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View Full Version : Introducing the “Technical Playground”


SpearMax
09-11-2006, 10:57 PM
On Saturday, September 9, 2006, I had a difficult dive experience involving in-water recompression/missed deco procedures which is fully described at the following thread:

http://www.spearboard.com/showthread.php?t=34582

On Sunday, September 10, 2006, I performed a deep solo technical dive to an area not yet seen by anyone to the best of my knowledge. I often work with the Palm Beach County Artificial Reef Committee as a volunteer who does video surveys of areas before and after they create an artificial reef.

The County has been working on developing this new 210 foot deep area just outside the Palm Beach Inlet that I am proposing to call the Technical Playground. The reason for this name is that the concrete structures down there look very similar to another well known 120 foot deep area called the Playground.

The challenge is that the new area is almost 100 feet deeper and definitely requires technical dive training and equipment to dive safely. The risks of nitrogen narcosis, oxygen toxicity, and other dangers are substantial. Please do not try to bounce dive this area with recreational dive gear.
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Palm Beach County is creating this area primarily as a deep fishing area. They have put tons of concrete structure down there over the past year or so. They recently sank a barge and sailboat. Plans for further sinkings are in the works. We are very lucky to have such a great group of people working at the County and on the volunteer Artificial Reef Committee!

Here are some video frames of the Technical Playground. It is dark down there because of the depth. Sorry the frames are not brighter. I put my hand on the sand which was 210 feet deep.

SpearMax
09-11-2006, 11:00 PM
Here is the sailboat. I could not find the sailboat on this dive.

SpearMax
09-11-2006, 11:00 PM
Here are some of my Cochran dive computer downloads that show a pretty good dive execution. You can see that a mere 15-20 minutes at that depth created a deco obligation over 1 hour and 10 minutes with a first stop at 80 feet. Once I arrived at 30 feet, which is where I can safely switch to 80% oxygen, the deco obligation at that point went from 55 minutes to 22 minutes which is a great time saver! My total time in the water was 1 hour and 3 minutes which is about the same as one of my regular recreational dives. Accelerated deco procedures are wonderful!

SpearMax
09-11-2006, 11:00 PM
More computer graphs.

bfsc
09-12-2006, 06:06 AM
Any fish?

SpearMax
09-12-2006, 06:22 AM
Any fish?

I shot one grouper that shook my shaft and ended up with a flag on his head. Not much of anything else, but that is the case just about everywhere on the East Coast at this time of the year.

Scubado
09-12-2006, 09:06 PM
thanks for sharing tony, I belong to the flagler county reef progam and it is a great program. we have made three new reefs in three years. its people like them that put the time and effort into it for all of us to enjoy (divers & h&l ) I look forward to diving down there sometime.

SpearMax
09-13-2006, 06:27 AM
thanks for sharing tony, I belong to the flagler county reef progam and it is a great program. we have made three new reefs in three years. its people like them that put the time and effort into it for all of us to enjoy (divers & h&l ) I look forward to diving down there sometime.

These programs are great! :thumps: I will be showing my underwater survey of the Technical Playground to the full committee tomorrow morning as we plan the dropping of another big ship.

Scubado
09-13-2006, 04:50 PM
thats cool, I thought the survey of the ocean bottom was a cool learning experience.Tony are they going to take your survey and turn into a computer map of the area? sorta like a 3D of the site.