Stoo
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I applaud you folks who have the fortitude to ice dive. I think you're nucking futs,
I think this was about '78/'79. Wetsuit. I'm still trying to find my futs.
Ice diving thread (who is doing it?)
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I think this was about '78/'79. Wetsuit. I'm still trying to find my futs.
Here you can see how nice it is to have an opening (1) so large several people can use it w/o being in each other's way and (2) so shallow that you can stand firmly on the bottom. Not too shallow obviously, you want to be able to swim away underwater w/o needling a shovel
Good point. Most of our inland sites w/ water clear enough for diving are quarries with rock or gravel bottoms.
Stoo
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I tend to avoid traditional ice diving since it generally involves a mob of people and I really don't do mobs. I do however, love being under loose ice at spring breakup... Just me, maybe a buddy.
The second shot was taken just as I was going under. A friend commented that that dive technically earned me about 8 PADI cards as it was a solo, night, kinda ice, drysuit, photography dive... although the best part of the dive was the sunset.
The third image was just a flop out in front of my house where there are a few little wrecks.
AfterDark
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@Stoo, is that salt water in the pictures? I've only dove under the ice in salt water once. The ice was 4 inches thick and mushy. It couldn't be walked on, while under it one had only to punch thru the ice to break thru to the surface. The only ice dive I've done that didn't require a hole and entry was like any shore dive except I was walking thru ice. It was a unique experience.
Stoo
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No it's freshwater... Georgian Bay/Lake Huron specifically. Tobermory...
I figure if it's cold enough for salt water to be freezing, I'm heading to Belize.
Georgian Bay is a large body of water, but many years it will freeze all the way across. A few weeks of prolonged cold and light winds are needed though. I think it was the winter before last that all five Great Lakes were 100% frozen, other than a patch in the middle of Lake Superior.
If you know Tobermory, the Arabia is just off the shore of the island that's left of centre, about 3 miles out. Flowerpot Island is on the far right.
The sea here is salty enough to taste it, but fresh enough to drink it and survive, maybe 1/2 of 1 percent (0.5 %) here near Kristinestad. I have been diving on the Baltic sea ice just once, about a mile from the nearest shore. It was an amazing day. In the springtime, on a sunny day with endless areas of snow-covered ice reflecting all the light back up and around the sunshine is incredibly, impossibly intense. In a few places the top of the ice had huge piles of broken sheets and chunks of ice piled up into heaps from doghouse-size to 2-storey townhouse-size; just amazing! Underwater the underside of the ice was completely covered with huge rolls and bumps with a few deep valleys between them. Also something about the temp change just where the water met the ice made the water there cloudier and oily-looking, greater reducing clarity and visibility. All the time I just saw my safety rope vanishing into blurryness some 6-8' above my head. I couldn't see the opening in the ice until I was directly below it and almost at the surface. Not a place to ever ever ever be stuck without a saftey rope back to the surface. When we went to exit I remember how my buddy (on a separate rope) was above me while I was at the level of his feet. I could only see him up to about mid-back height, and I still couldn't see the surface. All of a sudden my buddy was vanished *whoosh*, as neatly as if an alien space ship just sucked him up :-D (he reached the surface and helping hands dragged him up and out quite quickly). I had to rise another 6' before I could see that yeah, there really is an opening and daylight up here.
That was my one time under the sea ice. I know that in many places and on many days it can be quite transparent and have a very flat, smooth top & bottom just like on your average lake or pond. I think the ice I saw wasn't like that because it was the free-flowing ice, with lots of broken-off bits and plowed-under chunks now attached to the underside. It was really neat and very much worth seeing.
AfterDark
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@FinnMom sounds like quite the adventure! That oily description: "Also something about the temp change just where the water met the ice made the water there cloudier and oily-looking, greater reducing clarity and visibility."
I've seen a similar affect several times in the fall around here where the cold bottom water meets the warmer surface water.
Also the Clive Cussler novel I'm reading now used just that description for the same affect during a ice dive in the same geographical area, Norway.
@Stoo the pictures remind me of Lake George NY. You have a nice place to ice dive!
I've seen a similar affect several times in the fall around here where the cold bottom water meets the warmer surface water.
Also the Clive Cussler novel I'm reading now used just that description for the same affect during a ice dive in the same geographical area, Norway.
@Stoo the pictures remind me of Lake George NY. You have a nice place to ice dive!
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