Crazy currents this week

[morecowbells]

We have been diving for the past couple of days. The currents are crazy! We have been diving in Cozumel for 12 years and I have to say the currents are unlike anything I have encountered in the past. At least the weather has been stellar and oceans calm. #nonortes.

 

[flyboy08]

Carry your SMB

 

[Altamira]

Carry your SMB

And a PLB!

 

[DandyDon]

And a 19 cf pony. I left mine on the boat for a shallow reef dive once, not understanding that it was at the edge of a wall. Got pulled in a down current to 100 feet or so, thinking that I wish I'd brought mine. I swam out of it ok that time.

 

[ReefHound]

Define crazy. Fast? Odd directions? Down currents?

 

[Streydog]

I have had a few dives when the currents were not normal in Cozumel. I would like to hear what others have experienced. One example I had was a night dive at Delila when the current was ripping. There were only 3 of us and the guide so it was manageble but not your normal night dive. I remember seeing an octopus on top of the reef and I could not stay still for a couple seconds.

 

[morecowbells]

Define crazy. Fast? Odd directions? Down currents?

Both fast and change in direction. If they are wicked today, I will get a video of action.

 

[gopbroek]

It is the season. I think a slight shift in the main channel current angle causes eddies near the shore. For the last year or so most of the dives I have done have done have been in weak currents and lots of backward currents and mid dive reversals. Without the normal moderate to strong prevailing north current the visibility has suffered. February thru April 'crazy currents' has been the norm for me in years past so hopefully the normal current patterns are returning.

 

[cozcharlie]

They were evidently crazy last Thursday also. I dove in afternoon, but I heard the morning DM complaining about the currents to other divemasters.

I asked the captain what was up and he basically said the current was going every direction (think he literally he motioned with fingers pointing at each other going uo/down , forward backwards and sideways )

Strong currents are way too much trouble with a camera with strobes so we dove Palancar Gardens followed by Columbia Shallows so we could stay out of most of the issues. It was fine there though there was moderate current even on the inside of Palancar (i could see the sand blowing by fairly quickly in a photo of a stingray digging in the sand).

@Streydog. My worst current dive was with some locals at Cedar Pass after a hurricane had come through the Yucatán Channel between Cozumel and Cuba 17 years ago. We covered all of Cedar Pass and were inside of the Santa Rosa in something like 13 minutes (normally it is around 50 minutes ). Total dive time was either 9, 11 or 13 minutes depending upon who is telling the story. There literally were sponges everywhere blowing/rolling on the bottom like tumbleweeds. You basically had to keep your eyes forward and swerve left or right to avoid being pushed into coral heads. A friend wasn’t paying attention and got pushed a little closer to Santa Rosa wall at the end of the dive. He got stuck in a whirlpool where his bubbles were going down and not up. He didn’t getting taken very deep at all( since we we’re already on our way up near the surface ) but it really got his heart rate going and he was still talking about it years later.

That dive I doubt you could have even slowed down without literally hugging some coral head. We certainly would not have gone there that day with tourists. Also, only reason we dove that site because I was the idiot that suggested it (it is my favorite ). We knew it was going to be wicked fast before we got in, just not that fast.

 

[ggunn]

My worst current dive was with some locals at Cedar Pass after a hurricane had come through the Yucatán Channel between Cozumel and Cuba 17 years ago. We covered all of Cedar Pass and were inside of the Santa Rosa in something like 13 minutes (normally it is around 50 minutes ).

We did a dive very much like that a few years ago. We started at Cedral and ended up in San Francisco. In that section of Cedral between the canyon and the hills there was so much entrained sand that it looked like a blizzard. It was a wild ride for sure.