CT-Rich
Contributor
I have been diving for a long time and I did something today for the first time. I dumped weights in open water. It was the closet call I have had diving that I can recall and I thought I would share it, partly as a self reflection, partly to get some input.
My dive buddy Mike and I decided to head up to RI this weekend to get a couple of holiday dives in. I had been hearing that dive conditions at Ft. Wetherill, a popular dive spot in Jamestown RI were not particularly good, the wind had been sending rollers up into the cove and been killing the visibility down to 4-6'. This is not unusual there since a good day especially with all the novice divers getting their checkout dives in may be 10-12'. Mike and I set out to take advantage of my one day a week available to get wet.
As we drove up the sun was out the air was calm and the weather was perfect, much better than I had seen forecast two days before. As we got closer to the site I suggested that if Mike wanted we could do the extra driving and head into Newport to another spot that we had both frequented , Kings Beach, a shore entry dive loved because it is outside Narragansett Bay and has a protected easy entry boat ramp. Kings Beach is for most a good novice dive spot because there is a boat ramp that is protected from waves by rocks on the East and a small rocky island to the south, Depths get 15-20 in the little sound between the beach and the isle. The wind was from the SW but was low, only a couple of knots, tide was still rising with a couple of hours to till high. There were no white caps but but the swell was around 2 ft and I could see waves breaking on the rocks off shore. A little more frisky than usual.
The Dive Plan: The plan was to enter the water and submerge as soon as we were clear of jetty, take a heading of SSE and head for the island. I was going to navigate, Mike was going to tend the flag. When we reach the base of the island at about 20fsw, I was going to keep the rocks on the left and proceed around the island until I was heading ESE and head for an area called Price's neck at a depth of 30' until we hit our turn around pressure of 1,900 psi. we would ascend to 15-20 fsw and retrace our path back around the island until I hit a depth of about 15' sand and had a NNW heading. Moving across the sand until reach eel grass and which point we can snorkel to the ramp. This is a dive profile I have done numerous times solo.
Gear: This year I upgraded to a drysuit, an Aqualung Fusion with a Hollis 100gm undergarment. This would be dive number seven with this suit and the second dive with a recently purchased DUI weight harness. Before this season I had no experience diving dry and have been hesitant to do any solo dives (I am usually solo about half the time). I was using 12 lbs in my Nighthawk BCD and 20 on the harness and a steel 120 filled to 3400 psi.
The Dive: the dive started well, we made it across to the island as planned and but the surface waves could be felt even at depth once we closer to the southern exposure of the island. We started out on out easterly heading at a depth of around 30 fsw with visibility of 4-6'. Farther along in the dive we migrated down to near 40 fsw, and still feel the push of the waves as we went. What I was not aware of was that the wind, which had been blowing for several days had set up a long shore current, accelerating our swim to the East. We hit our turning pressure and I headed us into shallower water. The swell was considerably more noticeable at these shallower depths we made much less progress coming back and the wave action seem to keep taking back to 30', Finally at about 1100 psi I decided that we needed to do a pop-up and double check our bearings. When we surfaced I realized that we were still south of the island and were nowhere near the western end of the island and were actually only due south of it. The wind and the swell had picked up considerably at this point I told mike that we should head for the protection of the western side of the rocks which would shelter us from the waves and we could proceed with a surface swim to the haul-out.
The Trouble: I have done variation of this dive a several times over the years and have on more than one occasion found myself short on gas and plodding away on the surface. This was no different except for the new dry suit. What I immediately noticed about the suit and harness was the weights sit much lower on my hips than a weight belt and they kept me vertical in the water when I added gas to my BCD. The bigger problem was that the collar on the dry suit was adding pressure to my neck, not a lot but enough. On land it was noticeable but not terrible, in my normal horizontal trim it was hardly noticeable at all. On the surface of this dive it was significant. It was having a impact on blood flow and I could feel it. I could feel it on my neck and made using the snorkel very claustrophobic. After struggling with my orientation for the surface swim I rolled onto my back with the intention of swimming in on my back and pulled down my mask to get more air and hopefully better blood flow to my head. I was not panicking, but I could feel that was the direction I was heading. The pressure was enough to now make me feel noticeably lightheaded and I was concerned that if I continued to get light headed it would flip me over face down in water and I would not be able to right myself in the chop. Mike was about 30 ft away at this point and I shouted to him I was going to dump my weights. I was thinking that if I lost the weights on the harness I would be able to lay flat in the water, taking the pressure off my arteries and surface swim in. I did a little fumbling to find the releases (I, of course, forgot how much lower they sit than my old belt). I dropped the left one and then the right one a few seconds later.
As soon as they were clear my legs floated up. I still felt the need for blood to get to my head and the nascent panic was still there but it was immediately getting better. I closed my shoulder valve so I could pump up my dry suit with more air and not having to worry about losing it. I didn't really want to have the back badder too full since the tank was going to act as a keel during the swim. I gave a couple of spritzes of air to the suit until I calmed down and was comfortably buoyant. Things were much better once in the lee of the rocks. It took a good five minutes to completely regain my composure once I had dumped the weights.
I have been diving on and off since 1980 and have been doing it with steadfast regularity for the last six years. This is the first time I have ever dumped weights. My problems on the surface came up in less than a minute and I made the decision to drop them within a another couple of minutes.
I have been in situations where a long surface swim was necessary, but always with a wetsuit. The relatively rough seas and the pressure on my neck proved a bad combination. Had I been waiting at a ladder or for a boat pick-up, the vertical orientation in the water would not been a big a problem. My guess is that trying to keep my head back so that my snorkel would stay out of the water or later my face out of the water was what was causing/allowing the collar on the dry suit to put pressure on my neck. I am going to see about having the neck opened up a little more or make some other changes to my rig.
