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Raja Ampat, or the "Four Kingdoms," is a group of Indonesian islands off West Papua's Bird's Head Peninsula. It became a hot diving spot in the '90s after Australian ichthyologist Gerry Allen and underwater photographers Denise and Larry Tackett revealed it had the world's richest reefs. More species of coral and fish have been identified off Cape Kri than anywhere in the world.
What makes these reefs so rich? Pacific ocean currents combine with tides and force water up through the Dampier Strait, where Kri Island acts as a foil to the flow. The nutrients in the cold oceanic up-wellings support the fabulous and prolific underwater flora and fauna.
Between Kri and the larger island Waigeo, the channel is peppered with reefs, causing ripping currents and over-falls. The currents near Kri can send the unprepared diver whirling downward, bottoming out at 40m before being released and spat out. At the far end is a manta cleaning station - Manta Sandy - where you hook into something secure and watch the mantas dance in the flow. Once you've selected your position, it's impossible to swim to another, the current can be so strong. Sometimes the sand is whipped up like an underwater sandstorm, leaving your photographs unsharp and disappointing, but if there is no current there will be no mantas.
Underwater photographers who like to dive repeatedly with the same subject to perfect their shots may be disappointed at many sites. Around the Dampier Strait, it's different every time you get into the water. The vast quantities of nutrients can also be problematic.
Most liveaboard operators have earmarked sites farther south that are less demanding of a diver-photographer. Of course, they are often less spectacular. Many of these reefs are home to pygmy seahorses. Take a strong magnifier or an extreme-macro camera.
Liveaboard operations tend to be divided between Northern and Southern charters. Some more extended trips incorporate both areas but leave the diving in the Dampier Strait until last so their passengers are well-dived. There is no point in frightening your passengers at the beginning of a charter.
The islands in the Misool region are jagged peaks that rise spectacularly. Close to the Misool Resort are three sites to which they shuttle divers back and forth, and the currents seem manageable. Liveaboards tend to press on after a few dives, ever looking for something better.
Finally, a word about the weather. Raja Ampat is at zero degrees latitude, and nowhere in the world is more tropical. The islands are in the doldrums, and strong winds with rough seas are rare. However, temperatures vary between extremely hot and quite cool and can happen almost moment to moment. Clouds continually roll across the sky, obscuring the sun, and it rains in biblical proportions, sometimes for days on end.
With ordinary ISO settings on my camera, I've often needed long exposures to get the background light in balance with my flash. Down deep, there is little natural light. In the north, nutrients rushing past in the current can cause an unsharp effect so pictures can be disappointing. That said, there's always plenty to photograph. In the southern area, diving is easier but visibly and dramatically less dynamic.
Said simply, the Dampier Strait is good for adventurous diving, and the southern area around Misool is better for more sedate underwater photography with plenty of macro subjects.
- John Bantin, Senior Editor
The Danger of Down Currents
Currents can also be caused by strong wind or high-pressure atmospheric conditions building up pressure in the open ocean. When a current comes up against a vertical wall, it must flow up and over, around, or down. That vertical down current can be very dangerous to those divers unaware of how to cope.
Divers meet down currents at the Maldivian atolls' outside reefs and at Indonesian islands, where there is a tidal difference between the Indian Ocean and the smaller seas to the north, such as the Banda Sea. Indonesia's Raja Ampat is well known for its currents. One of its famous sites, Cape Kri in the Dampier Strait, often has an infamous down current that may appear just as divers are finishing their dives. It can whisk divers down to 130 feet before releasing them to bob back to the surface, a frightening experience for an unsuspecting diver. Divers have died there.
They Can Be Very Localized.
Downward currents can be strong, multi-directional, and dangerous. They can begin the moment a tide changes. There may be tell-tale signs: schooling fish swimming energetically yet vertically, or soft corals flattened in the flow.
Sometimes they are very localized. The flow that promises to send you down 100 feet might not affect a diver only a few feet away from you. In my early diving days, I had the surreal experience of trying to climb a reef wall near Komodo when another diver kindly offered me his gloves. He was not affected by the current and was wondering what I was doing, yet he was only an arm's length away.
| Swim horizontally away from whatever is causing the down current, usually a reef wall. |
If you find yourself in a down current, it can be of little use to inflate your BC or SMB or to try to swim up against the current. I've watched in awe as the surface marker buoy I deployed at 60 feet hit the down current near the surface, turned away from the reef face, and descended fully inflated.
Imagine a Waterfall
Think of a down current as a waterfall. If you get close to the wall, you might get out of it in the lee of an overhang. But where do you go? Certainly not rock climbing. And you're not a powerful swimmer like a salmon.
So, you must swim horizontally as hard as you can away from whatever is causing the current - that waterfall - to flow downward. It's usually a reef wall. You don't know how wide the waterfall is, so swim toward the open ocean and out of the waterfall.
If you did inflate your BC and dropped your weights, you risk an uncontrolled ascent to the surface once you are free of the current - so that's to be done only if you are almost out of air and totally out of ideas.
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