Choctawhatchee River Levels(Morrison/Cypress/Becton - Springs)

[SuPrBuGmAn]

The weather is killing us over here. This morning marks the 3rd day in the row we've had tornado, thunderstorm, and flood warnings out in the northern Gulf Coast from Pascagoula, MS to Destin, FL. Its been non stop. Power at work and at home is going on and off. The neighbors lost a tree, shed, and car to an explosion caused by lightning this morning. The news channels can't list all the road closings because there are simply too many. We lost another tree in our yard, its survived Ivan, but not the storms over the past few days.

At the time of this post, the river level at Caryville is 14.65'. This is the closest meter on the river that alot of the west panhandle springs feed into. To give you some examples on where the water level would better be at - we had 20-30' of visibility at Morrison when the river level is at 5.5'. Cypress, which pushes nearly 100 million gallons of fresh clear water a day, starts to cloud up and get tannic around 12'.

According to http://www.srh.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/ahps.cgi?tae&carf1 , in 1978 the 5th highest recorded crest was as high as 16.89'. Its still raining, news guy is saying more to come before it clears up later this evening. Are we gonna set a new record?

[/end frustrated rant]

Anyone in the area want to head to Morrison to snap a pic on how high up the pavillion the water is at the moment?

 

[Biggen]

If I wasn't going to drive 300+ miles tonight down to south florida, I would defiantely drive up there to check out the water level.

Oh, BTW, I am dring to south Florida tonight. I figure with all the damn rain we have had, diving conditions are going to be aweful no matter where we go. If you go diving the Destin Jetties, be sure to post a report.

Any plans for next weekend? I doubt I'll make the dive back down again, and if we can hold off on the rain next week, the river levels should at least come down some.

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

I'm still planning for a Destin jettie dive tomorrow. If vis sucks, then it sucks, and I'll have snowy blown out backscattered pictures to prove it I'll have a report as well. I'm getting frustrated not being able to dive, I tried diving Mon, Tues, and Wednesday nights here at Gulf Shores but have been thwarted by rough seas each night. Atleast the jetties will sheild us of surf.

14th or 15th were originally planned for a Cypress dive, but if the water levels don't come down some, even Cypress will be out of the question. We may dive jetties again if thats the case. Either way, you should come.

 

[WaterDawg]

Matt I suggest you head down to PCB abd take a quick course before going to destin (just in case the viz sucks). just kidding! Good luck man.
Any word on how Ginnie might be?

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

Any word on how Ginnie might be?

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/ahps.cgi?jax&fwhf1

Not looking too promising for Ginnie

"Blackwater Certification" would come in handy there as well

Comon down to Destin take a dunk into some salt!

 

[jviehe]

Good summary, SuprBugMan. I still would like to get back into Morrison when the water looked like below. It mustve been a fluke. Sure is looking sunny today, though.

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

It mustve been a fluke.

It wasn't a total fluke, I dove Morrison with 100+' visibility last October. So its gotta happen periodically

 

[NUTTZ]

Hey I drove to Morrison Saturday at lunch to take a look at the high water levels and water was up over the steps leading up to the pavallion. Gates were locked as well I guess the figured no one was going to dive. I did do a couple of dives at Vortex and the viz there was maybe 10 ft at best. I think at one time before we left there you could have walked accross all of the the spring basin and not gotten you feet wet there were so many divers there.

 

[SCUBADIVINERIK]

Ginnie ended up being pretty good. They had fabric barriers up to keep the tannic water out of the cavern at Ginnie spring and at little devil and the eye. What a awesome place. If it wasnt for the 600+ miles of driving it took me to get there and back this weekend I would go every weekend. It is an incredibly beautiful place both above and under water. The air fill prices in the area cant be beat. The caverns are awesome. The water is clear and there are endless amounts of good looking women. There were all levels of divers there and everyone was super friendly. Watching those cave teams disappear into the eye just makes you go hum......I wonder whats down there... How was the panhandle diving?

Waterdawg and I did a full day of diving on Saturday. It was my first trip to Ginnie. I cant wait to go back!! Next time I will bring my tent to cut down on the cost.

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

I was prepared to dive in some limited visibility, but apparently my ride wasn't Unfortunately, I can't get around to dive sites without a driver so I was SOL. My local buddy didn't want to drive that far to dive in coffee we tried going out to Gulf Shores but managed to get a combination wrench stuck in his tire which pretty much ended any chance for a dive.

Could have definately been a better weekend - dry again.

Glad you guys still went to Ginnie and it wasn't flooded with the tannic