Dive Report: Saturday 9/13/03 Miami Project dives the Lakeland, East Coast Reef, and Paraisio drift

Photos:
http://www.geocities.com/tiswango/0309mplakeland/

Team 1: Buck, Jody, and Gwyn
Team 2: Matt, Andrea

Team 1: Lakeland

The calm seas made for a nice boat ride out on a sunny Saturday morning. I got a good reading on the sounder so the first team started to gear up. The planned for a 150ft dive though the deck was at 120. A 20 minutes bottom time on 21/35 and 19 minutes of deco switching to 50% at 70ft and shooting a marker as they drift off the wreck made for a 30 minutes run time. Everyone geared up and starting running through the checks.

At the end of the valve drill Gwyn reached back and pulled the rubber knob clean off her left post. The metal insert was still in place but the rubber had come off clean. Hum, those factory recalls really need to be noticed. Buck had a back up knob and I had the knowledge to replace thanks to Mark at Fill Express making fix my mistakes. I grabbed the tool kit and went to work. Before losing the screw that holds the knob in place I asked Jody to lean forward so any projectiles holding back 3300 PSI would have a clear shot to the ocean. I replaced the valve in 5 minutes and they were back up and running. There was no current so I set them up right over the wreck and they splashed.

The dive went perfectly. During the debrief Buck added an extra minutes or two of deco and Jody was a little late shooting the bag at 70ft after the gas switch.

Team 2: East Cape Reef

Looking for some new reef to explore. Jody pulled out the map and found the numbers for East Cape Reef. Andrea and I planned for a 60 minute dive, fish count, and some mask drills at the end.

Seas: 1-3 (calm in the morning and built up through the day)
Temp: 84 degrees
Visibility: 75ft, nice blue water top to bottom
Bottom Time: 55 minutes
Ascent: 6 minutes
Depth: 44 ft
Current: .03 knots

We jumped in and headed down. The vis was great the current carried us along. We had to swim slightly into the current to stay on the reefs edge. I didn't know this reef and didn't want to get blown off into a sand dive. The sandy patchy reef was ideal conditions for hogfish. There were a few nice ones, but mostly babies. Andrea had to fight off up to six gray triggerfish at a time. They were quite annoying and fortunately they liked her more than me!

Andrea got to play with the camera while I took a fish count. When ever we could find a coral structure, there would be a lot of fish around it. Andrea lost her spool again. I think this makes four times now. I'm glad her coldwater suit has pockets!

At 45 minutes we decided to work on our drills. Andrea practiced taking off her mask and maintaining buoyancy. She did much better, but still floated up a little. I realized this is a major skill for Tech 1 I hadn't been working on, so I whipped off my mask. I passed it to Andrea and got out my back up. By the time I was done I was about 8 ft higher then when I started. Errrrr.... Game Over... Thank you for playing. I need to work on this on every dive until I get my breathing back to automatic.

Team 2 Second Dive: Paraisio Drift

Since the current was still moving out of the South. I dropped the other team on the Paraisio. When they left the boat with a 20 min bottom time, they shot a bag and continued to drift.

I wanted Andrea to get some practice driving the boat. I explained how to get a heading from the GPS and then transfer it to the compass and get the boat going in that direction. The trick with a large boat is the steer it using the transmission and not the steering wheel. We were heading back to the wreck and while I was teaching her I noticed a sportfish pass close by. I looked and saw them on coarse for the lift bag. We ended the drill and I spunt he boat around and gave chase.

There was a woman on the tower with her feet on the controls and a group of people in the stern looking at the fishing poles. I gave chase and got my boat between them and the sausage while honking my horn. The guys on the back of the boat where holding up their arms in the "What do you want buddy?" position. I guess they didn't notice the 24" Alpha and Diver Down flags flying clearly above the boat. After 30 seconds, one of them figured it out, went up to the bridge and changed course. The ocean is so big, but let your guard down for a moment and it gets very small.

When the divers came up they had a big smile on their faces. The current was just right and they drifted over the Paraisio. They then drifted over some tanks and concrete wreckage, followed by the Princess Brittany, followed by the South Seas, 727 airplane wreck, what Jody thinks was the Houseboat Barge, then the two barges east of the Belcher barge, and finally the Belzona III. Not bad for not having scooters or an underwater map to follow.

We returned to the dock at 2 PM from a great day out on the ocean!

--Matt