Tech Diving Locations

[dberry]

I'm not sure if your focus is on wreck or deep, but there seem to be plenty of wrecks just in the few miles between Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton: (you can filter the map by depth by clicking the tabs along the top.)
Wreck Diving Sites - South Florida Diving Headquarters

 

[IDS_Bill]

I know you asked about the SE U.S. but there are places like the Philippines where, even though it is expensive to fly there, it is dirt cheap to stay, eat and - oh yeah - DIVE! In Subic Bay they have wrecks from 70fsw to 230fsw and they are intact and not artificial reefs. I can actually travel there and dive for a week cheaper than Key Largo (I am in AZ though).

If you ever want some info, let me know. I did my TMx cert there and it was great.

 

[Doppler]

If you are restricting your area of operations to SE Coast of US and Caribbean, then you have a been given a long list of possibilities... I like Bill's suggestion too.



For the record, I use wrecks off Florida to run Trimix courses... there really are plenty of sites.

 

[sunshower]

Thanks for the input, Philippines could be very cool. Hey Steve, I'm going to be in south FL in a few weeks with my kids; might stop in and meet you if that's an option.

 

[Kristi@CCDS]

From my experience the offshore tec diving is very problematic especially if you have to work for a living. There are lots of things that can cause problems with your plans. First the true tec charters are limited in that most divers are only ow certified so this is what most of the dive boats are geared towards. Generally to get a tec charter you have to rent the whole boat unless it is a dive like the Oriskany where they can do a 2 drop dive with ow divers while you do a single long tec dive. Next is the weather. Since you are chartering a boat you have to plan way ahead and if you are like me that includes taking vacation. I can't tell you how many times a trip has been blown out for me for days at a time. The South Florida scene is definitely more active and the East Coast boys are lucky that they don't have to run far offshore for the deeper wrecks. The Gulf Coast and Carolina guys generally don't have this advantage from what I have seen. Deep diving in the Carribean can be costly with the price of helium in most of those spots. A rebreather will help with that but you have a high initial cost. Now cave diving is easier in these regards. There is always something to dive. Some sites are only good in flood stage while others are better in times of low water. There is no chartering of boats unless you want to dive a river cave without land access. The cost for going cave diving is generally significantly less than an offshore tec dive from my experience. I am also not one who enjoys doing a short bottom time followed by a long deco of 2 or 3 times your bottom time. You can go cave diving in Florida and do a 3 hour bottom time with less than a 1/3 rd of that time spent decoing. Now in Mexico generally there is little to no deco. I hope you have better luck than I have finding offshore tec diving opportunities in the Southeast. I mainly cave dive now and never thought I would like it but I am hooked.

Having done a bit of wreck diving in NC, I can attest to this. My husband and I all but stopped counting on charters to go out and started coming to Florida for a week to cave dive. For what it was costing to do a couple days of charters for two divers, we could do a week in FL cave diving and it cost about the same. Plus there was always an option to dive someplace. But caves aren't for everyone.

I did enjoy the wreck diving in the Carolinas, and the wreck diving out of Block Island was challenging and wonderful as well.

 

[boulderjohn]

Having done a bit of wreck diving in NC, I can attest to this. My husband and I all but stopped counting on charters to go out and started coming to Florida for a week to cave dive. For what it was costing to do a couple days of charters for two divers, we could do a week in FL cave diving and it cost about the same. Plus there was always an option to dive someplace. But caves aren't for everyone.

Do a search in the Florida forum for a thread I started in March regarding this problem. I stay in south Florida for a couple of months every winter, and two of my students scheduled their vacations so they could join me for a week of diving to complete their trimix certification dives. I planned the dives more than a month in advance, and we had every single dive scheduled. I even overscheduled to allow for a couple lost days. The two had planned flights, a rental car, and a room for that week. The week before they were scheduled, we must have set a record for calm seas, if there is such a thing. I went for a couple of dives with the ocean looking like glass--not even a ripple--when we set out. The week after they were scheduled, it was the same thing--beautiful, calm weather. The week they were supposed to dive--gale force winds everywhere every single day. No ocean diving was possible. I also learned (as you would see in that desperate thread) that there are no inland alternatives for tech dives that do not include deep caves. We had to cancel everything, costing my students quite a bit of money and a planned vacation.

