Empress Expedition 2004-Trip report

[Scuba_Steve]

I'm not sure where to post this, so it's going here where I do most of my postings, unless it gets moved to the appropriate spot.

It's rather lengthy, hopefully not too boring, but it is my first report, and I can get kinda wordy at times...................



The stage was set several months ago. I was going once again to the wreck that I hadn’t even known existed 3 short years ago.

My trip this year was to be with Tyler Bradford aboard Dany St-Cyr’s Zodiac. Two firsts for me. I found diving on the Zodiacs to be as easy as Tyler had said it would be.

I had met Tyler the year before, on my first Empress trip. It was there that I had learned just how well he knew this wreck, it’s history, and the people who dove it.

My fellow team members consisted of Tyler, Lisa, a friend who was certified with myself, and Paul, a fellow who I would soon learn I could rely on when things got a little “nastier” than I had expected them to get.

Dive day one consisted of the usual “Get to know it” tour of the externals of the bow. It was comforting to know that I had remembered most of this small part of the ship’s layout. It was a chance for the other two members to relieve the “First Dive” tension. My dive buddy, Lisa, called the dive and I was leading back to the up-line. We had done a lazy tour over the now non-existent port-side stairs of the Shelter Deck, down across the 2nd and 3rd cargo hatches, over the 3rd class entrance, which still held the bottom remains of the forward mast. We had then slipped over the breakwater wall, and made our turn towards the port side. I think it was at this point that Lisa had gotten her first taste of just how massive this ship really is. I had made a point of mentioning earlier, an easy marker point of locating where you were on the “top-side” of the bow, which for me was always the unmistakable dip of the hull between the bow and the first class bulkhead. We had just gotten to the rear section of it, when I received the “Where the heck are we” universal hand-sign that we’ve all given at one time or another. Fortunately, this time, I knew. I motioned “This way”, and within moments we were in sight of the safety of the up-line.

We managed to get in a second dive on this first day, a feat that would happen only once more for the rest of the trip. The second dive would be a duplicate of the first, with the addition of continuing forward to the very tip of the bow and then drifting down to view the port side anchor. The currents had been nice to us on these first two dives, and the water a balmy 37 degrees with 15ft of vis.

Day two was lead by Tyler. Our plan was to penetrate the explosion hole, a 15ft irregular hole made shortly after the sinking, to allow for access to the purser’s safe, and dropped down the 70 degree grade of the Shelter Deck to the steam ovens of the first class galley. We drifted down past what would become an early marker, a lone chair still in place. The remnants of the table bases, brass retainers, were the only evidence left of the once elegant 1st class Dining room chattels.

Our second dive of the day would be our last multiple dive day due to the whims of nature. We had decided to video the Main Staircase via the 1st class Gangway door, before penetrating again, the explosion hole to the galley for some footage. The water temperature was 39 degrees, and would not be getting any warmer.

Day three was blown out by South-west winds at 15 to 20 knots. I had learned that the best winds were South winds. South-West was probably next best, but would not necessarily guarantee a dive due to wave formation being whipped up by the long trek straight down the St. Lawrence. The dreaded North Easterly winds were a one-way ticket to a very bad day. We spent the day cleaning gear and repairing what would become a problematic thorn in my side, a video light head that insisted on eating glass lenses and trashing the electrical connectors and bulbs, with the entry of the sea-water. We also took advantage of the down-time to visit the CPR mass grave site of 68 souls lost in 14 minutes, May 29, 1914. From there we had back to Pointe-au-Pere, the location of the Musee de la Mer.

