Plan:
S: Jody, Matt, David + Captain Ralph
A: 18/45 Matt, 21/35 for Jody and David with 50% deco gas
D: 160ft average, 195 max depth, 130ft at the top of the tower
D: 20 minutes
D: Around the wreck and drift off
D: Deep stops at 120ft, 70/3 60/2 50/2 40/2 30/3 20/8 10/5 =25 minutes
Conditions:
Seas: Calm
Visibility: 45ft
Current: 1 knot between 120ft to 150ft. Surface and bottom were calm
Temp: 75 on bottom, 81 above 110ft
Background:
Most divers hit the East or West tower. The two flat ones in the pic below. If you look closely, there is a small section on its side. That is also next to one of the 110ft deep sections. The Miami Project dove the section on the left side of the barge. I believe the tallest section in the middle of the barge is also out deep. We did not find this site and this must be the "missing 5th Section" we have read about, but did not find taking a quick look around with the depth finder.
The tower we dove was 195ft to the sand and the top of the tower is at 130ft. There is about 65ft of relief. There is quite a bit of surface area for growth all over the wreck. These sections were put down in October 1985, so there is over 21 years of growth.
I have been asking divers what they thought of the deep site since moving down in 1999. I've always gotten mixed, so so reviews. Generally divers were glad to see it once, but it really isn't Worth the time, effort, risk and expense to go see. Now that I have dove 4 out of the 5 sections, I believe these divers were referring to the "Deep Skinny" tower in the middle of the pic. Sorry, there isn't a conventional naming convention for the 5 sections which are all referred to a "Tenneco Towers".
Our dive was on the left most section, "Deep Wide" and it was outstanding!
The site is a 28 nautical mile run from dock of the Depreciation. This only the kind of site you do with calm seas and lots of time. It was officially the last site to complete the list of dives we wanted to do. It has taken a long time to develop the team, training, and tools to make this dive a great success.
We arrived at 7:30 AM to load the boat. Jody didn't load the scooters. I almost left mine at home, but threw it in the trunk at the last minute. Jody didn't think we needed them, the tower was a big target and easy to swim around. My counterpoint was that if there was any current, there was no where to hide in the lee side of a wreck or cargo hold. This site was completely exposed. So we loaded the gavins and headed off.
It was a quick easy run up to the site. Talking before and after the dives is almost as much if not more fun than the dives themselves. At the site, there were no fishing boats to argue with. It was all ours. We looked around and did not find the other tower. Jody didn't have any numbers on it so we set a 200ft lead for the tower we had numbers for. There was .5 knot current at the surface.
The drop was good and we started down. I got ahead of Jody, who was ahead of David. David had a slight issue clearing at 50ft and then his primary light died. He cleared, got down, and deployed his back up light with precision. Jody could see him, I could see Jody, and I landed right on on top of the tower. However, the tower was quickly moving away from me as I perceived it. TGFG (Thank God for Gavins)! I turned the pitch down and held position. David get in sync with his Gavin and caught up to us. I was watching Jody for the "thumb" to abort if David didn't get in gear soon. He did!
I ducted behind a column to get out of the flow, clear the wide angle lens of bubbles and fire a couple of shots off to make sure the exposure was right. There were schools of Juvenile Creole Fish (red fish with three white dots) and Creole Wrasses (purple fish) all over the top deck. We checked each other out and proceeded with the dive. Jody and David settled in and I gave the thumbs down to go over the side to the bottom. I was curious where the sand was as I've seen reports of 185 to 210. It was 195ft on the button. I took a few shots of the base of the tower.
There were metal circles all over the base in a 2x2 square pattern. I wondered what those were used for? The tower did not appear to sink into sand, it was planted, solid with no signs of weakening. The overall tower was in perfect condition structurally and well over grown with beautiful life. I few Gray Angelfish darted around the base and 5 amber jack greeted us. There was not nearly as much life at the base.
I was very nervous every time I hit the trigger as the tower had long strands of fishing live and tackle everywhere. We found a 3 pound orange weight that was lost by some angler recently. I was tempted to cut some of it in the Oculina, but I thought I could easily make things worse with "loose ends" dangling in the current. I'm glad there were two other people with me who could get this stuff off my manifold if I made a wrong turn.
On the scooter, we spiraled around the tower as we worked our way up to 150ft. This is where most of the growth was. Then over on one side I spotted an Oculina Coral cluster the size of a beach ball! Wow, it is perfectly intact. I had seen softball size clusters on the 100ft deep wrecks, but nothing like this. Its pure, bleach white appear was ghost like. What would be a sign of serious disease in a shallow coral is perfectly normal and healthy in this deep dweller as there is no zooanthelli living inside the coral to give it color. It is just the coral polyp itself. The Oculina was everywhere.
Back at the top of the tower there was a walkway at 140ft that was grown over with deep water sea fans. I was so in my own world of wonder trying to soak up as much as I can in the mere 20 minutes that I didn't see David posing for photos at different turns. We were completely out of sync.
The colors of the soft coral and sponges were amazing at the top section. The HID light made the colors jump out. The whole dive I had a deep feeling a scarcity that I would not be able to see and explore the whole tower on just one dive. I had not left yet and I was already thinking of how long it would be before I could come back again. I guess it is this anticipation that keeps me motivated as haul tanks around for fills and listen to wife as she reviews the Amex statement every month for line item charges that say "Fill Express".
The time flew by as an HID light gently waved against the back of my Ikelight camera housing. I put my thumb out without looking up as I new it was time to go. I packed the camera away to bring the images safely back. It is so tempting to take photos at deco, but the thought of dropping my camera with no recourse but to watch it sink into the abyss is too much to bear. I leave it clipped off.
Jody ran us through the deep stops and we all "ok'd" each other switching to 50% O2 for deco at 70ft. I handed Jody the spool as I prepared to shoot the bag. As I was about to hit the purge on my reg, I heard Jody "boom" and I paused to look at him. There was a knot in spool. He couldn't solve the problem and handed it to me. I felt my clarity of mind leave as the narcosis set it. I couldn't muster the brain power to solve the problem. I signaled "Line" to Jody and clipped off my spool. He got his out and we had a clean shoot. His quick attention saved us from sending Ralph up a "decoy bag" to follow.
The rest of the decompression was smooth as I replayed the dive in my head. On the surface, Ralph was right there waiting for us. He as able to follow out bubbles thru the entire dive. After getting all the gear on deck, Ralph asked, "Who got separated from the team on decent?" Man, that guy is good! We ran thru the whole dive with him.
15 minutes later, tossed the hook on the wreck of the Narwal.
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