May 2004 Dive Reports

[zboss]

Morehead City, NC Dive Report 05/15/2004 - 05/17/2004

During this trip I was able to complete my PADI Wreck Diving certification as well as dive on the most spectacular wrecks I have ever imagined was possible for someone of my skill level (I had 48 real dives under my belt when I started). We dove with Olympus Dive Center based out of Morehead, North Carolina. Hands-down I believe that, outside of expensive live-abords, that this was the best dive operation on which I have ever been. The crew is extremely professional, knowledgable, friendly, and the boat (the "Olympus") was in excellent condition. The boat itself is located just 20 steps away from the dive shop, on the dive shop's own dock.

The boat features a covered deck large enough to suit up 25 divers, with every two seating areas having just enough room for two 14-gallon Rubbermaid containers. I found that using Rubbermaid containers was an excellent way to transport and store all my gear, especially when you need to put your wet gear back into the car. Although I didn't have a second container inside the rubbermaid to manage all my nick-nacks I hope to have it next time. The boat also featured an air-conditioned galley with a microwave and fresh water supplied by a drinking fountain, although most people brought their own drinks (Olympus supplies neither food nor drinks but if you so desire you may request that a local restaraunt deliver boxed lunches to the dock the morning of your dive). There is also a large sundeck which makes a nice warm place to rest after your dives or to enjoy the ride out.

We couldn't have asked for better weather. Wave heights were 1-3 feet with an occasional swell the first day, with 1 foot swell and occasional 3 foot swell the second day. The sun stayed in most of the weekend but it peaked out occasionally the second day. Wind remained steady at 10 knots most of each day. Water temps were in the high 70's at the surface and mid-to-low 70's at depth. Air temp was a balmy 85 degrees.

We would begin gearing up about 15 mintes from the dive site. When we arrived at the dive site, crew member would dive down and tie off at the wreck. The Olympus features a whiteboard on which the DM drew the dive boat above a drawing of the wreck (also drawn was a good copy ofthe downline system). The DM would then brief the dive and demonstrate how to descend on the lines to get to the wreck. On the wreck, Olympus would also place a line that you could use as a reference across the wreck by first tying it off close to the anchor and then reeling it towards the features of the wreck.

The one important thing I did ahead of time was call up and arrange to have two Aluminum-100's with Nitrox 30 each day. Out of approximately 16 divers only 2 or 3 used air. I understood why after these dives... even though I am nitrox certified I never realized how much nitrox (plus a dive computer) can increase your bottom times. On one wreck, the second of the day, we were able to get eighteen minute bottom times at 105 feet. Also - I was surprised how manageable the 100's were. I didn't notice the weight at all when either gearing up or getting back on the boat. I certainly didn't notice the extra weight at depth. As a matter of fact, the AL-100's assisted ascent during the ever important last one atmosphere because they are nearly neutral at 500 pounds. We made sure to do deep stops at half our max depth in order to follow the latest scientific advice on micro-bubble formation. Previous to the trip I ran my potential dives through v-planner and it predicted that off-gasing would begin for me at 60 feet. We completed our dives with at least a five minute hang at 15-17 feet.

I found out an interesting thing about Sunnto computers, which a few people on the dive trip had - you have no way of checking your PPO for nitrox diving while in surface mode. You have to wait until you start your dive to plan your dive. On my Aeris dive computer, I not only have a bar graph with my PPO but I also have a digital number that I can reference. With that said, I only have four green bars instead of six as on the Oceanic computers. This was confusing and misleading to me - I kept on expected a green bar to show up but one hadn't (unlike my buddy) which lead me to suspect that my computer might not be functioning properly (more on THIS later).

The Olympus is equiped with a very effective hang-line and two emergency decompression rigs. This made it very easy to do your hang and just check out the sea life... the occasional large (very large) fish would swim by. On one wreck we had small jelly fish which stung a bunch of people - I got stung on my lip - so be sure to wear a hood even though it may seem warm. For the most part I just left the hood outside of my wetsuit rather than tucking it in. Getting back on the olympus was a piece of cake. After your hang you just wait your turn in line (either by staying on the hang line or using the supplied granny line) swim up to one of the two massive dive ladders and inch your way up. At the top, a crew member helps you pull your fin onto the deck and then you turn around and they take your fins off for you. You call out your assigned number and climb a up to the deck where you just sit down and take your gear off.

