Panama City Beach - Black Bart and Hovercraft Dives

[Skeptic14]

Some nasty weather had settled over the panhandle for the last couple weeks but the forecast for Saturday looked to be improving, so we headed over to PCB to do some diving with Dive Locker on the Narcosis.

The day started out nice and clear but some fronts moved in right about the time we were leaving dock so
it was pretty sporty leaving the pass, but the storm front passed and things settled down a little once we got to the dive sites. We did the black bart tug and the hovercraft and despite all the rain the water was very nice. The first 50 feet down the visibility was 40-50ft and nice blue water. But below the thermocline the vis dropped to around 20-30ft. Lots of fish, amberjack cutting through bait balls, a big loggerhead on the bart, a lot of large blue angelfish and lots of other interesting critters.

The Dive Locker crew was great, a very enthusiastic and high energy bunch and would definitely dive with them again.

A few shots:

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The rest 2016 North FL Diving

 

[sportxlh]

I dove the Black Bart on Saturday as well, but with Diver's Den. Vis was only so-so in the morning: I'll bet it was 30 feet at best. The bait fish balls on the BB were incredibly thick: pretty wild watching the amber jack herd the bait fish and dive bomb them. Also saw a batfish down in the sand off the starboard side of the wreck: you don't seem many of those in the Atlantic outside of Blue Heron Bridge, but I've seen a quite a few on gulf dives. Bridge Span #14 had better vis at about 50 feet. Plus, the four resident goliath grouper were not acting bashful and moved in close to the divers as long as the divers weren't flailing about. I thought the seas were just a bit sporty as well: not that the waves were big, but the interval seemed very very short and at times the wave action became unorganized and seemed like a washing machine bouncing us around. Diver's Den is also a good shop/boat.

There are a lot of mantis shrimp around the hover craft: if you have a macro lens with you on your next dive, swim out about twenty feet on the port or starboard side of the craft and look for almost perfectly round holes in the sand: those holes are likely to contain the mantis shrimp.

Nice pictures! Where'd you take the shot of the turtle?

 

[eeel]

That turtle pretty much lives on the pilot hose roof of the Bart. I see it there more times than not. It looks like that is where tha photo was taken.
Great pics by the way it was too rough for my biat this's weekend we stayed inside the bay.
Glad you guys got to go out.

 

[Skeptic14]

Bridge Span #14 had better vis at about 50 feet. Plus, the four resident goliath grouper were not acting bashful and moved in close to the divers as long as the divers weren't flailing about. I thought the seas were just a bit sporty as well: not that the waves were big, but the interval seemed very very short and at times the wave action became unorganized and seemed like a washing machine bouncing us around. Diver's Den is also a good shop/boat.

There are a lot of mantis shrimp around the hover craft: if you have a macro lens with you on your next dive, swim out about twenty feet on the port or starboard side of the craft and look for almost perfectly round holes in the sand: those holes are likely to contain the mantis shrimp.

Nice pictures! Where'd you take the shot of the turtle?

We had the option of span #14 or hovercraft and the consensus was hovercraft but that sounds pretty cool regarding the goliaths.

There were some nice waves stacked up in the pass going out, but coming back was smooth, but we weren't coming in until 7:15pm.

Thanks for the mantis shrimp tip, will have to remember that.

The turtle was on the top of the bart, I think around 54ft down... that was still in the nice blue water, made for a very clear shot.

That turtle pretty much lives on the pilot hose roof of the Bart. I see it there more times than not. It looks like that is where tha photo was taken.
Great pics by the way it was too rough for my biat this's weekend we stayed inside the bay.
Glad you guys got to go out.

Yep, that's where he was resting.

 

[sportxlh]

I didn't see the turtle in the AM. Divers must have scared it off before I got the wheelhouse. I'll have to keep an eye out for it in the future.

That picture turned out particularly well

 

[Skeptic14]

Thanks, sometimes it all comes together just right!

He seemed pretty accustom to divers and our captain told us to look for him, so I suspect he's a regular there.

Next time I dive PCB, I definitely want to try and see the goliaths, are they regulars at span #14?

 

[sportxlh]

I also dove the span #14 in May and there were two that I saw on the span at that time. The Divers Den DM indicated that four have been on the span for quite a while, so I might have simply missed two of them in June.

Above the thermocline, the water was pretty clear, much like your BB observation, so a camera like yours would have taken a really good picture if you could get all of them in a single frame

 

[deeper thoughts]

thnx for posting

 

[Skeptic14]

I did some cropping to the blue angelfish pic I original posted but I can't remove the dead link now; I think the cropping helped a bit:

[url=https://flic.kr/p/KfWG6j][/URL]