After failing to get on the Hydro Atlantic a few days which caused severe disappointment, we fought the ripping current yesterday and ventured out on the Jupiter Star. The JS sits in 160 fsw on her side making her a large interesting dive.
August 2001 "The Atlantic Gamefish Foundation prepared the "Cleve Jones, Sr." formerly known as the "Jupiter Star", a 232' steel freighter, for scuttling in the Pfleuger Artificial Reef Site. The ship, which had been a derelict vessel on the Miami River, was deployed on August 14. From the vessel's orientation on the surface as she sank, it appeared that she settled in a general east/west orientation with her stern in about 150' of water and her bow pointing east to a depth of about 158'."
There were 6 of us diving today. Dive team 1 consisted of myself, a GUE Tech 1, and a mutual friend. Our fourth bowed out with congestion. Dive team 2 consisted of a TDI instructor and his two students doing their final checkout dive (TDI Adv Nitrox and Deco Procedures). DT1 were outfitted with doubles filled with 21/35 or ean24 and ean50 for deco. Our runtime was 1 hour and since DT2's runtime would be considerably less, we would go down first.
The hookup:
DM Jeff and Capt G did a fantastic job. Jeff hooked the buoy line on the stern, which marked the wreck and gave us a line up for our dive bomb. The 3' ball was half submerged, showing us a nasty 3+ knot NW current. The descision was to free descent and drift deco on bags. We'd unlash the chain and let the ball drift before leaving the wreck and starting deco.
The drop:
DT1 entered, inverted, and kicked like hell to the bottom, 160' below. Passing through 110', we hit the thermocline. Holy crap, 68F! I'm glad I had my drysuit on! We stopped the descent at 150' and literally flew across the sand towards(hopefully) the wreck. The vis was about 50' and the looming hull popped out of nowhere in front us. This was going to be a good dive. All was working according to plan!
The dive:
We worked our way along the hull to the bow. Not much to see here. We turned the corner and worked back along the deck to the superstructure. We just did some light penetration yesterday, as none of us had dived together as a team before. Buddy skills were superb, and I look forward to diving with these two guys in the future. We ran into DT2 at about 20m into the dive. They seemed to be fighting the current, as they explored the base of the deck. As we started for the line to unlash, DT1 got caught in an upcurrent across the deck. I was diving 'dry', and had to emergency dump some air from my seal. I caught a hold of a rail bar, and pulled myself back in behind some structure to shield myself from the current and prepare to release for deco.
The deco:
DT1 gathered at the chain, unlashed it, and let it go. Then we released from the wreck and started our fast drift and ascent to our short deep stops. At 80' we deployed our lift bags and switched to ean50 at 70'. I gotta install a peevalve! DT1 with a much shorter obligation, was probably getting aboard about halfway through our deco. The deco went smooth, and we reboarded the boat with check in the box marked Friggin Cool Dude!
Hat's off to the crew of the H2O Diver and the members of DT1. Our next dive is scheduled for Tuesday. Location: Deep Tenneco (185' to the sand, 135' to the top of the structure). If you're interested in going along, PM me.
Peace and safe diving,
Mem
