Pompano reefs

[vr24]

I dove all winter last year, I used a 3mil suit, with 2 mil socks under my booties, plus a 3 mil hooded vest under my suit, was just fine the entire winter... sometimes actually warm...

 

[SFLDiver3445]

Don't mean to distract form the subject of this thread, but I have seen colder water in South Florida. In the mid-nineties, I was doing a tech dive on the Wreck of The Cruz Del Sur (Not far from Houlover Inlet and 250ft to the bottom) and we encountered a VERY cold water deep current (not a standard thermocline). As we descended past 100 feet our temperature gauges began to drop. By the time we hit the anchor, which was on the tower of the wreck, our gauges were in the low fifties and dropping. I'll never forget it, because we were only wearing 3 mils and were not expecting cold water, because the surface water temperature was in the eighties - My external ears were in pain from the cold. Needless to say, we unhooked the achor and ascended immediately. We heard from some other tech divers that they had encountered 40+ degree deep water currents that weekend as well.

 

[Scubakevdm]

Don't mean to distract form the subject of this thread, but I have seen colder water in South Florida. In the mid-nineties, I was doing a tech dive on the Wreck of The Cruz Del Sur (Not far from Houlover Inlet and 250ft to the bottom) and we encountered a VERY cold water deep current (not a standard thermocline). As we descended past 100 feet our temperature gauges began to drop. By the time we hit the anchor, which was on the tower of the wreck, our gauges were in the low fifties and dropping. I'll never forget it, because we were only wearing 3 mils and were not expecting cold water, because the surface water temperature was in the eighties - My external ears were in pain from the cold. Needless to say, we unhooked the achor and ascended immediately. We heard from some other tech divers that they had encountered 40+ degree deep water currents that weekend as well.

Yeah, on some of the deeper wrecks I've seen thermoclines in the 50's. Mostly in the summer. Anyway, I'm pretty sure they wont be an issue on the Pompano reefs.

 

[deepstops]

Don't mean to distract form the subject of this thread, but I have seen colder water in South Florida. In the mid-nineties, I was doing a tech dive on the Wreck of The Cruz Del Sur (Not far from Houlover Inlet and 250ft to the bottom) and we encountered a VERY cold water deep current (not a standard thermocline). As we descended past 100 feet our temperature gauges began to drop. By the time we hit the anchor, which was on the tower of the wreck, our gauges were in the low fifties and dropping. I'll never forget it, because we were only wearing 3 mils and were not expecting cold water, because the surface water temperature was in the eighties - My external ears were in pain from the cold. Needless to say, we unhooked the achor and ascended immediately. We heard from some other tech divers that they had encountered 40+ degree deep water currents that weekend as well.

What you encountered was this most likely and had nothing to do with it being winter.

These coldwater upwellings are fairly common in the summer here. I've hit mid 60s at Hole in the Wall and mid-50s on the Hydro a few times.

 

[SFLDiver3445]

What you encountered was this most likely and had nothing to do with it being winter.

These coldwater upwellings are fairly common in the summer here. I've hit mid 60s at Hole in the Wall and mid-50s on the Hydro a few times.

If memory serves me, it was summer, because one of my dive buddies had a whole in the leg portion of the wetsuit he was wearing and he never would have been wearing that wetsuit in the winter.

The explaination in the link does seem to provide a reasonable explaination of what I experienced.