Dive Report: Hydro Atlantic
Sunday, November 21, 1999
Tonto, Bob Sheridan

By: Mike Rodriguez

We dove the Pappa's Wreck this morning, and after several hours of
surface interval, we were ready to dive the Hydro Atlantic.  I calculated
the pressures for my mix; I had to add a touch of Helium and Oxygen
to my left-over gas from the morning dive then topped with air to
get a 100 foot END at 1.4 PO2 in the sand.  It was a very inexpensive
gas purchase for a change since I had so much Helium left from the
morning dive.  When everything was ready, we headed out early in the
afternoon.  On-site, the water temperature was 79 on the surface with
about the same on the bottom.  Bottom current was about 1/4 knot and
surface current was about 1/2 knot.  It was fairly sunny with a broken
cloud layer.  Bob Sheridan was running the boat.

While loading the boat, we noticed that someone had... uh... walked
their dog along the path to the boat.  It made for an interesting
obstacle course with doubles on my back.  Once the boat was finally
loaded we headed out for a great dive.

I planned a 30-minute bottom time and had a wonderful dive.  I took
the downline, and the other divers followed me down.  We were all on
the wreck a few seconds after hitting the water.  I tied-in and headed
for the engine room.  Nobody had been in there for a while, so all
the silt had settled, and the water was very clear.  Taking advantage
of this, I tied-in a reel and went exploring way back into the ship.
I enjoyed looking around and tried to imagine what it was like in
there before the sinking and what it must have been like for the
crew during the storm that sank this ship.  The area I was in
apparently isn't frequented by divers because there were a bunch of
rust stalactites hanging from most of the pipes and fittings.  The
rust seems to just hang down delicately as the metal corrodes, and
the slightest touch or water flow damages them.  I was careful not
to touch them or send a swirl of water from my fins toward them since
I'd like to see them again some day; I can only hope other divers
who get back in there will be as careful.  After spending about 15
minutes in there, I turned around and exited.

I swam on the port side toward the bow along the side of the wreck
and admired the abundance of sea-fans growing on the ship.  It was
like a forest.  As I got to the bow, I moved up toward the deck
and hovered in-place against the light current just forward of the
bow.  It was reminiscent of that corny scene in the movie Titanic.
I looked down toward the sand; about 10 feet off the bottom and
a few feet forward of the bow there was a BIG-ASS barracuda!  It
was about four feet long.  I was directly above it and wanted to get
a good look at it before heading back, so I shined my light at
it... ooops!  It went from hovering quietly to pointing *straight*
up at me.  It's body was perfectly vertical as it looked at me.
AAACCKKKK!

Nice fishy, fishy...  !!!  I switched off my light, hung the cord
over my neck, and waited to see what it would do.  My BP and
heart-rate went up a notch or two as I recalled a childhood event.
I was about 12 and fishing off a pier in clear shallow water in
the Florida Keys where I grew up.  There were numerous small
yellowtail which were my target.  Also in the area were several
barracuda which were ignoring my bait.  In the clear, shallow water,
I could see very well and remember being freaked out when I hooked
one of the yellowtail and the instant, I mean *the instant* it began to
struggle against the hook, one of the barracuda covered the 20 feet or
so to my catch and ate it so fast that I didn't know what had happened.
The barracuda's teeth were so sharp I didn't even feel a tug on
the fishing line as my catch vanished.  The end of the line was
cut as if with a knife.  This memory made for a tense few seconds
as the fish finally figured I was too big to eat and returned to
it's horizontal attitude near the sand.  I smiled nervously and
let the current move me backward over the bow of the ship until
I was out of sight of the barracuda.  For a second there I thought I
was going to have to clench my knife in my teeth and wrestle the
evil barracuda like they do in the movies.  I've shined my light at
barracuda a million times and have never seen that reaction before.
Boy, I won't be doing THAT again!

With that interesting event over, I checked my gas and time... I'd
only used about 45 CF which puts my SAC rate at just over .3; my
bottom time was almost gone, so I headed back toward the downline.
As I started my ascent, one of the other divers who followed me down
12 minutes after I jumped was unhooking the line.  He had planned only
20 minutes on the bottom, so it made sense for him and his buddy to jump
12 minutes after the first group and release the line at the end of his dive.

My buddy's and my deco went as planned, though another diver using new,
unfamiliar gear had a brief free-flowing regulator and some trouble with
buoyancy.  He eventually completed his deco, and we were all back on
the boat a while later.

So, after this dive, the Pappa's Wreck this morning and the Lowrance
yesterday, I think I've made up for the weather-canceled dives the last
few weeks.  I'm happy again, but I'm looking forward to another dive
on the Pappa's Wreck scheduled for next weekend.