...there I was, diving 170' down to the mouth of a 36" effluent pipeline for an inspection / repair , carrying a video camera, hydraulic wire-brush scale remover & a 5 gal. bucket of pipe treatment, to be applied to any damaged areas found. As always, I'm in a surface-supplied diving helmet with umbilical supply. That's a total of 5 separate lines to manage.
...I back into the pipe feet first & scurry my way into the pipe about 150'. I am diving on the W. Coast of Vancouver Island, an area known for it's rippin' tidal flows. My Supervisor has studied the tide charts & has slipped me in for this job during a brief slack-tide window.
...I wish he had read the charts a little more carefully.
...About :7 into the dive, & I'm videoing the interior of the pipe, giving a running dialogue of all that I see, when in an instant I am exiting the pipe like a fart from a bloated boa! All the lines I'm mangaing are acting like a giant kite in the sooner-than-planned-for tidal surge booking along at about 6 freakin' knots! I'm spat out the end of that pipe like a dart from a blowgun, but I mange to grab the flange face on the end of the pipe & hang on for all I'm worth. All my lines are gone save my umbilical, though the force of the current on it alone was enough to have me flapping in the current like a penant on an SST. Good thing I had my trusty 2' stab line with carabiner, which I clipped into the shot line to take up most of the pull. I'm breathing like a bull in a pen of playmate cows as I make my water stops, anxious to get topside & back down to 40', on O2, in my nice, climate-controlled deck chamber.
...I surface with the worst dam CO2 headache ever recorded. Gut-churning nausea to boot. Into the chamber I go & honk on the O2 bibs mask for all I'm worth. Slowly, the little man with the pick-axe whose been chipping away at my brain, gets bored of it all & leaves me alone.
...Just another day in the deepsea.
...So yes, I've dived in current some.
Best fishes,
DSD
