WPB Rpt Jun15- Walker's Charters Saves Me

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My boat has a 14’ beam, so not really towable. If you heard how much they are charging for a bottom job, you would run outside and kiss your trailer. I agree towing has it advantages, especially for hitting distant inlets and of course the ease of maintenance in your driveway.

John - sorry for misdirecting your thread. And now, back to the original programming….
 
. And you shot a SMB, from 85’, so the Captain would know?
Y E S!,,Below is a picture of my setup.

No one else has asked, but I have to. ..
Here's a picture below.

A blank white slate with a note written on it takes too long and the captain may get it wrong. So I have a pre-made form that just has "Check Marks" for everything they want to know. I can mark the boxes in less than 10 seconds and shoot the SMB within the first 60 seconds of hitting the bottom.

Every person who grabs my "Txt Msg" on the surface gets a ton of information and knows exactly what to expect and it gives them time to prepare. In today's dives it meant that I changed the agreed upon dive plan with the captain while I was underwater. This is a great system if you tend to wander away from the divemaster.


Txt_Message.JPG
 
and you pull your SMB rest of dive?
The dive master pulls the flag, so I just send up the 'txt msg' and it stays on the boat. When I'm ready to come up, I shoot my bigger SMB to the surface and do my safety stop under it.

The txt msg means he know about where to expect me. Otherwise with our fast currents and changing conditions, the boat could be over 1 mile away and that's a little difficult to spot an SMB in some rough seas. This just lets the captain know in advance. It's simple and Everyone loves the information.
 
The dive master pulls the flag, so I just send up the 'txt msg' and it stays on the boat. When I'm ready to come up, I shoot my bigger SMB to the surface and do my safety stop under it.

The txt msg means he know about where to expect me. Otherwise with our fast currents and changing conditions, the boat could be over 1 mile away and that's a little difficult to spot an SMB in some rough seas. This just lets the captain know in advance. It's simple and Everyone loves the information.

One more question. If you just shoot up the SMB, what keeps it standing tall on the surface? Or, since the captain knows you are going to send it up, he just looks for it laying in the water?
 
One more question. If you just shoot up the SMB, what keeps it standing tall on the surface? Or, since the captain knows you are going to send it up, he just looks for it laying in the water?
99% of the time, it comes up within 5 minutes of when I splash. Since it's sent as soon as you hit the bottom, the boat is right there. Sometimes we wait 20 minutes but that's a special instance. Like I'm hitting wreck or a 'middle of nowhere' grouper hole and then moving across sand to a reef line.
 
I've never dove (dived?) with Walkers but I have friends who do, they say they're great.

Your "text message" only works if it's a hot drop correct? (Hot drop meaning without setting an anchor for those that don't know). That way the captain just moves the boat over to retrieve your message. If they do set anchor how do they get the message? Or maybe you don't use it when ascending to the same spot and this is only used for drift dives.

It's a very cool idea nonetheless, just wondering about the logistics topside in different situations. Thanks for sharing...now where's that piece of crap PADI smb so I can build an aquatic text message:D
 
I... If they do set anchor how do they get the message? ...
99.9% of our dives in the WPB/Jup area are drifting hot drops so the captain just pulls up next to it and grabs to read.

But I also do anchor dives in the Gulf of Mexico where we anchor into a wreck or similar non-drifting dive site. This is where I have a clear advantage. Usually a DM will "bounce dive" a wreck and come up to report conditions. I'll show the captain my Txt Msg and tell him faster the conditions because he doesn't have to wait for the DM to slowly come back up and get on board. He'll let me go down 1st before anyone else (not even the DM !!)

What I'll do is bring down an additional 12" diameter hoop fish stringer that clips open & closed. At the bottom of the anchor rope, I quick chk mark the conditions, clip it to the hoop stringer which I circle clip around the anchor rope and send it sliding rapidly up the line to the bow where the rope is attached. The captain reaches down with a boat hook, lifts up the hoop stringer/Txt Msg/Float and unclips it from the rope. He then reads it and reports to the other divers to get ready and prepare to dive.

This give me usually 10 MINUTES to have the wreck all to myself and that's a huge advantage to not scaring off the fish.
 
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