 

[tursiops]

Thanks for the feedback. This was triggered when I saw a shop running a trip to the Monitor; that seems pretty interesting given its historical significance and got me thinking about the opportunity set.

Which shop was that, for when?

 

[Kristi@CCDS]

The week they were supposed to dive--gale force winds everywhere every single day. No ocean diving was possible. I also learned (as you would see in that desperate thread) that there are no inland alternatives for tech dives that do not include deep caves. We had to cancel everything, costing my students quite a bit of money and a planned vacation.

It is a conundrum. I really wish forty fathom was still reasonable to dive. It wasn't ideal but it was an option inland for this sort of thing. As it stands, unless you are a full cave diver, booking a Trimix course in this area of FL is almost an impossibility. The good thing is though, if you are a cave diver, there are a bunch of AWESOME sites for trimix training and diving!

 

[boulderjohn]

It is a conundrum. I really wish forty fathom was still reasonable to dive. It wasn't ideal but it was an option inland for this sort of thing. As it stands, unless you are a full cave diver, booking a Trimix course in this area of FL is almost an impossibility. The good thing is though, if you are a cave diver, there are a bunch of AWESOME sites for trimix training and diving!

When I interned for my trimix instructor rating, we did the big dives in Eagles Nest. We could do that because the instructor trainer was a cave instructor and both the trimix student and I were cave divers. Since I am not a cave instructor, I cannot take trimix students into a cave, even if they are cave divers--and mine are not.

 

[Colliam7]

I am . . . curious about how many tech diving opportunities there are around the east coast (primarily SE) and Caribbean. Not cave/cavern, more deep wreck. What awesome sites do tech divers like to visit

You have received some good suggestions for FL. I personally like the Hydro Atlantic a lot, and it is an easy boat ride compared to many deep wrecks.

In NC, there are a number of wrecks that you can dive that are appropriate for technical / decompression diving. On the shallow end of the spectrum, the Tarpon comes to mind - a fun dive if the vis is good, as it is a hangout for sand tigers. The Manuela is one of my favorite dives. At ~160', it is possible to carry enough gas to make a reasonably long dive on the wreck, followed by a comfortable deco schedule. At the deeper end, the Malchace (~206') and the EM Clark (~250') are sought-after (at least by some) tech dives. The Monitor is in some ways a 'box check' dive - glad to do it for the tremendous historical significance but other wrecks are perhaps more enjoyable. However, it is certainly high on the list of NC coast tech dive opportunities.

A couple of comments about diving the NC coast. As several posters have noted, it is not at all uncommon to get blown out of a tech charter. It took me several years to actually make it down to the Clark, between a charter cancelled before the weekend even started because of a daunting weather forecast, to having the second and third days (planned Clark days) of a 3 day charter cancelled because weather came up overnight after the first day, to actually getting to the wreck site only to find that there was a ripping current that precluded a safe dive attempt. Once I made it, the wait was worth it. But, it took a while. In addition there are only certain boats that go to these wrecks, and their schedules often fill up early in the Spring. I personally like going out with JT Barker, on the Under Pressure (Capt JT's Wreck Diving Site - Diving Hatteras NC and Virginia Beach VA), but there are several other boats that offer tech opportunities off the NC coast. And, under the proper conditions, you can sometimes arrange to make a deco dive on 'recreational' wrecks (e.g. the Normania, at 115') IF the plan for the charter is to make two dives on the same wreck, and IF the captain knows you / trusts you, etc. I have done that and it can be a lot of fun - essentially you and your buddy are alone on the wreck while the others on the boat are doing their surface interval between dives, then you are coming up as the others are making their descent for the second dive.