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Old 07-13-2006, 01:00 PM   #31
larryl
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Nice thread, and nice forum. Thanks to Pete for the steer.

I dove with a group of nine divers off the east side of Cozumel on the tail end of a Norte. We were about 2.5 miles offhsore with 8-10 foot waves from the storm. That's the deserted side of the island. While we were down the boat driver managed to back into a wave, flood the engine compartment and sink the boat.

We had a kick-ass three hour swim to get back to shore, then a very interesting shore exit through crashing waves. Everyone survived, although two were towed almost the entire way. If the current had been its usual self we would have been gone.

We skipped the afternoon dives.
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Old 07-13-2006, 01:36 PM   #32
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

One time 12 years ago in San Diego we were diving in the Point Loma kelp beds we went down with no current on a beautiful day. If you've ever dove kelp you can tell there is no current because it's laying all over the surface and standing strait up. We went down on the dive and I notice a steadilly building current at 60 ft. 1 hr later when we surfaced on the anchor line the kelp was laying on the bottom we fought it and came up within 15 ft of the transom of the boat. We never got any closer the current had the boat out of sight within 10 min. Our partner missed the boat as well and got picked up by a passing boat while dad and I swam the 3 miles to shore. It took 3 hrs due to niether of us willing to leave our gear. We came ashore on the Mexico California border in a town called Imperial Beach 15 miles south! Needless to say, I never anchor dive anymore and always have a competent person on the boat .
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Old 07-13-2006, 03:47 PM   #33
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

What are the currents typically like in the diveable areas off San Diego? I surfed Imperial, but I always wondered what diving offshore there is like.
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Old 07-13-2006, 05:47 PM   #34
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Stealthdiver
Anyone know what size the life raft is as shown ? Space issue .. but thats one of those things if you need 1 time , you don't care how much it costs or if you ever get it repacked ! We all should probably all carry one , especially with all the solo diving thats done spearfishing ! Great thread !

Here's a link....

http://www.halcyon.net/mc/dlr.shtml








Judging from the size of the Bolt Snap Swivel-Eye it can't be that big... The shop I showed are ordering a new shipment since they are all out... When they get some more I'll buy one and show you guys the pics of it attached to the back of my back plate....

I don't know.... when the going gets tough, I know that you want to keep yourself out of the water and out of the sun.... thats why I am giong to put a bright orange tarp about the same size of the raft in the bag with it.....

So far I have a 6" safety sausage, reflecting mirror, three 12 hour glow sticks, whistle, and soon a dive alert that I keep in my Dive Rite thigh pocket..... gonna see if I can get the raft to fit in there too..... would really like to do so, incase I have to ditch my gear, I still keep all my safty gear.

Also.... does anyone recomend a certain brand of neoprine glue so that I can glue this thigh pocket on to my wetsuit? Just thought it would be more comfortable that way....


Jorgy
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Old 07-13-2006, 06:57 PM   #35
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

I was out with Jr. one time on his boat and I swear he was lost. He wouldn't admit it, but I'm pretty sure he didn't know where he was going.
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Old 07-13-2006, 07:01 PM   #36
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Quote:
Originally Posted by fast97rs
Also.... does anyone recomend a certain brand of neoprine glue so that I can glue this thigh pocket on to my wetsuit? Just thought it would be more comfortable that way....


Jorgy

Best thing to do is use fishing line like Dacron and sew the pocket on.
Use four one inch seems at the coners as this lets the pocket stretch a bit with the suit and also you can take it off as the pocket will outlast the suit by a longshot.


Dago.
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Old 07-13-2006, 07:20 PM   #37
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

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Originally Posted by Marcus
I was out with Jr. one time on his boat and I swear he was lost. He wouldn't admit it, but I'm pretty sure he didn't know where he was going.
What are you talking about Marcus?
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Old 07-14-2006, 07:22 AM   #38
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Quote:
Originally Posted by inletsurf
What are the currents typically like in the diveable areas off San Diego? I surfed Imperial, but I always wondered what diving offshore there is like.
The diving is close to shore. The kelp is great to about 80 ft . Then in 90 a good dark cold meanlooking ledge. There is good structure and the ocasional Great White Shark. My dads partner in SD said he was trapped in a cave by a killer whale for a while once(no proof though). Off of IB I've never been diving, but off shore 5-10 miles are the Coranado Islands great shear stuff and Strong currents.The current is usually lite 1 kt strait N or south near shore every day was different. By the way we always found our marks by lining up three points on the shore no GPS there. Cold Cold Cold the warmest it ever was there is still colder than the coldest I've felt here (except 3 years ago mid 50's on the bottom)usually lived by the rule to dive in the kelp felt safer for some reason. The fish are smaller and the lobster are keys size and less findable. There are more fish to shoot on scuba that I like to eat here. This must explain my cross-country move 5 years ago. There I could barley afford renting a little place in Mission Beach. Here I own a house a boat and live 7 miles from the boat ramp. Paradise baby. I hope this answers your ? Let me know Rick
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Old 07-14-2006, 07:40 AM   #39
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Yes, thanks!
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Old 07-14-2006, 12:21 PM   #40
Marcus
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Quote:
Originally Posted by junior
What are you talking about Marcus?

Being lost at sea? Don't deny it. j/k
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Old 07-14-2006, 12:40 PM   #41
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Quote:
Originally Posted by loose_cannon
Not me, not yet…hopefully not ever.

