Date: June 20, 2010
Time: 7:00am
Location: Diver's Cove
Depth (feet): 25
Dive Time (minutes): 20
Surf (feet): 1-3
Surge (feet): 1-2
Water Temp (fahrenheit): 64
Visibility (feet): 2-5
Visibility Description: Red tide - bad
Notes and Highlights: Dove with Josh - If you're keeping track this would make more than 6 months dry...knew the conditions were going to be poor with a red tide in, but didn't care - was diving anyway. Geared up and kicked out without incident...the last "without incident" portion of the dive...
Just as we were about to drop down I reached down to look at my computer, and as I started to pull it up to where I could see it - there was a loud bang and an explosion of water and air. I was holding a live high-pressure hose and no computer. The first thing I thought of was "find the computer", and I yelled to Josh to drop and start looking. I got out of my BCD so I could reach my air and turned it off to stop the high pressure flow, and swam in to drop my gear on the beach. I turned and burned to get back out and help with the search...turning freediver on top while Josh continued to look on the bottom. Two thoughts jumped into my head - the first was "crap! my car key was on the ring that I hook the computer to the retaining lanyard"...the second was "wait! could it still be attached to the lanyard? I swam back in and ran over to my gear - computer and key still attached! In my hurry to try and get into the water to start the search I hadn't taken the optimistic second to search the gear.
I signalled to Josh when he popped up that I had it, and to hang for a few minutes while I go up to my car and see if I can re-attach...the threads still looked good. A diver named Tim saw me working on it, and not only informed me that there was a small pin with o-rings that must have blown out when it exploded, but he produced a spare one he let me have and I was able to re-assemble the whole thing. Thank you Tim!
Got back down to the gear and was putting it together when Josh walked up with an odd look on his face - "I didn't attach my mask right when I was hanging in the water, and it must have dropped off"...you're kidding me...6 months of dry, and this day was just getting worse. I threw my gear on and figured I'd at least get a dive looking for his mask - 6 months ago I would have had a spare (or two) in my car, but the gear had slowly migrated from the car during the dry spell. On my second pass along the bottom of the surf zone I saw a black thing rolling around on the sand - Josh's mask was found, and it's game on again!
We dropped down quick into the warm, red water and just tried to relax and see if we could find anything interesting. Saw several giant black sea hares, some small halibut, blaksmiths and a couple garibaldi...basically pretty sparse and everything red and murky. After 20 minutes Josh showed me his computer - which showed no depth or air...and we figured it was the third strike - surface swim back and toss everything back in the car - nobody was hurt, and all the gear came back with us...so overall a good time had by all.
Time: 7:00am
Location: Diver's Cove
Depth (feet): 25
Dive Time (minutes): 20
Surf (feet): 1-3
Surge (feet): 1-2
Water Temp (fahrenheit): 64
Visibility (feet): 2-5
Visibility Description: Red tide - bad
Notes and Highlights: Dove with Josh - If you're keeping track this would make more than 6 months dry...knew the conditions were going to be poor with a red tide in, but didn't care - was diving anyway. Geared up and kicked out without incident...the last "without incident" portion of the dive...
Just as we were about to drop down I reached down to look at my computer, and as I started to pull it up to where I could see it - there was a loud bang and an explosion of water and air. I was holding a live high-pressure hose and no computer. The first thing I thought of was "find the computer", and I yelled to Josh to drop and start looking. I got out of my BCD so I could reach my air and turned it off to stop the high pressure flow, and swam in to drop my gear on the beach. I turned and burned to get back out and help with the search...turning freediver on top while Josh continued to look on the bottom. Two thoughts jumped into my head - the first was "crap! my car key was on the ring that I hook the computer to the retaining lanyard"...the second was "wait! could it still be attached to the lanyard? I swam back in and ran over to my gear - computer and key still attached! In my hurry to try and get into the water to start the search I hadn't taken the optimistic second to search the gear.
I signalled to Josh when he popped up that I had it, and to hang for a few minutes while I go up to my car and see if I can re-attach...the threads still looked good. A diver named Tim saw me working on it, and not only informed me that there was a small pin with o-rings that must have blown out when it exploded, but he produced a spare one he let me have and I was able to re-assemble the whole thing. Thank you Tim!
Got back down to the gear and was putting it together when Josh walked up with an odd look on his face - "I didn't attach my mask right when I was hanging in the water, and it must have dropped off"...you're kidding me...6 months of dry, and this day was just getting worse. I threw my gear on and figured I'd at least get a dive looking for his mask - 6 months ago I would have had a spare (or two) in my car, but the gear had slowly migrated from the car during the dry spell. On my second pass along the bottom of the surf zone I saw a black thing rolling around on the sand - Josh's mask was found, and it's game on again!
We dropped down quick into the warm, red water and just tried to relax and see if we could find anything interesting. Saw several giant black sea hares, some small halibut, blaksmiths and a couple garibaldi...basically pretty sparse and everything red and murky. After 20 minutes Josh showed me his computer - which showed no depth or air...and we figured it was the third strike - surface swim back and toss everything back in the car - nobody was hurt, and all the gear came back with us...so overall a good time had by all.