The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
Dive class for a friend and her friends. A little bigger than I like (a full 8) and way out in another county. Ah, but the best part is that they have an 8 ft pool and live on a spring fed lake that goes to at least 60 ft deep. The "cleanest" lake in Florida as the owner loves to point out!
So a majority of the class room stufola has happened and all of the pool stufola has been accomplished and we are ready for our first OW dive. I bring the big red ball out about 125' from shore and drop the concrete anchor. You know, it's one of those concrete supports they sell for creating a deck. I go down the line to find a somewhat mucky bottom @ 25' deep. The muck is only a half inch to the sand so I don't sweat it and the vis is at least 10-15 feet so I go back, do my briefing, get all of my ducks in a row and swim them out to the buoy.
One student is mortified, so I wait for her to exit and then begin the descent. Unfortunately, these students listen way too well. I briefly mentioned in class that the best to descend a down line is hand over fist, or just drift down while holding the your fingers around it, but don't swim! They heard the first part.
So there I am, having gone down first waiting for my first eager student. I then barely perceive a slight thump-thump-thump as the visibility starts to decrease rapidly. But my fins are steady and I am not on the bottom... WHAT GIVES??? Then I look at the anchor up close and see that it was bouncing off of the bottom... thump-thump-thump! Acting like a giant agitator from a washing machine... thumpity-thumpity-thumpity!
As the second student arrived, I realized that we were NOT going to be able to make this work. You could not see your hand stretched out in front of you! So, up the line I went with students 1, 2, 3 and 4. Then I got all the rest to huddle together on the surface around the buoy, as I went down one at a time to the bottom to do a mask clear, a reg retrieval and an ESA with each one in turn.
Not to be completely frustrated in my attempts to show them the fun of diving, we packed up quickly and headed for Alexander Springs. Unfortunately, mother nature had other plans and so we aborted that dive as well, and went back and worked on tables some more.
Sunday afternoon saw us back at Alexander (sans one student who had to drive to Jax) and all three dives were completed in that amazing vis.
Lesson learned... a great theory is never as strong as a few moments of reality. A tarp on the bottom would have prevented this from happening and even though the muck was only a half inch deep, it has the ability to muck up several cubic yards of water. Even better... I don't think I will EVER take a class into a new area for dives 1, 2 and 3 again. Familiarity breeds attempt... and I like the idea of knowing the entire area 100%. Alexander Springs is far less stressful for the beginning diver and has more to look at too!
The class has one more evening session to conclude, their test, and then their final OW dives in the ocean out of Jupiter a week from this Saturday!
So a majority of the class room stufola has happened and all of the pool stufola has been accomplished and we are ready for our first OW dive. I bring the big red ball out about 125' from shore and drop the concrete anchor. You know, it's one of those concrete supports they sell for creating a deck. I go down the line to find a somewhat mucky bottom @ 25' deep. The muck is only a half inch to the sand so I don't sweat it and the vis is at least 10-15 feet so I go back, do my briefing, get all of my ducks in a row and swim them out to the buoy.
One student is mortified, so I wait for her to exit and then begin the descent. Unfortunately, these students listen way too well. I briefly mentioned in class that the best to descend a down line is hand over fist, or just drift down while holding the your fingers around it, but don't swim! They heard the first part.
So there I am, having gone down first waiting for my first eager student. I then barely perceive a slight thump-thump-thump as the visibility starts to decrease rapidly. But my fins are steady and I am not on the bottom... WHAT GIVES??? Then I look at the anchor up close and see that it was bouncing off of the bottom... thump-thump-thump! Acting like a giant agitator from a washing machine... thumpity-thumpity-thumpity!
As the second student arrived, I realized that we were NOT going to be able to make this work. You could not see your hand stretched out in front of you! So, up the line I went with students 1, 2, 3 and 4. Then I got all the rest to huddle together on the surface around the buoy, as I went down one at a time to the bottom to do a mask clear, a reg retrieval and an ESA with each one in turn.
Not to be completely frustrated in my attempts to show them the fun of diving, we packed up quickly and headed for Alexander Springs. Unfortunately, mother nature had other plans and so we aborted that dive as well, and went back and worked on tables some more.
Sunday afternoon saw us back at Alexander (sans one student who had to drive to Jax) and all three dives were completed in that amazing vis.
Lesson learned... a great theory is never as strong as a few moments of reality. A tarp on the bottom would have prevented this from happening and even though the muck was only a half inch deep, it has the ability to muck up several cubic yards of water. Even better... I don't think I will EVER take a class into a new area for dives 1, 2 and 3 again. Familiarity breeds attempt... and I like the idea of knowing the entire area 100%. Alexander Springs is far less stressful for the beginning diver and has more to look at too!
The class has one more evening session to conclude, their test, and then their final OW dives in the ocean out of Jupiter a week from this Saturday!
Many of the quarries have much less than half an inch of silt or muck on the bottom and it will destroy the viz very quickly when you get new or unskilled divers doing anything that stirs it up. Good thing you had some back up options even though you caught a bad break from Mother nature. We pretty much have no choice but to go ahead and do the dives regardless of the viz which is hard on the students and IMHO causes some of them to give up on diving.