The longest ride out for either day was around an hour and fourty-five minutes with a two hour surface interval between dives. Since the boat leaves the dock at 7 am sharp, we were back at 1:30 pm the first day and 3 pm the second day. BTW - the boat has excellent marine head facilities Well on to the dives...

 

[zboss]

Dive #1 to the CaribSea. The CaribSea was a freighter sunk during WWII (it's amazing how close German U-Boats got to our coast). Visibility at the site was around 80 to 100 feet and the wreck was teaming with huge fish and Sand Tiger sharks. The first dive for the day, we teamed up in buddy teams and did what was the 3rd dive of four required for the Wreck Diver specialty. We basically tied off the reel to the wreck and practiced outside of the wreck in such a way that we simulated being inside the wreck. I noted that it's very easy to find yourself too close to the lead buddy. I made a note to make sure that I allow at least four feet between myself and my buddy. During the exercise I tried to turn on my primary dive light and all I heard was a POP! I looked down and my dive light was full of water. Damn! At least I had my backup light. I turned that on and continued the dive. After completing the exercise we had enough time to look around the wreck. WOW! The wreck itself was huge. I had never been on a bigger wreck. When we got to the boilers and the engine, my jaw dropped. Right in front of me were two boilers the size of small houses and behind them stood a two story high engine with A-Frame support. This dive was to about 85 feet with visibility in the 80 to 100 foot range.

Dive #2 we decided to stay on the CaribSea and no-one minded at all. For this dive my Wreck Instructor was going to complete the other buddy team's certification - which left my buddy and I time to explore the wreck. We entered and decended to 85 feet. After being able to spend some time actually looking at the wreck I began to notice how much coral was there - I had been expecting less. On several sections of the hull, the sides were so covered in white polyps that it looked like a field of snow. There were sea anenomes of all types, lot's of lizard fish, giant spade fish, huge groupers, lot's of bait ball fish. We started swimming and came around a piece of wreckage. Right in front of me - maybe about 30 feet away was a Sand Tiger shark swimming towards me slowly. I decided to stop and look and he turned around and headed out to sea. I felt so lucky and excited! I didn't think I would see anymore. We swam a few yards and up ahead there was a school of 4 or 5 Sand Tigers about 5-8 feet in length! I swam up closer and got to within 20 feet or so of one. They have these big heads that swing back and forth cause they can't see you in front of them; they also have dark black fins. After checking them out for a while I didn't think it would get better - was i wrong! Swimming even further along the deck we spotted a dead sea turtle getting pecked on my fish. The shell must have been five feet long and four feet wide - it was huge. We checked that out for a while then swam around to the top of the deck. Just about all of the other divers were at the complete opposite end of the wreck... when all of a sudden out of the deep sea came the largest sting ray I have ever witnessed with what looked like a giant jack swimming underneath it. It was gray and about 16 feet long from tip to tail with a body about seven feet in diameter. My buddy hadn't seen it so I grabbed him - his jaw dropped. I was amazed and that alone made the whole trip worth-while. It was at that point that I realized that "crap - I am coming back here a lot this summer". The sting ray just kept on cruising right through, never noticing any of us. When we got back on board the boat my buddy and I asked if anyone else had seen the ray - they hadn't, however I am told by the crew that they regularly get massive rays in that area.

When we got back to the dock the crew and store manager had started a grill and picked up hamburgers, hotdogs, chicken, and four or five cases of beer.We sat around drinking down beer and talking about the dives for a couple of hours before heading back to the hotel. It's important to note that while we decided to stay at a hotel, Olympus dive center has a small diver hostel that sleeps about 30 divers.