Back in 2003 I went lobstering down in West Palm. After the first dive we were heading back south to drop again and I heard a guy screaming. I heard him first, and then literally saw the whites of his eyes at about 50 yards. We pulled this drifting diver out of the drink with no buoy, no noodle and no whistle. He was a severely panicked dude, babbling incoherently…the whole nine yards. After calming him down he gives us the story.

Turns out this guy was from Rhode Island and he told us he hadn't been in the water for three years. While he was descending, he lost sight of his brother and the other divers (probably freaked) and decided to come back up. He ended up drifting aimlessly for more than an hour before we found him. He didn't know the name of the boat he was on and nobody would answer our calls. Hard to believe his boat driver didn’t make a radio call to alert the other boats. So we just ambled up to every boat until we came upon a Hydra-Sports with all hands at lookout stations. The guy’s brother was on the bow equally shaken up…he was definitely expecting the worse.

So we geared the guy back up, pitched him overboard and it was all good.

The diving down there with the drift and all really struck me as something that requires a good captain. Divers get so spread out in the current because some are working on pulling bugs and others are getting swept down current while they look. No way to effectively stay on top of multiple divers from what I could see. How do the locals down there do it? Do you pull each other’s divers out of the water, or keep running down current until you come upon them?

I was waiting for you to say he had drifted from Rhode Island...
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Old 07-14-2006, 01:41 PM   #42
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Almost lost a diver about 15 years ago, he went down current chasing a grouper and didn't realize how fast or far he was traveling. Forunately, he had his speargun wrapped with with red reflective tape, we finally saw one flash and immediatelay got a compass heading. Couldn't guess how far he was out, but we ran a long ways to pick him up. This guy also dives with a scuda, so he had fresh water with him.

Another time I came up to find the three bubble watchers on the boat had gotten busy fishing and drifted quite a ways off. Turns out they all had sharks hooked(yikes, that's what I want to come up to by the boat)and took the time to unhook them instead of cutting them off, meanwhile they drifted completely out of sight. Luckily we had a jug out and numbers in the gps for it, so they were able to find us.

1. Make sure the bubble watcher can run the boat and gps.
2. Try the reflective wrap, it works.
3. Save the fishing for between dives, pay attention to the divers.
4. Make sure the guy on the boat knows approximate bottom time, and has a time piece of some sort. Five minutes wondering if someone is up means a long distance with a strong surface current.

I have to wonder about the experience level of the other people on the boat that lost the girl in the gulf. Did they even know to search downcurrent?
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Old 07-14-2006, 02:00 PM   #43
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

I know about that surface current, we dropped buoy last week and everything was ok we dropped anchor weell a few minutes later we noticed the buoy was gone well by the time we spotted it it was 1/4 mile away maybe so we pulled anchor to go get it and could not find it by the time anchor was up we traveled over a mile and never saw it again. that gave us an idea how strong the current can be.
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Old 07-15-2006, 07:42 AM   #44
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

About 6 years ago while on an unnamed Dry Tortugas charter my buddy and I floated for 45 minutes before being picked up. I can't entirely blame the charter as we had little experience spearing and drift diving. We were not familiar with the drift diving protocol on the boat - in advance of the trip they told us we needed either 1) a safety sausage, or 2) a dive flag. We brought float-ball flags down with us thinking we would be towing a flag mounted on the float - charter said no, don't bring 'em on board. Their "flag" solution was to put the flag on the end of your spear and raise your gun so they could see the dive flag. They gladly sold us small dive flags for a few bucks a piece. We were diving in 20-25 fsw on our last dive when we "got lost". My buddy is an avid runner who can suck an AL80 forever, I had an AL100 and we were down longer than the other divers. With the slight current and length of our dive we came up about a 1/2 mile from the boat in 3-4' whitecapped seas. The wind and current were blowing in the same direction, so we were downwind of the boat. The dive flag mounted on the speartip didn't work at all since the flag was not visible upwind. We had to waive our guns sideways/back-and-forth in attempt for someone on the boat to see us. It was pretty exhausting trying to wave our guns for 45 minutes in 3-4' seas. We had seen a couple reef sharks on the dive so the other back of the mind fear was hanging on top of the water with two stringers of fish.

It was not a good feeling floating in the water contemplating whether or not you would be found. The low point which kicked us into simultaneous prayer occurred after waiving our guns for 30 minutes and watching the boat make a turn to motor further away from us.

Many lessons learned here:

1) Avoid being a dumbass.
2) COMPLETELY understand how the boat operates drift dives before getting to the boat
3) Have multiple signaling devices with you when you're drift diving.
4) Avoid being a dumbass.

The next week I purchased an oversized, 6' Halcyon safety sausage and a dive alert. They are with me on every drift dive since my Dry Tortugas experience.
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Old 07-15-2006, 08:48 AM   #45
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Re: Ever been lost at sea?

Great thread, good stories, lots of wise advice.

I recommend carry a good strobe, many available between $30 - $100.
Greatly improves your chances of being spotted in bad weather, dusk, at night.

See PrincetonTec, Tek-Tite, ACR Electronics, Jotron, etc.
A Cyalume lightstick is cheap insurance and fits on most sausages or spearguns.

I've never been lost. However floating above hundreds of sharks 600 miles offshore
from Ecuador for "a while" (weird currents split group) is an educational experience. Glad those panga drivers have sharp eyes. We once misplaced* a diver for 45 minutes. He was most happy to see us. Thank God for GPS backtrack.

*Always insist on a roll call, never just a head count. The 2 divemasters botched this one, over-excited by seeing Orcas.
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