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Click To Enlarge
From Tom Pritchard . . .
The Underwater Playground.
Gerhard, James Zimmerman, and I logged another 90+ minute dive from the Concrete Dock at Willow and now have more numbers than the U.S. Census Bureau. But we didn't just get new numbers, we found new stuff. We found another 20 ft. torpedo, this one south of the railroad tracks and east of the corrugated pipe. The real find, however, was an underground playground. The underground playground is a set of three truck tires suspended by ropes only a few feet from the bottom. Bigass truck tires make bigass tire swings - large enough for a bigass diver to sit in and swing. (Question: For an underwater swing, do you use the standard swing kick, a frog kick, or the flutter?) We didn't get a chance to play on the swing set last night, but that's high on the TNI to-do list. Join the TNIs next week for diving at around 6:30 and carbo loading about 7:30. Last night: 54 degrees, 15 ft viz, 98 minutes. Diving forecast for next Thursday: Cold water with scattered silt clouds. Chance of goofballs: 100%. I'm Tom Pritchard and I approved this dive report!
From Cindy Lu Who. . .
TNavigation specialist should NOT be on my dive profile. Lady Luck must have played an important role in my passing the course and acquiring a navigation certification. How does one miss the dozer? .... follow Huck in his silted hurry to reach the hole, that's how. Chris Sander, George Hunter and myself were attempting to find the illuded tool box. We were on track until Huckleberry Fin came along. I could have back tracked once I realized we missed the dozer, but decided to continue the dive South around 85'. We did find the dozer on our way back around. However, I don't think that was much consultation for Chris who said upon ascending "I thought we were going to the deep boat and tanker?" Oh well, I sent him with Greg Kulp on the second dive of the day, I felt he should see something on at least one of his two dives. Janine High and I decided to do a second shallow dive. The only thing we had on our dive plan was to find the tunnel. Funny how something as simple as the tunnel can fascinate the local quarry diver. When you have visited most of the quarry sites, it can be a different experience to enter and exit the confined area. We found it with the help of none other than... Chris and Greg whom were exiting it with lights blaring and silt a muck. See, it all depends on how you look life. Divers who silt up the quarry can help you lose your way or help you find it.
Congratulations to the open water divers in John Gross' class!! I look forward to diving with you soon.
From John Gross . . .
We’ll this was really a great class. Everyone did fantastic. We started the training dives on Sat, 10/23/04, at 9 AM access “A.” If you haven’t been to Bainbridge lately you haven’t seen the high water. All the picnic tables at the beach area are in water and the water is back to the new building. My Open Water class consisted of: Donald Eisenberger, Kevin Bradley, Lia Fleckenstein, Mark Fleckentsein, Jennifer Pittman, and Allison Moyer. This class also brought Brian Ober back into dive mastering. Brian had an extra incentive, as Allison Moyer is his niece. Peter Bohling was also dive mastering this class. I had four of my DITs (Dive Masters in Training) also helping, Diana Sholl, Mark Seymour, and Kristi & Jeff Raykos. Saturday also brought Tom Pritchard out of the woodwork to help with his final OW class for his DM training. Tom only needs to submit a few more items before he becomes an official DM. Jeff & Kristi did a really good job of briefing this dive. Our first dive was in the shallow beach area and it isn’t so shallow anymore. Average depth was 17-20 feet! We saw a lot of fish and those students bringing up the rear saw a lot of silt. After about 5 minutes we lost the last 2/3 of our group. After a brief search we surfaced and found them waiting for us. We again descended and continued past the boat, another boat and up the road and back to our exit. Jeff & Kristi cooked burgers and dogs for our lunch and surface interval. Our second dive found us on the platform in the beach area. Donald had his weight belt come off and he handled it very calmly. After he got it back on I checked if for tightness. It was tight and Donald now talks a few octaves higher. After the skills Pete took Donald and Kevin on a tour with Diana and Mark along as DIT. Brian got to take Allison and Jennifer on their tour with Jeff & Kriti as DIT. I took Lia and Mark on their tour and I had the honor of having Tom as my DIT. Everyone from students, DM and DITS did a great job.
Sunday we were back at access A and by the time I got up on the hill at “A”, Jeff & Kristi had set up a pop-up roof over our picnic table and had blankets on the benches and table. So everyone could stay dry while we changed into our wet suits or dry suits. DM’s takes notice these DITS are experts at anticipating what the instructor will need next. Needless to say they scored high marks on their DM evaluation. Diana & Mark did the dive briefing on Sunday. They did a really great job and also scored high on their DM evaluation. With all this help my job was a lot easier. With four DITs and two DMs our students were really impressed at the 1:1 ratio of student to DM or DIT. After a brief compass walk through on land we were in the water for our first dive on Sunday. Kevin decided the cold and heavy weights were too much and he finished with a Scuba Diver Cert. The rest of us went out to the platforms, which are hard to find as all but one of the barrels are under water. We descended to the platform and did our skills. Each DM took a pair of students on a tour. I had Mark and Lia with me and we checked out the dolphin tower and the cement mixer. As we approached the cement mixer I asked Mark if he is OK and he was. I then asked Lia and she gave me the cold signal. So we ascended the line at the cement mixer to 15 feet and did our safety stop. We did our final minute, of the safety stop, by swimming mid-water, at 15 feet, back to the exit. During our surface interval Jeff & Kristi again did the cooking and we had chicken and hot dogs. On our second dive everyone did fine with his or her skills including the underwater compass navigation. I think Jennifer got a little cold on her compass navigation, can anyone guess why? Congratulation to everyone for a job well done.
From Bryan Palmer . . .
Well the class at Elizabethtown College is going well, their last pool session is tonight and then they do their checkouts this weekend, some of them have really progressed and overcame personal challenges. Great job Elizabethtown Students, and GOOD LUCK!!!
On the other side of things I, along with James Z, Chris Mayo, and Webmaster Vern have had our shot at being students the last 2 Saturdays by going through the TDI Advanced Nitrox Class with Alex Meller. We are now able to get mixes of up to 100% O2 for decompression. This is a quicker way of getting out of the water among other things, when doing long bottom times. I highly suggest this class to divers that are particular about your diving or want more knowledge. This class is not for your everyday diver or one that may not pay attention to “little things” (depth, time etc...) anyways we all did well. Big Thanks goes out to Vern for sticking with it and getting the class set up. Look for another class in the spring with the same instructor. I have sent a few pictures from this weekend’s class so take a look.
I am off to Hawaii next week so look for a report when I get back. Get out live the adventure, dive!!!!
From Darth Vern . . .
Well Palmer stole most of my thunder for my report, but we did manage to finish the TDI Adv Ntrox Class. I do recommend it to anyone who wants to further their diving, but I must warn you that attention to detail is a must, especially with 100% oxygen. But it is an incredible class and challenging class. Well worth the money.
Dutch Springs was great for divng this past Saturday. Vis was at least 40 feet, in front and behind Pritchard. Look at some of the pics to the right. The bottom pic is me shooting from above the cockpit and you can see JameZ on the tail rutter of the helicopter. That is some seriously good Viz!!! I would suggest every quarry diver should dive there at least once. If you are interested drop me an email, I can always recruit more divers for a great day of diving at Dutch Springs.
Keep on diving and LIVE THE ADVENTURE!!!
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