1. Paul Oliver (BOTTLED IT)
2. Pikey Death Box Diver - Diving Dude (HARD CORE DADDY)
3. Getafix (MILDLY IMPRESSED)
4. 3 of 5 - Mark Chase ( F-IT WHO NEEDS A COMPUTER ANY WAY)
5. Madscuba (HARD CORE)
6. Nigel Ingram (PASS THE CROW BAR)
7. Colinicky ( BEND??? PHA, LETS GO FOR THE SEA BED)
8. Keith Henson (2.34 pp02 YEAHHHHHHHH NO PROBLEM)
9.
Muppet Son of a pikey - Gizmo ( I AM MAN ENOUGH TO WEAR A PINK KNIFE)
10. Gareth J (HARD CORE)
11. Gareth J Buddy (I LOVE THE SMELL OF PUKE IN THE MORNING)
12. Ray Peen - Madscuba's buddy (HARD CORE)
13. Steve - (LIGHT WEIGHT NORTHERN JESSY BOY)
14. Captain Deco ( TOO MUCH DECO FOR ME)
Soooo the real light weight's like Steve and Captain Deco bin the dive on the long range forecast and our valiant leader Paul finally bottled it after hearing Andy Neighs tails of doom. Which left 11 proper hard core divers to assemble in the car park ready to face the worst the Dover sea had to throw at them.
Keith analysis his twin set only to find he has a 29% nitrox mix, 29.4 actually but .4 is for poofs so we ignored that bit. Hummmmmm PP02 at 53m 1.82. Possibly not the ideal mix for the dive but sod it its only 1.45 at the top of the wreck so that will be OK.
I have a brand new Hammerhead and no back up computer (coz i sold the VR3's & my new Shearwater hasn't arrived yet). So I have DOTF and a Suunto Vytec on gauge mode backing up the somewhat unreliable Hammer Head. I also have forgotten my back up torch but thankfully i am testing out the Solus 1000 today so thats unlikely to break.
Sooooooo with young maidens throwing rose petals at out feet and wives and daughters sobbing into hanky's the intrepid 11 set aboard the evil (It will be fine trust me) Dave Bachelors boat of pain and woooooooooo boy thats fast
Having lashed down the gear it was time to prepare for the open sea. Some prayed some wrote letters to loved ones but most of us had a cup of tea. Leaving the the loving bosom of Dover's harbor walls, we were subjected to the full force of the cruel sea. It was hell, I got a bit wet and Howard spilled his coffee. Alan fell asleep and had to be beaten awake so he could at least do the decent thing and look a little anxious.
On we went relentlessly pressing forward against the elements for ohhhhhhh I don't know? 40mins?
Then finally we were above the Andaman and relative piece broke out with the silencing of the mighty engines.
After the further torcher of.......
Ohhhh bollocks I cant keep this up, OK it was mildly choppy on the way out and Howard did spill his coffee which was a bummer
Dave shotted the wreck but was instantly aware that the shot had not go in the way it should. Keith was some what limited by his back gas so i suggested I would run a line to the wreck from 40m on the shot so they didnt need to descend to the sea bed to find it.
Howard Colin and i drooped in first and I led the way down. I decided to wait until the wreck came into view before tyeing off the transfer line. Sadly I ended up on the sea bed at 53m with only the ships mast in view
A quick look about and i found the main wreckage so I signaled Howard and re ascended the line to 40m to tie in the transfer line. There was no hope of finning across to the wreck so I went down the shot again and across the sea bed and up to 37m before tyeing in. This was about 29m off the shot. I know this because my 30m spool was now empty.
I was also alone. I didnt like this as I had no back up computer. I scanned around for signs of a torch beam in the pitch black sea but there was none. I checked the Hammer Head and then realized my Heads up display was missing
. The cable tie had broken and it had fallen off. Dam I must fit the new mounting bracket ASAP. The hand sets were interesting because they were showing I was on Air??? Thats not right as I was on 20/45 when i started the dive. I switched them over to trimix again and did a quick life check.
Hand sets fine, breathing fine, bail out gas working OK, quick check of BOV mouth piece shows new gas connector working OK. Trim and buoyancy OK. Bugger hand sets are back on Air. Thats not good. Switch back to trimix again and make sure i confirm the switch.
I spend a min just watching the hand sets and everything seems fine so I decide to reel off from this position and try and find Howard and Colin by heading down and roughly in the direction I last saw them.
Shortly after this i stumble upon a bright pink line! Now who would use a bright pink line? It had to be Howard so i tied off and cut my line and followed the pink until I bumped in to my erstwhile buddies again.
About now some 20mins into the dive i can start to try and enjoy it. Colin and Howard were doing fine so I switched my Solus on to full power and unleashed 1000W of LED power on to the nearest unsuspecting star fish.
The torch was on loan from Barrie (Bang On) in Ireland and I was to be writing up a test on it. No video today conditions were crap but it was a good test for it in high silt conditions and pitch black. It was doing well. The color temp was about the same as the Salvo 21W and the back scatter was minimal. The beam was a lot wider than the light saber Salvo and it didnt cut through the gloom as far but it did light up a bigger area of the wreck immediately in front of the diver.
Id like to tell you all about the Andaman and what we saw, but frankly i cant. The viz was rubbish and we had no idea where we were on the wreck (probably mid ships due to position of mast). I saw a lot of velvet swimming crabs and a lot of steel and not much else. Not even a conga for Howard to abuse.
Howard mean time was demo-ing his newly acquired line laying skills. A fine job he did too. (Well done Mark Powell) . We went into a large over head area which demonstrated just ho easy it would be to accidentally do this on a dive on this wreck. No drama for us we followed Howard in and lead hem out and headed back to the shot.
On rout we found a large glass dish. About 500mm across 5mm glass curved like a shallow bowl or a watch face. I considering bagging it up but in the end I am glad i didnt as the tide was running hard. I did however find a lovely co- co cup which i hope is original to the Andaman.
Ill do a pic when i clean it up
Fortunately My Hammer head worked perfectly and was staying on Trimix and showed all the deco on the way up. Deco was deco and we ended up with a run time a min or two short of two hours.
Not a good dive but enjoyable none the less. Sadly my transfer line idea hadn't worked to well and Keith and his buddy didnt make the wreck. The line was too deep for the gas.
Bacon sandwiches were ready top side but the OC boys got the hot ones whilst the CCR divers got the stone cold ones as punishment for making every one wait so long
The sea on the way home was flatter than a flat thing and we all laughed at the forcasts of Force 5-6 conditions.
Dave had called it well and proved again the power of local knowledge.
SO a jolly meet up and we got wet on a work day so we cant complain but a tad more viz would have made the day.
ATB
Mark Chase