We opted to dine out this evening, a decision that would remain the same for the balance of the trip. This evening “Le Cactus” a local hot-spot watering hole got in the way, and it was 11:00PM before I managed to tear the others from the “Two-for-one” Molson specials. My stomach found contentment next door at “Le Maison du Spaghetti. We had managed to make some new friends at Le Cactus. We sat down with several more people than we had arrived with. I had made some more acquaintances, and ones that I would see again and again for the balance of the week. My new friends consistent of two brothers from Victoriaville, Serge and Jacques Tardis. Together they had logged almost 300 dives on the Empress. Also with them was a younger fellow named Robin. The language barrier had made its first real impass. Dany St-Cyr, the “King” of the Empress, also originally from Victoriaville, managed to pull himself away from filling tanks to dine with us. His good friend Simon Pelletier , Instructor, safety diver, videographer and full-time paramedic also joined us. Simon would be our full-time interpreter (For those of us requiring it) and reservation maker. He also seemed to fancy my dive buddy, Lisa. A suspicion that was confirmed later in the week, when we hadn’t even left the province and she had gotten two e-mails from him on our ride home at the conclusion of our trip.

to be continued...............

 

[Scuba_Steve]

Our fourth day greeted us with blue skies. We had also confirmed that Dany would do his historic 500th Empress dive with us, or more correctly, we would do the dive with him. Two news people from the local station CFER TV, would accompany us on Serge and Jaques Zodiac. Robin also followed with his boat. We arrived at the sight. Although there was no wave action, the buoys implied a different story where the current was concerned. After an hour and a half of sun tanning, we finally got around to the reason for being there. We splashed into mild current, and then dropped into paradise. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Surely this was the Maker himself smiling down upon us. This was only my 14th dive on the Empress, but I could tell that this was something that just didn’t happen too often. Tyler and Dany would later confirm, that this was the best visibility they had ever seen. Although I had brought my video camera down, the wonder of having so much visibility was obviously just too much for me to concentrate. My head and eyes darted back and forth, trying desperately to capture all the items on the decks that, to this point, I had only been able to see one or two at a time, and only after illuminating them briefly by canisters lights that just never seemed to cut through as much as I had desired them to.

The original plan was to have some champagne at the lifeboats, on the starboard side of the wreck. The current seemed to be picking up as we descended, so the plan was altered to suit the conditions. Dany drank a toast at the 1st class Gangway doors, while we all watched. He passed the bottle around to those wishing to partake. We had gotten an impromptu lesson on just how to drink from the bottle while submerged 110ft in cold sea-water. As it turns out, my initial thought of it being a bad idea didn’t get the consensus decision I thought it would. Fortunately I was videoing (Or at best pointing a light capturing machine) so I didn’t have to test the premise of my colleagues’ decision. Dany then proceed down the fore-deck and I’m sure said a silent prayer for his friend, Pierre Lepage at the memorial plaque in his memory. Pierre had spent two years diving with Dany to recover the stern letters of the Empress, only to lose his life on the wreck two years later. Dany poured the remaining contents of the bottle over the memorial. The ceremony concluded, Paul and I took the opportunity to view the bow letters, cargo hatches and other sorted equipment still fastened to the fore-deck. Any unclear recollection I had remaining of the area had now been brought into full realization by the remarkable visibility.

As soon as the dive started, it had finished. We raced back across the channel to the vehicles for some fresh tanks. We had visions of a great second dive with visibility equaling the 60ft we had just wtnessed. Upon arriving on shore, we had to first race our video footage to CFER for dubbing. Incredibly, they didn’t have S-video capability, so only Simon’s video was useful to them. It was going to be broadcast on the 6:00PM news, and they needed the raw footage by 1:00PM.

This small diversion would prove to be our downfall. The window of opportunity had passed us by, as the winds had kicked up again. The incredible day that would not soon be duplicated, was gone.

