Planning multi-level deco dive?

[tursiops]

I do realize this is an old thread. tbh, I found the conversation very enlightening.
My question, did you ever do the dive? And if so, what did your plan end up being?

@stuartv

 

[stuartv]

I do realize this is an old thread. tbh, I found the conversation very enlightening.
My question, did you ever do the dive? And if so, what did your plan end up being?

I started this thread when planning to dive the O over Thanksgiving weekend, in 2016. I did not get to do the dive at that time. In fact, I drove from Tallahassee over to Pensacola on Saturday morning of that weekend, to do it, and when I got there, the boat captain said "we're not going to the O today. There's a Small Craft Advisory. We're going to do some inshore wrecks instead." To which I responded, "y'all have fun. I have tickets to the Florida-Florida State game for tonight and I'm not missing that to dive some inshore wrecks." I got back in my truck and drove home.

But, I did go back and dive 2 days on the O about 6 months later. 1 dive each day. For those dives, I was Helitrox certified and used TX21/20, with one deco gas (EAN80). As it turned out, I actually did pretty much dive square profiles. We went to 170' (yes, I was exceeding my training limits - I don't do that anymore), to get to the hangar deck, and stayed at that depth for most of the dive before coming up to the flight deck at 145' and making our way back to the tower to do our ascent. Ascents were more or less a direct, 30 foot per minute, ascent. Not a slow, leisurely tour of the tower as we went up.

Bottom time was 25 - 30 minutes. Total run time was 70 - 75 minutes.

Now, here it is over 4 years since the planning that started this thread and I have advanced my training to Advanced Wreck Penetration, TDI Advanced Trimix (cert limit 330') and CCR Advanced Recreational Trimix (cert limit 170'). I would love to go back and spend some quality time diving the O. But, it would definitely be on CCR. And, ideally, with my scooter to get me around to spots where I could go inside and explore. And with my next CCR training done, so that I would be trained and certified for any depth that I could get to on that dive site.

 

[Diver2018]

@stuartv. Thanks for the follow up. I still find the information in this thread very thought provoking.