Holy crap!! Agree with String: Scrub the dive. This isn't a military operation. It's (supposed to be) recreation! Man....
I nearly lost fingers going up the ladder, at the end of my first OW cert dive in the Big Water. The surge was pretty heavy, and as I was climbing the ladder, I had my hands on the outsides of the ladder rather than on the rungs. The surge had pushed the ladder away from the back of the boat, but then it SLAMMED it back against the boat and if I wouldn't have had quick reflexes, there's no doubt in my mind that my hands would have been crushed.
I used one of those stringer ladders in Cozumel, and climbed it with my fins on. Not so bad, really... It's just easier to hand the fins up or clip them to snap rings on the cummberbund of my BC, though.