NC Dive Reports

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flounderer

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Location
Wilmington, NC
Bringing back the dive report thread.

Diving has been awesome the past week! The marine forecasts said 2-4 and 3-5 ft but it was mirror flat out on the water. Saturday and Sunday it was literally 2-3 inches. Visibility has been pretty good also. The water is gin clear down to about 20ft off the bottom where it has been 40-50 ft on the offshore wrecks. I got to dive with Aaron and some of the Down Under Scuba guys, they know how to make a dive boat fun, I had a blast.

Sunday on the Nashville the seas were the flattest I've ever seen, no signs whatsoever of a hurricane 500 miles offshore. There was a stiff current on the surface but not unmanageable. I could see the wreck sitting in 110 ft of water when I reached 30ft. Water temp on the surface was 84 and 79-80 on the bottom. I haven't been to the Nashville in 5 years and the seas have taken there toll on the wreck but it is still a really cool place. I got to the bottom set the anchor and started looking around. My focus for this dive was to snap pics so I left the catch bag topside. Five minutes into the dive I see antennae and I think to my self "I'm 110ft down without a catch bag I don't want to go back up". I go to investigate to see it is a BIG lobster. I swim down and grab him he puts up a fight but he is as good as dinner by this point. I swam him back to the boat and went back down to complete my picture taking goal. There were a lot of small tropicals over the wreck even some cleaning stations with small wrasse cleaning grunts. The wreck was surprisingly void of large fish not many grouper, amberjacks, or pompano. I was diving 30 nitrox with a 70% deco mix but decided not to go into deco because of the earlier bounce dive. I did a nice slow accent with an extra long hang on the 70% to be on the safe side.

Next I dove the Gill. The same water that was at the Nashville was at the Gill. Clear on top 40-50 ft on the bottom. The current was a little stronger but still not bad. The Gill is a great dive, after being on it dozens of times there is always new stuff to explore. The was 3 sand tigers patrolling the wreck, a few barracudas, and a moray.

Hopefully these conditions continue.

The first pic was taken from 70 ft just to show you show clear it was and you can see the slight ripple on the surface showing how flat it was.
The second picture is of dinner (~8-9lbs) and to show how calm the surface was 35 miles out.
 
That is one MONSTER bug! Good catch. Glad you had good conditions down south, up around The Cape the conditions were deteriorating throughout Saturday afternoon into Sunday due to the storm. We had large swells causing a heavy bottom surge that was suspending sediment about 30 feet off of the bottom on the inshore wrecks. Saturday morning offered good vis on the dives, by the afternoon is was decreasing quickly on many of the sites. The Ashkabad in the morning had about 60 feet of vis and was down to 3 feet by the afternoon.
 
flounderer:
Next I dove the Gill. The same water that was at the Nashville was at the Gill. Clear on top 40-50 ft on the bottom. The current was a little stronger but still not bad. The Gill is a great dive, after being on it dozens of times there is always new stuff to explore. The was 3 sand tigers patrolling the wreck, a few barracudas, and a moray.

We did two dives on the Gill on Saturday. Perfect conditions, not even a ripple on the water. Scootered the whole wreck on the first dive which was fun. When we got in for the second dive, a pair of dolphins hung out with us on the surface for a few minutes which was really cool. We saw 4 or 5 Sand Tigers, one Nurse shark, one reefy looking shark, but I couldn't ID it. Lots of big 'cuda, couple of morays, big school of spadefish, all the other usuals. Hanging at 20', you could see angelfish swimming on the wreck. We had a strong surface current, but not much on the bottom.

Out of curiosity, why 70%? Kind of an odd number.

John
 
I couldn't get away for a full day this weekend, but I did make it down to Radio Island on Sunday afternoon. We hit the water around 4:00pm and there was still ~10 min of incoming tide. Viz was around 8-10 feet until the tide started flowing back out and dropped the viz to ~5ft.

We spent most of out time (52min) around 25ft and saw all of the usuals with a few puffers, 2 schools of teaplate sized spadefish, a few mackerel zipping around, and 2 tiny butterfly fish mixed in.

Rich
 
jdh:
Out of curiosity, why 70%? Kind of an odd number.

John

It was actually 73%, now thats an odd number. Thats what I could get out of the garage I fill from. The O2 bank bottle was kinda low so I could only squeeze out what it would let me. I was shooting for 80%. Just as long as I can plan my dive first I'll use any mix that will scrub me clean quicker. Just out of curiosity what mix do you use for the offshore wrecks around here?

Pat
 
Well the forecasters were wrong again. This time in our favor though. Saturday on the Box Wreck (Rock Pile) we had 70' viz and 78deg bottom temps. Lots of big grouper when I tied in the hook but very skittish as another boat has been hitting this wreck regularly. A few decent flounder on the bottom and tons of tropicals. At my 40' stop, I had a school of big chopper blues swarm me and the bait ball that was engulfing me. After untieing, I drifted well off the wreck and found some structure that was holding some BIG flounder. Must be where the smart ones moved to when divers hit the wreck. Sat PM- W.E. Hutton for 2 dives. Viz was about 40' and temps around 77. Lots of flounder, the random sandtiger or two. I did a dive during the interval and coming down the anchor line, just in front of the boilers, I see two 7' bull sharks cruising in. The first one went on by but the second one came back by for a couple of curious passes before he too lost interest. Kinda gets you to thinking when you're down there by yourself. I've seen more bulls this year than ever before. Not sure why though. Sunday did 2 on the Aeolus. Viz was great down to 60' where the surge had the bottom picked up with lots of particulates in the water column. A little current but bearable. Wednesday did a rock on the east side and it was great 80'+ viz no current... these are the places I like to dive since they don't get hit very often by others. This week hopefully will find the bottom settled down and the viz increasing.

coop
 
flounderer:
It was actually 73%, now thats an odd number. Thats what I could get out of the garage I fill from. The O2 bank bottle was kinda low so I could only squeeze out what it would let me. I was shooting for 80%. Just as long as I can plan my dive first I'll use any mix that will scrub me clean quicker. Just out of curiosity what mix do you use for the offshore wrecks around here?

Pat

I pretty much only use 50% in the ocean around here. There is not really much difference for local dives with non-helium bottom gas.
You can do the switch to 50% deeper and maximize off-gassing sooner. If I had to take something else, it would be 100%. 50% is easy to mix, even with low O2 banks. I'm a big fan of standardized gases. For here, all I ever use is 32%, 30/30, 21/35, and 50%. I might be somewhat tainted by my choice of training agency though.

John
 
jdh:
I'm a big fan of standardized gases. For here, all I ever use is 32%, 30/30, 21/35, and 50%. I might be somewhat tainted by my choice of training agency though.

John

John,

You can borrow my OMS bungeed wing anytime you'd like.:)
 
flounderer:
John,

You can borrow my OMS bungeed wing anytime you'd like.

Such a gracious offer, but, I think I'll have to decline :)
I'm not out to convert anyone to anything, I just am often curious about the thought process behind other people's choices for gases/gear/etc (ie. the 70%). Be safe, have a good time doing it.

John
 
beautiful pics, pat, and a too cool report! thanks!
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/

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