A great day of diving to say the least. I can not believe how high the water has risen at the quarry , since I was last there. The highest water temp I saw was 55 degrees, so, it's still quite chilly. When I arrived at Pennyroyal & checked in, I had no diving buddy so waited to see if any prospects showed up. After a few minutes I ran into Stan & Marvin from my LDS. I asked if I could tag along with them. At first Stan was a little reluctant to agree because it was to be Marvin's first time in doubles & that they would probably stay shallow, depending on how Marvin did. I told them I would stay out of the way & just wanted to get in a dive or 2. After a minute, Stan thought about it & decided in might be good to have another pair of eyes to keep an eye on Marvin in case he got distracted.
Dive 1.- Max depth: 28ft , Dive time 42 min., Avg. Water temp.51 degrees, Vis about 2- 30ft. We dropped down onto the suspended platform & hung out there for about 15 min to allow Marvin time to adjust to his doubles. As he did that I just hovered right off the platform & worked on my buoyancy control in my doubles. I was able to keep myself between 23 & 25 ft the entire time (I was quite proud of myself on that one). Once Marvin got his bearings & started to feel a little comfortable we took off at about 25ft along the wall towards the shallow end. I was in the lead, then Marvin & then Stan. We made our way to the shallow platform just off the old parking lot ledge to give Marvin a bit of a break. We then toured around going to the helicopter, bus & such, then back to the shallow platform. Marvin started having some issues with his wing ( he had actually rolled his left post valve off when messing around & rolled over on his back, thus cutting off his BC inflater hose). He actually did quite well as he had a secondary bladder & inflater hooked to his primary regulator. At that point we decided to end the dive & we headed back to shore.
Dive 2.- Max. depth 84ft, dive time 28 min., Avg. water temp. 45 degrees, vis about 30ft (a couple of places on the road from the deep had 0 vis where someone had stirred the bottom up). On this dive we once again, we went down to the suspended platform again to give Marvin a little more time to adjust. He seemed quite comfortable, so we descended down the deco ladder to the Blue Dolphin. We then proceeded with going up the road. Marvin was in the lead, then Stan, then myself, bringing up the rear. We made our way to the fire truck & then up over the ledge. As I came over the ledge, I suddenly became very buoyant. I dumped the air in my wing, to no avail. At that point I figured out it was my drysuit, but I didn't know why. I was trying to dump the air but it seemed I couldn't. I had to flair out to slow my ascent. At least it was only from 25ft at that point. When I reached the surface, my suit was like the "Stay Puff Marshmallow Man". My inflater had not stuck, but I had found my exhaust valve had some how gotten shut off. I usually leave it in automatic dump mode (least resistance). So I opened it back up, dumped the air & went back down. About that time, Stan realized I was missing & started to look for me. I dropped down behind him & it took me a couple of minutes to get his attention that I was back. We decided we'd had enough & made our way back along the wall towards the tables. As we got to the end, I got light again (this time due to my tanks being at 1200lbs. (I just needed about 2 more lbs to be perfectly weighted).
The boat sinking (or not,... in this case). About 3pm there were about 7 of us going to do the sinking. (Stan, Marvin, me & a few guys from the quarry). We spent the next 3 hrs filling lift drums & trying to get the boat off the old parking lot ledge. After getting it off, we freed it from the barrels & it sank up to the roof, but no further. We were all too tired to to do any more (I was beginning to get cramps in my legs). So, we tied the boat up where it was & they will eventually put some rocks in it to sink it. After all that I went home & crashed for awhile.
Yes, Wally, it's the same report I put on the Evansville web site. It was a good report, why waste time retyping it?
Dive 1.- Max depth: 28ft , Dive time 42 min., Avg. Water temp.51 degrees, Vis about 2- 30ft. We dropped down onto the suspended platform & hung out there for about 15 min to allow Marvin time to adjust to his doubles. As he did that I just hovered right off the platform & worked on my buoyancy control in my doubles. I was able to keep myself between 23 & 25 ft the entire time (I was quite proud of myself on that one). Once Marvin got his bearings & started to feel a little comfortable we took off at about 25ft along the wall towards the shallow end. I was in the lead, then Marvin & then Stan. We made our way to the shallow platform just off the old parking lot ledge to give Marvin a bit of a break. We then toured around going to the helicopter, bus & such, then back to the shallow platform. Marvin started having some issues with his wing ( he had actually rolled his left post valve off when messing around & rolled over on his back, thus cutting off his BC inflater hose). He actually did quite well as he had a secondary bladder & inflater hooked to his primary regulator. At that point we decided to end the dive & we headed back to shore.
Dive 2.- Max. depth 84ft, dive time 28 min., Avg. water temp. 45 degrees, vis about 30ft (a couple of places on the road from the deep had 0 vis where someone had stirred the bottom up). On this dive we once again, we went down to the suspended platform again to give Marvin a little more time to adjust. He seemed quite comfortable, so we descended down the deco ladder to the Blue Dolphin. We then proceeded with going up the road. Marvin was in the lead, then Stan, then myself, bringing up the rear. We made our way to the fire truck & then up over the ledge. As I came over the ledge, I suddenly became very buoyant. I dumped the air in my wing, to no avail. At that point I figured out it was my drysuit, but I didn't know why. I was trying to dump the air but it seemed I couldn't. I had to flair out to slow my ascent. At least it was only from 25ft at that point. When I reached the surface, my suit was like the "Stay Puff Marshmallow Man". My inflater had not stuck, but I had found my exhaust valve had some how gotten shut off. I usually leave it in automatic dump mode (least resistance). So I opened it back up, dumped the air & went back down. About that time, Stan realized I was missing & started to look for me. I dropped down behind him & it took me a couple of minutes to get his attention that I was back. We decided we'd had enough & made our way back along the wall towards the tables. As we got to the end, I got light again (this time due to my tanks being at 1200lbs. (I just needed about 2 more lbs to be perfectly weighted).
The boat sinking (or not,... in this case). About 3pm there were about 7 of us going to do the sinking. (Stan, Marvin, me & a few guys from the quarry). We spent the next 3 hrs filling lift drums & trying to get the boat off the old parking lot ledge. After getting it off, we freed it from the barrels & it sank up to the roof, but no further. We were all too tired to to do any more (I was beginning to get cramps in my legs). So, we tied the boat up where it was & they will eventually put some rocks in it to sink it. After all that I went home & crashed for awhile.
Yes, Wally, it's the same report I put on the Evansville web site. It was a good report, why waste time retyping it?