Dive #3 The Schurz. The next day we headed out again and today's sea was flatter than the day before. The ride out to the first dive site was almost two hours - no big deal on such flat seas. The two divers that had completed their wreck dives yesterday did not accompany us today. That was too bad. Once at the site, we had the usual briefing. Me and My buddy were going to complete our wreck certification and discussed our plan with the instructor. During my gear up, everything was going fine and then all of a sudden I hear a POP! HISSSSS and look around to see my Low Pressure Inflater o-ring on the 1st stage popped out. I quickly ungeared and determined that the o-ring was fine. I reattached it and started gearing up again. I bent down to pull my straps tight for my fins and POP! my buckel for the fin strap broke off. I was starting to get worried about this dive... like something was telling me I shouldn't do this dive. I ignored it. My dive instructor realized that the divers who had not come on today's trip had left their gear onboard the boat. I checked a pair of Apollo BioFins (which I didn't care for by the way) out of a friends dive bag. By the time I finished gearing up all the other divers had already hit the water and I was the last in (I felt a little hurried at this point). The advantage to being at the stern of the boat is that you don't need to fight your way through a bunch of divers to get to the front of the boat when the dive is complete, since you board via the rear deck. You also don't need to be the first geared up. I inflated my BCD and did my giant stride. I landed a bit away from the down line and had to swim against the current a little to get back to it. When I grabbed the line, the boat swung back away from me, with the down line, and took my arm with it - pulling my arm pretty hard. By this time I had already dumped my air and started to descend (I later figured out that you that unlike how I was trained, your supposed to jump in with a deflated BCD to make it easier to get under). This actually worked in my favor because I got under the boat and the waves and I was able to massage my arm a little. What else could possibly go wrong? As I descended I started to kick harder and harder to catch up with everyone and by the time I reached depth I was huffing pretty hard. After reaching depth with my buddies I felt kind of light headed. Then, just when I thought everything was OK and I started to calm down, my computer started beeping at me and flashing the O2 symbol. I thought - what is this? I knew that the alarm would only be going off and displaying my O2 for one reason - that I was over my daily PPO or MOD. To make matters worse - the ascend symbol was also displayed, which means ASCEND NOW. I decided that I should call the dive and let my buddy team up with my instructor to complete his certification. I told them I was heading up. When I started to ascend I realized that I had descended right in front of two massive deck guns from the ship and I could see the prominent bow of the boat. When I got to 90 feet all of a sudden my head cleared up and my computer stopped beeping. I quickly realized that I had been narced and forgot that I had set my computer to alarm when I reached 100 feet, in anticipation for reaching my MOD for the nitrox mixture I was breathing. DUH! The O2 sign was displayed just to indicate that my PPO was the governing factor for the length of the dive not nitrogen and I had not violated any rules. I felt silly but at the same time knew I have done the right thing. Since I was in no danger and I had no buddy I thought it prudent to continue to ascend slowly. I did so and watched the other divers swim around and watched the big mid-water fish come and go. It was very VERY cool, but I wish I had been on the wreck. There must have been billions of small fry. On the surface I had divers with more than 5000 dives in places like Fiji saying that it was one of the best dives of their lives. Apparently, the wreck is still giving up some China pieces. Most of the divers saw a Manta Ray and a very big shark of some kind. Oh well - I live to dive another day. None of the divers or boat crew thought anything but that I had done the right thing by aborting.

Dive #4I actually dove the U352. I didn't realize how cool it was until I got down on the wreck at 105 feet. It was AWESOME. A perfect u-boat sitting at a slight list. Prominent features were the intact con tower, the propeller, and exposed interior. I stuck my head in a real u-boat. I was amazed at how small the inside was... maybe big enough to stand up but that is about it. There were yellow spotted eels all over just hanging out. Giant Spade fish, but generally not much other fish since the boat is so intact and laying in a sandy field. I completed my fourth wreck dive to complete my PADI cert. One of the coolest features of this boat is the drum-style depth charge that lays half uncovered next to it. By the way 75 degrees and 100+ foot visibility at the bottom. I know this because I could see the stern of the uboat from the bow clear-as-day.

A am a proud recipient of a PADI Wreck Diver Certification. Do I feel like I qualify to actually penetrate wrecks? No - not on your life... this really is just a very basic introduction to wreck diving. It taught us a little about the law, the equipment, the excitement of history, and the general color-between-the-lines kind of information. Would I recommend that people take the Wreck class? In this case I realized how useful a reel is even though you may not actually penetrate a ship. I also learned about the need for redundant equipment. I certainly will take a reel along next time I dive in limited visibility or at night. Am I ready to take my diving to the next level and actually do a penetration? No...