Saturday, November 14, 2009

Key Biscayne


A 4:30am start is always tough, but the wreck of the Jack-up Rig Key Biscayne is usually worth the effort. Our team's 'good weather fairy' Justin delivered again and provided us with great conditions despite being called off the dive at the eleventh hour due to work commitments.
That said, and despite the good weather, the trip out to the wreck had everyone on board dropping their breakfast over the side before we got to the wreck and there were some distinctly yellow faces as people geared up and dropped in.

The Dive

We motored down the shot line and then took a wide swing around the perimeter of the wreck enjoying the good (15m) vis to get a rare overview of the wreck site. We then hung around the central section of the wreck which is littered with meters of scattered drill rods and other oil rig paraphernalia exploring the crevices of the up-turned superstructure. Unsurprisingly the Crays were out in force, knowing as they do that this was the last day before the season begins. Its a given that by tomorrow they will all have vanished.


As we got into the latter half of our 30min bottom time we headed off down one of the three triangular legs now laying splayed out on the sand in 40m water. These legs are massive, 10m high and at least 200m long and make for a great scooter ride.
Once back at the main superstructure we took our time ascending to the shot line and into a slightly nauseous deco; the seasickness having not totally worn off on the dive.

Date: 14/11/2009
Max: 40m
Avg: 21m
BT: 30mins
RT: 60mins
BG: 21/35
Deco: EAN50
Ratio: 3,2,2,2,2,8,5

Heres some video and photos from the dive.





Colourful life on the upturned deck

A diver ascends the shot line

Scattered winch at the end of a leg

Part of a crane

Into the distance

Crushed Superstructure


An encrusted motor

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

GUE Extravaganza 2009

GUE Wrecks of the South China Sea trip 2009
In this photo: Gideon Liew, Alvin Javier, ZJ Wen, Eriko Jonsson, Andy Dyer, Thomas Jonsson,
Takashi Tayama, Richard Walker, Andrew Robertson, Justin Martin,
Richard Walkland, Leon Boey, Dagomir Dag Kaszlikowski

For the past three years Gideon Liew and his team from Living Seas have been running a GUE sponsored dive trip to the numerous wrecks around Tioman off the coast of Malaysia. October in the South China Seas is a period of calm and warm weather perfect for running extended open ocean diving expeditions. Each year the trip has grown in popularity and and the calibre of the diving has improved from what was essentially a Fundamentals level trip in 2007 to a full Tech 1 & Tech 2 level expedition with scooters etc in 2009.

Word of these trips has certainly got around and this year the trip was over subscribed. The trip also attracted a prestigious number of GUE Instructors from around the world; along for the trip with Gideon and Leon was Thomas Jonsson, his wife Eriko and Takashi Tayama representing the Japanese Underwater Explorers (JUE); and from the UK Rich Walker GUE's Technical Training Director joined the trip as part of a four week diving tour of South East Asia.

The rest of the team was made up of the technical divers from Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, both regular faces and some new blood, and of course the DIRdudes were there again to lend our own distinct form of credibility to the whole proceedings!

THE DIVING