Dive 073
| Date | Jan 15, 2002-09:58 AM |
| Location: | S.S. Yongala - Coral Sea, Australia |
| Dive Shop | Mike Ball |
| Purpose | Recreation - search for shovel nosed ray |
| Buddy | Kerrin Jones |
| Exposure Suit | 3mm |
| Other Equipment | video wide angle lens |
| Weight | 12 |
| Viz | 50 |
| Max Depth | 98 |
| Start Air | 3000 |
| End Air | 190 |
| EAN | 21 |
| Minutes Under | 37 |
| Surface Interval | 105 |
| Remarks |
I went down with Kerrin again. This dive was not for any class, just pure recreation (I was glad Kerrin was willing to do this with me, becuase he was really bussy the last few days). Before the dive I told Kerrin that I was interested in looking for a shovel nosed ray that lives near the wreck. He said he would take me to the places he had seen it before and hope for the best. I found out he had taken me to one of the places last dive, but it was a no show.
As we hit the water I noticed that the ship was floating away from the wreck, making a longer surface swim. Annoying, but not a problem.
We went down to the sand again and started swimming to the other end of the wreck. I wasn't too happy with going down to the other end, because I knew I would have to swim back against the current.
About half way down the wreck Kerrin stopped me and pointed to a sea cucumber. I have seen about a thousand of those this week, so I kinda blew it off. There was a buldge on the cucmuber, which I thought was a growth (maybe sponge or coral), but nothing too interesting to me. The Kerrin pointed to my camera and the buldge. I though, "OK, I'll film it a little and make him happy. Then we can get on to something interesting." I filmed a little, then backed off. Kerrin started taking pictures with his camera. As he took the pictures the flash on his camera went off. The buldge apparently didn't like the flash of light, becuase it let go of the cucumber and started to swim away. That is when I realized it was an octopus. My interest was peaked a little, but I still wanted to go find that ray. Kerrin kept chassing the octopus around, when I noticed that the octopus started changing colors. It was flashing a warning, like it was saying, "You guys are starting to piss me off. Back off or I'll cut you." The warning color that this particular octopus was using was small blue rings on its body and tentcles. I had a hard time believing what I was seeing. The blue-ringed octopus is hard to find because it is extreamly small (this one was less than 6 inches when it was fully extended). It is also an extreamly toxic animal, able to kill humans. And there is no anti-venom for it right now.
After Kerrin finished taking pictures I swooped back and got some more video. The octopus was werry of us, so it was doing a lot of color changing. It would swim from rock to rock trying to get away from us. As it landed on a rock it would change color to match to color of the rock. It would watch us a little, then decide to go to a different rock. As it was leaving a rock it would flash the blue rings it is famous for. I got some video of it hitting a few rocks.
After that I signaled to Kerrin that I needed to rise a little to help with my no deco limits. We went to the top of the wreck, which is about 40 feet shallower than the bottom. We were at the end of the wreck that I didn't want to be at. We could either ascend at this end (on a line) and make the crew come pick us up, or swim back to the other end of the wreck (through the current) and get back using the lines. We both looked at my air gague, which read 1300psi. We both figured that would be enough to get back to the other end of the wreck, through our safety stops and back to the ship. Getting to the other end of the wreck took a lot more work than I thought it would. The current was tearing through the site, and I had the extra drag of my video unit. Kerrin stopped a few places to look at some stuff and talk to some people. I pretty much went straight for the other side. I had been monitoring my air, and it was going down faster than I thought it would.
When we got to the other side I only had 380psi left in my tank. I wanted at least 600 for the safety stops and swim back to the ship. I had two options: use Kerrins air (agiain) or grab the safety tank that was down there. The crew put a spare tank of air on each end of the wreck. If any one got in trouble with thier air (the situation I was in) they were to grab the spare tank and ascend. This would give them plenty of air for making good safety stops and getting back to the ship. I was tempted to crab that spare tank. If I wasn't with Kerrin or another diver that had proved their diving skills to me I wouldn't have given a second thought about grabbing the tank. Kerrin looked at my gague and handed me his octopus. We went up the line and did both safety stops using his air. After the second safety stop all we had left to do was get to the surface and then to the ship. I decided it would be a lot easier for both of us if I switched back over to my air. His octopus hose is about three feet long, so I we pretty much laying on top of him while we were coming up the line. On the line it was no big deal, because the current kept us horizontal, and we would stay close to each other anyway. For the last 15 feet I went back to the surface on my air.
When I got to the surface I was a little annoyed to see the ship a few hundred feet off in the distance. The look out gave me the OK sign to make sure I was ok and didn't need help. At this point I was considering getting a ride back to the ship. I looked at the conditions and my air gague. I still had about 360psi and the conditions were nice and calm. I decided that I could make the swim back to the ship (should have enough air and could do a surface swim if I needed to). I made it back with only one problem: 190psi in the tank. This wasn't a serious problem because I was back on the ship with unlimited air and there was still enough air in the tank to keep water out (and the tank from rusting on the inside). The only reason I consider this a problem is because it gave me very little room for other errors. I think most big problems occur from a combination of little problems. This was a little problem that could have had a big dominoe effect.
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