Friday brought better conditions and a chance to finally dive the Starboard lifeboats. We traversed the now familiar Shelter deck from the down-line to the 1st class bulkhead. We followed the Teak rail starboard, down to the bottom of the St. Lawrence. My computer read 135ft and 37 degrees. Again the left lamp of my video lighting system started to fail. The right lamp would continue to work flawlessly, but I would require lighting from my dive buddies to have any hope of capturing any usable footage from the perpetual darkness that accompanies the lifeboats. Swimming aft, my first discernable object was one of the lifeboat davits, still positioned inwards, denoting the fact that the starboard lifeboats never had a chance to be deployed. I had learned also from Tyler, over a cup of coffee one morning, when we were looking over some deck plans, that he had also seen evidence of how fast this ship went down. As he discussed certain sections of the ship, the talk lead to the water tight doors. On at least one level, all the port side doors were closed, but the starboard ones were wide open, denoting that either the operator never made it to his station, or died trying to close it, to stem them huge inflow of sea water. It was also, as Tyler told me, the cause for one death inside the wreck, where the diver had swam through an open water-tight door, only to be hopelessly lost trying to find his way out.

Simon again, had made reservations for dinner at a sports bar in town. The night ended somewhat earlier than the previous one had.

Saturday’s plan was one that I had wanted to do even before my first dive on the Empress. A couple of years ago, when I had made plans to dive her, I had started looking at pictures, memorizing sections of certain attainable decks etc. One picture that had caught my eye was the 3rd class children’s playground. Certainly not a memorable location by any standards, but I think being a parent myself, and seeing the children in the picture, made an impression on me. It was by all accounts an easy penetration, if there ever is such a thing in a labyrinth like this.

As Tyler had to sit out this dive due to a malfunctioning Rebreather, he emphasized again to be careful, as there was no way he could make a dive if there happened to be an emergency. He also, over breakfast that morning, after learning of our plans made some observations about what to expect, and also of potential exit points if need be. He also warned us again that Serge Cournoyer had drowned in this underestimated part of the wreck, albiet I believe he was a couple decks lower, but had the same opportunity of exit, through the 2nd and 3rd cargo hatches as we would have. I pondered how one could miss a 15ft by 30ft hole in the ceiling at 110ft, with just enough greenish ambient light, to give us that warm fuzzy feeling about not be in “too deep”. I guess I had a lesson to learn, again.

Lisa also called her dive on the surface due to the current. So Paul and I would do the dive, with myself leading, as it was my idea and I knew where I wanted to go better than Paul did. The downside of this was, I couldn’t run line and video at the same time, and also, Paul is a better reel man than I am. It probably worked out for the better, as things got a little hairy in fairly short order, and having the bulky video camera would have made it quite unmanageable.

We tied off at the 3rd class entrance, port door, dropped down one deck and made our way aft. I negotiated the stairwell quite easily, and then swam over the area that had been the playground. One lone railing on the port side was all that remained of the play area, but I could see it all in my minds eye. I turned and started towards the bow. I had noticed in the plans that there were washrooms in this area, that may hold some interesting objects to be viewed. Several doors and a set of stairs were my markers, and my studying of the plans allowed me know exactly where I was at all times. Swimming forward, I could tell that it had been quite a while since anyone had been here. Not because of its inaccessibility by any stretch, but more so because there’s so many places to see, this was but a drop in the bucket. The silt was fairly thick, and to this point we had stirred very little of it. I reached through a door way to attempt to gingerly move just enough silt to uncover the glass in a port-hole to show Paul.

Uhggg, It was about then that I had the realization that although drinking champagne at the bottom of the St. Lawrence was probably not a good thing, neither was disturbing the fine silt that laid everywhere inside the wreck. In my haste to back out of the door way to limit the silting, I had only achieved in making it worse. The dive was over as far as penetrating further was concerned. Paul and I, in close contact, managed to make it back to the staircase in absolute zero vis. All I saw besides the odd dull glare of his light, was his hands making the life saving “O” with his fingers and thumb around the line. I’m sure it wasn’t anymore than 2-3 minutes, but it was long enough to get a real good feeling of just how alone and vulnerable you are down there. Hand signs in the silt were limited, but we had somehow managed to do the equivalent of a Vulcan Mind-Meld. We were “one” on the way out, and for me it was comforting. We made the final turn of the staircase, even though I could not actually see where we were, I knew we had made it. It was after I had reeled up, that I had realized I had never even noticed the 2nd and 3rd Cargo Hatches on my way out. The lesson was not lost on the student.

