Hello all,
It's been a while since I last posted. Today, I want to post about an experience this past weekend with a certain dive charter off of Atlantic Blvd. in Pompano Beach which made me feel uneasy about the operation. My buddy and I had booked an afternoon dive this past Saturday and arrived early to check-in. I have done many dives with them in the pre-covid past so it was a bit of a shock that they were charging for rental of the cylinders and the weights, with the overall cost having increased 20% since I last dived with them (is this in-line with the rest of the industry?).
After paying, my buddy and I headed towards the dock and boarded their smaller 34 foot boat. I was rather happy to feel that we were going to have a new dive experience with them on a different boat. My buddy and I setup our gear, but my buddy appeared to have problems with his octo as it started venting air, but he quickly fixed it. As we waited to depart, we could see their larger dive boat was docked next to us boarding divers and looked near-capacity after everyone had boarded. After roll call, the crew was preparing the boat to leave by releasing the ropes. Another crewmember was raising the gangway with a rope, and from one moment to the next, the young man nearly dropped the heavy gangway on his head, only to save himself with his quick reaction to hold it up with the help of several divers who were horrified to see the young man come inches near death. He later told us that one of the crewmembers had given him an order to grab an object before he had secured the gangway.
After the initial scare, we were expecting to leave any minute but realized there was a problem with the boat when they opened up the engine compartment just underneath our feet.
As we baked in the sun watching the crew try to breathe life into the engine, the staff debated amongst themselves if we should all move on over to the bigger vessel. Approximately 13 divers would be added to 26 divers and crew of the other boat. The mechanic did not endorse this idea, even after a few of the crewmembers of the other vessel said they would make room for the rest of us. The mechanic insisted on bringing the dead boat to life and made a few phone calls to try to get some ideas on how to start the engine.
However, it was not meant to be as the boat lay dead on the water. The mechanic finally agreed that the divers transfer over to the other boat after he discovered some cables had badly corroded. One of the dive shop employees came on the boat and offered a refund to anyone who did not want to go as the waters had been extremely rough all day ( 2 out of 14 divers that morning felt fit enough to dive both dives in rough seas).
I had a bad feeling about diving on the other boat, especially when I heard the mechanic resist the transferring us over. When the rest of the divers transferred to the other moved over, I turned to my buddy and asked him if he was still down for it and he said no because there were too many bad signs that day and to him they were:
1. His octo malfunctioning
2. The young man nearly losing his head
3. The dead engine
As for myself, I was just recovering from a cold (I had taken Afrin that morning) but still had lingering tightness in my ear. In the morning, I thought I had to expel everything I needed to expel throughout the day to feel ready for the dive, but this did not happen. Most importantly was the concern about overcrowding on the larger boat.
As we drove off, my buddy told me that he had recalled not ever wanting to dive with this company again because the dive shop employee had been rude to us and made us carry our cylinders to the boat. I remember having to carry the cylinders but not the former.
I want to hear your opinion about this. What would you do if you ever encountered a situation like this? Would you dive with them again? Not sure that I will.
Mau
scubaboard.com