Red is the dive path, Green is the surface swim.
This is what the water looked like after we exited.
My dive buddy Mike and I decided to head up to RI this weekend to get a couple of holiday dives in. I had been hearing that dive conditions at Ft. Wetherill, a popular dive spot in Jamestown RI were not particularly good, the wind had been sending rollers up into the cove and been killing the visibility down to 4-6'. This is not unusual there since a good day especially with all the novice divers getting their checkout dives in may be 10-12'. Mike and I set out to take advantage of my one day a week available to get wet.
As we drove up the sun was out the air was calm and the weather was perfect, much better than I had seen forecast two days before. As we got closer to the site I suggested that if Mike wanted we could do the extra driving and head into Newport to another spot that we had both frequented , Kings Beach, a shore entry dive loved because it is outside Narragansett Bay and has a protected easy entry boat ramp. Kings Beach is for most a good novice dive spot because there is a boat ramp that is protected from waves by rocks on the East and a small rocky island to the south, Depths get 15-20 in the little sound between the beach and the isle. The wind was from the SW but was low, only a couple of knots, tide was still rising with a couple of hours to till high. There were no white caps but but the swell was around 2 ft and I could see waves breaking on the rocks off shore. A little more frisky than usual.
The Dive Plan: The plan was to enter the water and submerge as soon as we were clear of jetty, take a heading of SSE and head for the island. I was going to navigate, Mike was going to tend the flag. When we reach the base of the island at about 20fsw, I was going to keep the rocks on the left and proceed around the island until I was heading ESE and head for an area called Price's neck at a depth of 30' until we hit our turn around pressure of 1,900 psi. we would ascend to 15-20 fsw and retrace our path back around the island until I hit a depth of about 15' sand and had a NNW heading. Moving across the sand until reach eel grass and which point we can snorkel to the ramp. This is a dive profile I have done numerous times solo.
Gear: This year I upgraded to a drysuit, an Aqualung Fusion with a Hollis 100gm undergarment. This would be dive number seven with this suit and the second dive with a recently purchased DUI weight harness. Before this season I had no experience diving dry and have been hesitant to do any solo dives (I am usually solo about half the time). I was using 12 lbs in my Nighthawk BCD and 20 on the harness and a steel 120 filled to 3400 psi.
The Dive: the dive started well, we made it across to the island as planned and but the surface waves could be felt even at depth once we closer to the southern exposure of the island. We started out on out easterly heading at a depth of around 30 fsw with visibility of 4-6'. Farther along in the dive we migrated down to near 40 fsw, and still feel the push of the waves as we went. What I was not aware of was that the wind, which had been blowing for several days had set up a long shore current, accelerating our swim to the East. We hit our turning pressure and I headed us into shallower water. The swell was considerably more noticeable at these shallower depths we made much less progress coming back and the wave action seem to keep taking back to 30', Finally at about 1100 psi I decided that we needed to do a pop-up and double check our bearings. When we surfaced I realized that we were still south of the island and were nowhere near the western end of the island and were actually only due south of it. The wind and the swell had picked up considerably at this point I told mike that we should head for the protection of the western side of the rocks which would shelter us from the waves and we could proceed with a surface swim to the haul-out.
The Trouble: I have done variation of this dive a several times over the years and have on more than one occasion found myself short on gas and plodding away on the surface. This was no different except for the new dry suit. What I immediately noticed about the suit and harness was the weights sit much lower on my hips than a weight belt and they kept me vertical in the water when I added gas to my BCD. The bigger problem was that the collar on the dry suit was adding pressure to my neck, not a lot but enough. On land it was noticeable but not terrible, in my normal horizontal trim it was hardly noticeable at all. On the surface of this dive it was significant. It was having a impact on blood flow and I could feel it. I could feel it on my neck and made using the snorkel very claustrophobic. After struggling with my orientation for the surface swim I rolled onto my back with the intention of swimming in on my back and pulled down my mask to get more air and hopefully better blood flow to my head. I was not panicking, but I could feel that was the direction I was heading. The pressure was enough to now make me feel noticeably lightheaded and I was concerned that if I continued to get light headed it would flip me over face down in water and I would not be able to right myself in the chop. Mike was about 30 ft away at this point and I shouted to him I was going to dump my weights. I was thinking that if I lost the weights on the harness I would be able to lay flat in the water, taking the pressure off my arteries and surface swim in. I did a little fumbling to find the releases (I, of course, forgot how much lower they sit than my old belt). I dropped the left one and then the right one a few seconds later.
As soon as they were clear my legs floated up. I still felt the need for blood to get to my head and the nascent panic was still there but it was immediately getting better. I closed my shoulder valve so I could pump up my dry suit with more air and not having to worry about losing it. I didn't really want to have the back badder too full since the tank was going to act as a keel during the swim. I gave a couple of spritzes of air to the suit until I calmed down and was comfortably buoyant. Things were much better once in the lee of the rocks. It took a good five minutes to completely regain my composure once I had dumped the weights.
I have been diving on and off since 1980 and have been doing it with steadfast regularity for the last six years. This is the first time I have ever dumped weights. My problems on the surface came up in less than a minute and I made the decision to drop them within a another couple of minutes.
I have been in situations where a long surface swim was necessary, but always with a wetsuit. The relatively rough seas and the pressure on my neck proved a bad combination. Had I been waiting at a ladder or for a boat pick-up, the vertical orientation in the water would not been a big a problem. My guess is that trying to keep my head back so that my snorkel would stay out of the water or later my face out of the water was what was causing/allowing the collar on the dry suit to put pressure on my neck. I am going to see about having the neck opened up a little more or make some other changes to my rig.
Red is the dive path, Green is the surface swim.
This is what the water looked like after we exited.