The final day of diving, Sunday, had now arrived. The wind was again not favourable. The mornign dive, and then the afternoon dive was called. Just like that, our trip had come to and end. It took me back really. I wasn’t prepared for not diving today.

I set about fresh water cleaning my gear and drying it in the light sun and wind. Just as everything was being packed up, Dany stopped by with his truck pulling the Zodiac. The game was back on. We were asked if we still wanted to go, after cleaning all our gear. No answer was really required. It seems the mind-meld had not released its hold on the team.

to be continued.......

 

[Scuba_Steve]

The plan was to do one last penetration of the Blast hole, followed by one final sweep over the deck and a final caress of the hull before leaving. The team actually got a little separated at the end as the “spread” had gotten wider and longer in the limiting vis than had been anticipated. I also believe that the roller coaster events prior to the dive helped us mis-step enough to trip up the plan.

Regardless, we made our way up the line and safely back on the Zodiac. The final numbers would be 8 dives, and a total inwater time of 376 minutes.

Our final dinner would be with Simon Pelletier in Sainte-Luce at the Nipigon restaurant. Dany joined us for desert and then left to take care of some business. We proceeded to the bar side after dinner, to toast our new friends, and of course the Empress of Ireland. Dany came back for his final good-bye’s and managed to stay a couple of hours. We ended up closing the place at around 5:00AM and headed off home to bed. We awoke at 7:30AM, and I made another mental note to not do this type of thing too often. We packed up, cleaned the house a bit and bid our final farewells to one another with promises to exchange pictures and notes upon our safe arrival home.

Thirteen hours straight of driving between Lisa and I got us home safely to the Niagara Region. The trip was truly over, and I had already begun to make plans for next years’ trip. Needless to say, my once in a lifetime sales-pitch to my wife has long since been found to be the fraud that it is. So it is with much intrepidation that I will approach her with the idea of a third trip, but not today, as it’s our 12th, or is it 13th wedding anniversary, and I just found an anniversary card in my carry-on bag……………..Oooops.

Did I mention I love my life?, I mean my wife?

Regards

Steve

 

[Spike The Shark]

Did you see any of my kin, the Greenland Sharks?

 

[Scuba_Steve]

My heart and soul poured into this post, and all you have to say is that!!

Answer:

NO.

Was I looking?

Yes.

 

[Tom R]

I think your post is great, lots of information and lots of detail. Best trip report in a long while.

 

[imsharkbait]

i'm going to dive her next year thanks for the report

 

[Sirius Diver]

Awesome post Scuba_Steve! Maybe someday I'll get to dive her. I'm originally from the Gaspe Penninsula, (just a little further up the road) and would love to dive that way. Thanks!

 

[DiveMistress2]

My dearest Dive Buddy Scuba_Steve:

You are going to get me into trouble my dear.....

But it was honestly the best trip I have ever been on.

I was concerned about the zodia entry/exit and it turned out to be the only way to travel to the Empress in style.

As I said when questioned about "what the highlight of the trip" was - I still think it was the people. (not to say that the diving wasn't awe striking)

Everyone that we met treated us like family. They went out of their way to make sure that we were enjoying ourselves.

We've made some great friendships over the past week and I look forward to seeing everyone again in the near future....

I learned a lot about my limitations as a female diver and the amount that I was willing to push myself. I called two dives just at the surface because it seemed too much like work, and not enough like fun.

This was some of the most challenging diving I think any of us will ever experience and man was it fun. I think we've already put our deposits in the mail for next year Steve....(Tyler, they're on their way....)

And Scuba_Steve, I'm glad you redeemed yourself and stayed up with us until 5am. It wouldn't have been the same without you.

It was a trip I will never forget.

 

[DiveMistress2]

I also forgot to add the token photo of Steve.

I think this best sums up the trip!

This is during a nice downpour.....