jeepbrew
Contributor
Well I dove the Mighty O about two weeks ago, and I still haven't posted a trip report. I uploaded a 6 minute video to the web and I will post the link here. Check it out if you get bored.
Video: http://www.filefactory.com/file/a85e47/
Warning - the file is 277 MB, so you probably don't want to give that a shot w/o broadband...
Dive Report - Aug 25, 2007:
First off, we dove with Gary's Gulf Divers out of Orange Beach, AL, and I must give props to Gary - he runs a great outfit. Everyone was very polite and professional, and the boat was very nice and clean.
As soon as we were within a few miles of the Oriskany you could see all of the dive boats tied up to her. There were 8 other boats there that day. Initial reports were that the wreck was absolutely covered in jellyfish. Well, it was! The damn things were everywhere. There were so many that you could not see through them. This really sucked for me, b/c I was the only dumbass out there without a wetsuit. So, we sucked it up and headed in.
Dive #1:
We dove using my steel 130s filled with EAN 29. This was a multi-level dive, planned with tables, and dove using the ATOM. On the first dive, my g/f (divinjen on this board) and I decided we were going to make it to the flight deck. We made our way to the deck (in a hurry - to get away from the jellyfish), reaching a max depth of 136 ft. It was cool to make it down there, but there wasn't a whole heck of a lot to see there. There were, however, no jellyfish. We then made our way back up and circled the conning tower a few times. We saw a few nice sized baracuda and a ton of jellyfish on the tower. Unfortunately, b/c of our max depth, this was a short dive and we headed back up for our lenghty safety stop right in the middle of the pack of jellyfish. They were as thick as could be between the depths of 5 ft and 40 ft. They were so thick they blocked the sunlight for the most part. I probably got stung 200 times or more on that dive.
Total dive time: 39 minutes
Max depth: 136 ft
Avg depth: 70.58 ft
Surface Temp: 92 degrees
Bottom Temp (136-137 ft): 77 degrees
Temp @ 60-65 ft (where majority of dive took place): 82 degrees
Viz was b/w 60-75 ft when we were below the jellyfish, 10-12 inches when we were in the middle of them.
Dive #2:
Great news for us - the jellyfish had moved on! This time there were a few JF around, but there were spread out enough that I could dodge most of them. I think I only got stung about 5 times that dive. This time we didn't go quite as deep, but we did make it down to the control room. (As you can see if you download the video). We saw quite a bit more sea life this dive... probably b/c we weren't constantly getting stung! This was truly an amazing dive. One of my all-time favorites.
Total dive time: 48 minutes
Max depth: 95 ft
Avg depth: 61.07 ft
Surface Temp: 92 degrees
Bottom Temp: 82 degrees
Viz was 75-100+ feet! It was like being in the Bahamas!
Pics to follow shortly...
BTW, I have a total bottom time of 73 hrs 54 minutes this year!! - all in the ocean, not the pelham keys this yr!
Video: http://www.filefactory.com/file/a85e47/
Warning - the file is 277 MB, so you probably don't want to give that a shot w/o broadband...
Dive Report - Aug 25, 2007:
First off, we dove with Gary's Gulf Divers out of Orange Beach, AL, and I must give props to Gary - he runs a great outfit. Everyone was very polite and professional, and the boat was very nice and clean.
As soon as we were within a few miles of the Oriskany you could see all of the dive boats tied up to her. There were 8 other boats there that day. Initial reports were that the wreck was absolutely covered in jellyfish. Well, it was! The damn things were everywhere. There were so many that you could not see through them. This really sucked for me, b/c I was the only dumbass out there without a wetsuit. So, we sucked it up and headed in.
Dive #1:
We dove using my steel 130s filled with EAN 29. This was a multi-level dive, planned with tables, and dove using the ATOM. On the first dive, my g/f (divinjen on this board) and I decided we were going to make it to the flight deck. We made our way to the deck (in a hurry - to get away from the jellyfish), reaching a max depth of 136 ft. It was cool to make it down there, but there wasn't a whole heck of a lot to see there. There were, however, no jellyfish. We then made our way back up and circled the conning tower a few times. We saw a few nice sized baracuda and a ton of jellyfish on the tower. Unfortunately, b/c of our max depth, this was a short dive and we headed back up for our lenghty safety stop right in the middle of the pack of jellyfish. They were as thick as could be between the depths of 5 ft and 40 ft. They were so thick they blocked the sunlight for the most part. I probably got stung 200 times or more on that dive.
Total dive time: 39 minutes
Max depth: 136 ft
Avg depth: 70.58 ft
Surface Temp: 92 degrees
Bottom Temp (136-137 ft): 77 degrees
Temp @ 60-65 ft (where majority of dive took place): 82 degrees
Viz was b/w 60-75 ft when we were below the jellyfish, 10-12 inches when we were in the middle of them.
Dive #2:
Great news for us - the jellyfish had moved on! This time there were a few JF around, but there were spread out enough that I could dodge most of them. I think I only got stung about 5 times that dive. This time we didn't go quite as deep, but we did make it down to the control room. (As you can see if you download the video). We saw quite a bit more sea life this dive... probably b/c we weren't constantly getting stung! This was truly an amazing dive. One of my all-time favorites.
Total dive time: 48 minutes
Max depth: 95 ft
Avg depth: 61.07 ft
Surface Temp: 92 degrees
Bottom Temp: 82 degrees
Viz was 75-100+ feet! It was like being in the Bahamas!
Pics to follow shortly...
BTW, I have a total bottom time of 73 hrs 54 minutes this year!! - all in the ocean, not the pelham keys this yr!
