The
was current. I believe we got stuck in a wave return current following the UW canyon.
This was our first dive, a good mile + from shore. You don't get Up & Down below the UW buoy in 40+ feet deep.
We had to go down quick, and even so had a good 10 min kickfest to get to the mooring line. There we stayed for awhile to catch our breath and slow down our breathing. It was impossible on the surface to swim to the buoy down, we were just getting farther away, so we had to hug the bottom.
I hadn't expected the thick nylon rope of the buoy to have so much sea life on it. I now know better, I use my arm & wetsuit to stay still & relax.
We were quite close to where The Agressor II was moored off 7MB, Sunday (March 4th when I saw it) through Thursday, unable to leave the 7MB area to go to Little Cayman.
It's not at all like Cozumel drift dive that I did last year - you don't follow a buoy down, you go down as a team and drift together. This, was a struggle. Not all areas, the 2nd dive was closer to shore, though about as deep, and current almost nil.
We weren't expecting a current - and Sylvie had drifted a ways waiting for me - I had all my camera gear w/two strobes. So I had to swim to her, which was due West, with the boat pointing due East into the wind.
The first ocean dive after some 5+ months are the hardest. Now we know better - grab the ladder while waiting for you buddy and go down together.
Forgive me if I misunderstand what you are saying here, but how would a current make you go vertical? Was it a downwelling off of a wall or something?
My experience has been that if you were diving in high swells and small craft advisories, grabbing the mooring line is likely to result in feeling like the line is trying to take your arm off at the shoulder. Because of the way the boat will react to the waves and winds, it pulls the mooring line back and forth through the water and makes it seem as though there is a very strong current. If you had released the mooring line, you probably would have found the actual current to be less than you thought.
---------- Post added April 10th, 2012 at 09:29 PM ----------
On Tuesday night we stopped to eat at Calico Jack's, and the waves & water were cresting right up to the deck, thus two rows deep of picnic tables flooded every 10th wave or so, at around 9pm.
The waitress there talked to me about Nathan. Currently there's a sharp drop-off from the sand into the ocean, a good 2+ feet. It's not a gradual slope into the water. So it's easy to step one foot into this zone and be thrown off balance, into the ocean.
Sad story - not knowing exactly what happened. His story was the talk of the town, so to say. Posters everywhere on the island that I went.
