For our next story we step back in time to the early SOB days.
We had anchored on a boulder patch. The danforth was modest but the rest of the ground tackle was truly excessive for the 25 foot dive boat
25of 3/8 galvanized chain and ¾ nylon braided rode. Needless to say
the anchor itself never saw a day of honest work with that much weight in chain.
Surface chop and current were modest as well and we intended to each kill our limit of fish, as far apart from one another as possible.
Such was the competitive nature of our diving at the time. We were of course well equipped to dive without a buddy near by
we had Spare Air!
My *buddys* Spare Air was an older model with a thumb wheel that he needed to turn on to get air
. I however had the latest in diver safety: my Spare Air had a little lever that only needed to be flipped up to instantly provide air to spare.
Having splashed in at about the same time we immediately parted company and went about the business of spearing the biggest, the best and the most.
Having much better air consumption than my *buddy* I knew that the task of relieving the anchor from the boulders would fall to me since he would be back on the boat by then.
As the SPG ran down to 500 psi I headed back toward the anchor line and fortunately found it rather quickly given the limited viz.
Just then I saw the biggest~n~best
and had to add it to my stringer. The stringing took longer that the spearing as the biggest~n~best was not cooperating. Evidentially it did not realize that a paralyzer tip in the brain was supposed to produce compliance.
Down to 300 psi now but in possession of the trophies to prove my prowess I proceeded to the task at hand.
The boulder pile was rather large and had 25 of 3/8 chain draped across it. No good just moving the anchor
the chain was the issue and it needed to be moved out into the sand clear of entanglement
up current/up wind
which of course meant across the largest portion of the boulder pile.
So I set about moving, untangling, dragging, hauling & hoisting all this chain up and over the boulder pile while huffing, puffing, moaning and groaning until I had it all just about clear
and suddenly it was like sucking air through a straw
a small straw
one of those coffee stirrer straws.
Well I only had a few more feet to go. And it was only 70 feet deep. And we didnt have any more tanks on board. And I wasnt about to cut my beautiful ¾ nylon braid and leave my chain lying on the bottom. And I did, after all, have SPARE AIR!
This assessment took only micro-seconds
and so armed with the reassurance that comes from not having drowned before I proceeded to hump the last bit of chain off the boulder pile while sucking as hard as I could to pull a vacuum on my AL80.
One final heave and the chain was clear and the Spare Air was retrieved. I took the now useless regulator out of my mouth, flipped the little lever on the Spare Air and
Nothing happened.
No air
nada
zip
zilch
nothing
flip flip flip
OK... I havent had a breath for a while now
Ive been working hard and the Spare Air doesnt have any spare air.
Only one thing to do... no, not release the weight belt... I wasn't about to leave 40# of good lead behind... I swam as hard as I could straight up.
Obviously I was able to make an ESA but confess that I did not blow out tiny bubbles on the way up
I didnt have any to blow. Fortunately I did try my regulator again and was able to squeak a tiny bit o air off of it at about 30fsw
that was enough to get me the rest of the way.
Moral: sometimes you can have too much chain and too little air.
So
I downsized in the chain department
got rid of the spare death
and decided not to cut things quite so close in the future.
Hey... do you suppose Spare Air would use my story in one of their advertisements??
