’t as lucky. As soon as I got in the water, I lost a fin. I couldn't believe it! This problem would repeat itself 5 more times (5!) during our dive and was caused by me wearing socks in my drysuit boots instead of wetsuit booties under the drysuit boots like I usually do (I used them the night before, they were WET!). Fortunately, I discovered a WONDERFUL property of OMS Thrust drysuit fins – they FLOAT! We soon found my fin on the surface instead of on the bottom where I thought it would be. Nevertheless, I struggled with this issue all day and it was a PAIN.
We started our dive by surface swimming out about 30 yards and a little "up current." The current wasn't too bad when we started, closer to the beach. Ocean View had changed significantly since 1986, so I had lost all of my shore landmarks to locate the wreck. Our plan was to use a line reel and swing an arc parallel to the beach close to where I thought the wreck might be. If the line crossed the wreck we would snag it. We submerged together and found the bottom when our masks ran in to it. Visibility was about 1 FT with the wave action causing a lot of sand suspension in the water. I drove a 14" orange plastic tent stake into the bottom, wrapped the reel and with Rad in touch contact, began to swim outward from the beach. At about 150 FT of line, we surfaced for a fix, decided to begin swinging the arc and dropped back to the bottom. 2 minutes later, my hand closed on what I now think was a metal mast and we FOUND the wreck. I moved Rad's hand to the object and we exchanged grins underwater (as best we could)! We tied the float ball into the wreck, wrapped the reel and started to explore. Within 30 seconds, Rad was finding large brass or bronze spikes (see pic below) that seemed to be everywhere. Even though I last dived the wreck more than 20 years ago, it looks like no one else had been on it. Finding artifacts THAT fast in almost zero visibility means there are a still a LOT of them down there.
We circled the wreck with me holding the collection bag and Rad's arm while he lead the dive. Along with more spikes, he also found a 1960's coke bottle (see the linked thread above with the older artifact pictures for how I think this happened). The wreck seems larger than I remember, it might be that storms uncovered more of it. Wave action started to increase during the dive and we were getting tossed back and forth pretty well. After about 10 minutes on the bottom, we surfaced to fix our position in relationship to the float ball. Immediately we got pushed by the tidal current and soon were more than 100 FT down current of where we needed to be. Rad made the swim pretty well, but I had to thrash about with my arms because I kept losing my fins. I didn't remember it being that HARD when I was 25! When we finally got back to the ball, I was done and called the dive. Rad (bless him) took it well, retrieved my reel, swam with the ball and dropped down to get the stake out of the bottom when we got closer to shore. By this point I had given up on wearing my fins and put them on my hands to do the "flounder" backstroke. How embarrassing!
Anyway, when we eventually got back to the beach and our vehicles we took stock of what we found and were pretty happy. We now have a "new" fix on this wreck and plan on visiting it again. "Virgin" wrecks are always AWESOME dives, no matter what the conditions. Even though it was a "tough" day, finding that wreck after 20 years more than made up for it.
Obviously, I need more learning time for my new gear. I'm sure glad I didn't try THAT little adventure in 100 FT of water 40 miles offshore. Live and learn.
Rad, you were GREAT, thanks for putting up with me! Pook, don't worry, it's still there and we can dive it again...
Hope ya’ll enjoyed this. I’ll post more next time we go on it.
