Lord Bummington

Right,

finally after a long sunday of getting told by SWMBO that I have to do certain DIY jobs, I have managed to get on to the PC to get my trip report up

After much deliberation, I finally got my arse in gear and in April paid up some golden nuggets for an advanced nitrox and deco course. Now it has taken me 5 months in order to do this “birthday” course due to 1)Working in Natural England being a complete tw*t and having to do 3 peoples jobs, 2)Shifting to work for an oil and gas company and having to complete mandatory probation for three months and 3)Trying to get on a boat at the same time as my instructor and somewhere where we may get more viz than a few metres

So, I gets offered a place on the weymouth weekend organised by ian1904. Im going! I have never dived out of weymouth and its something that I wanted to do for some years now. I have done many subsea multibeam and side scan sonar surveys out of the harbour and off portland, but never managed to get underwater.

So, after fretting trying to get a fill in the twins and stage (thanks to colinicky for getting me out of a deep dark hole here), a quick drive to hastings sorted this - kit fettling (or is taht felching ) ensued. The two cocker spaniels that I have kept sleeping on my drysuit that i had laid on the floor, nicking bits of kit, such as my DSMB’s and one managed to even pull the 8kg of weight belt into her bed aswell! By this time, it was 9pm and I still had not cut tables for the dive!

Now this was in all essence a course, and I needed to get things right. I have a MSc in Dive science and Dive Technology, studied intensively over a one year period, with major emphasis on Dive Science – such as physiology, bubble models, nitrox, trimix and heliox theory and gas blending – just to mention a few of the topics covered in the degree. I have (and I put my hand up to this) been deco diving for the last 4 years since the degree, and also have tasted sweet sweet trimix at depth in a 50m chamber dive in Fort William, swapping from air to a 12L of 16/45 – now that was an eye opener on the re-take of the aptitude tests! Danny my instructor, knew of the MSc course and duely took it into consideration when I booked on the course.

After some careful consideration I cut my tables using my 27% back gas, and 45% stage (colin’s blending ) and using an RGBM model in GAP (my favoured piece of dive software). I used a +1 conservatism, purely because it had been 8 weeks since I was in the water, so I maybe a little rusty. So Tables cut, and off to bed. I knew that we had a max of 45m, so planned for a 25min bottom time, with a total of 51min runtime. There was other options, depending on viz and how I felt on the day. Laminated them, and off to bed I went for 4 hours of restless sleep.

3AM arrives, and off I go to Weymouth from Mid Kent. At 3:45am I met Big Si at clackets services on the M25. A quick cofi and off to get some brekkies in Weymouth, as it so happened in Maccy D’s J, not that we were waiting to get into the joint at 5 mins before opening time. Now at this point I will add that a cunning plan evolved. I would park my car in the HUGE carpark and pay 8quid for a 12 hour ticket, and load my kit into Si’s car and both go down in one as parking may have been somewhat restricted. Down to the quay and there is shed loads of parking, and to cap it off, two quid cheaper for a 12hour ticket, bugger L

Moving on, unloaded kit, got onto boat, met all that were diving that day and off we went. It was a corking day, flat seas, el schorchio and the usual banter at 8am in the morning. I had a chat with Danny about my tables and what not, and he seemed happy that I was not going to have a visit to the chamber, as he was not on duty that day and didn’t want to accompany me to the tin pot.

I have read so much about the Salsette, and what a wreck it is to dive on, so I had been looking forward to this for sometime. Danny ran through all my questions with ease, and checked all my theory stuff that I had completed earlier on that week. Pass first bit (I think). As we arrive at the wreck site, I get a few nervous feelings as I knew what suprises maybe sprung on me underwater, but had not bargined for a few things that did come my way!

Down the shot, it was about 8m viz, not bad, but good enough to have a nice nosey around the wreck. We decided on a 25min bottom time and then the usual deep stops and deco on the way up. I was running point.

6m bubble check, and down we go. The starboard rail was in 34m of water, so we progressed towards the bow, with me happily making a mental note of all the sealife I could identify for a seasearch form later on. Danny stops me, and we settle on the hull of the Salsette at about 42m, where he indicates me to do a shutdown drill, no problems there, valves are a little stiff but nothing to worry about. Then a stage swapping exercise, no problems there. Carried on further along the wreck and still had 10 more mins bottom time to use. We reached the point where I thought that the wreck finished, until danny pointed above me, the continuation of the other half! I was that engrossed in thinking about fish that I could have quite happily swam into the other half’s hull (the actress said to the bishop)

Time to go home, whip out a crack bottle SMB, up it goes dead on 25mins bottom time, stops at all the pre planned places, and a few more shutdowns, OOA, and stage swapping on the way up!

Back on the boat, I felt mildly annoyed at a few points underwater, like using more gas than I normally do at that depth (came up with about 15bar less than planned) and also my wisdom teeth giving me a right pain down the back of my jaw (something I need removing soon, not the jaw that is). The other thing that pisched me off royally, was the drysuit inflator hose had not seated properly and I was a little damp, as on the descent I could feel the water pissing into my suit L

After a few more mugs of tea, from smudge and Helena, and choccy biscuits, a quick decanting session from a 15L of 31% and that was charged to 250bar *cough* (the whip was used by a number of other people aswell, best 15quid I spent in ages), analysed my gas, predicting a 28.5% mix, the analox said 28.3%. Not bad for mental maths. Pulled the laptop out after discovering the next wreck, the James Fennel was in a max of 12-13m of water. No need to draw up tables for that dive! Kit was 99% dry thanks to the weather gods playing ball for once in the last 3 months.

Dive number two, involved a number of skills and drills, all passed off with minimal issues. The final one, involving a valve shutdown, whilst swimming like a tw*t being chased by a large hungry great white, followed by a stage removal, swap sides, reclip, remove swap sides and reclip again and then another shutdown and an OOA (missed the last one there L) as I noticed danny`s reg hanging by his side, just as I had shut off my primary pillar. Not happy at this point. We carried on the dive, not finding anything to eat later, and we called the dive on 40mins. SMB up, but not the crack bottle version, deployed, filled, sent up, getting my finger caught in the line, being pulled 3m up, before I managed to free my digit, plummet to 12m again and pick up the spool from the floor. To the surface we went doing a 6m stop as always, where Danny shook my hand, after another shutdown and stage swapping.

Arrived back in port, unloaded and had a nice 3hour drive home back to kent, where my kit is still drying in the kitchen

Thanks for a cracking day all. Shall be diving Weymouth again definitely!

Oh – If anyone finds a yellow SMB, made by kent tooling, floating around in the Chesil Beach area, can you PM me, it came out of my pocket when I was on the surface

keith
 

and a few piccys of the morning