Penzance 10th to 11th July 2004
This was the second year that we had dived out of Penzance
on Site Seeker. We stayed at Trevarrack Cottage in Rosudgeon, which is owned by
the skipper and his wife. This trip was organised by Louise Cronin and the
others on the trip were Steve Jones, Kieran Barry, Adrian Smith, Danny Burchett,
Jason Poynting, Rob Potton and Natasha Bowey.
We arrived at the quayside by 8am on the Saturday morning
to load the boat. This involved carrying all the gear down a lot of steps which
was somewhat precarious to say the least.
Everyone else had brought back gas suitable for the planned
dives. Unfortunately as my dives had been blown out the previous weekend my back
gas was a 17/35 mix. This was the subject of much amusement, but at least I had
an END of 18.6 metres on the first dive and 11.3 metres on the second.
Saturday
Dive 1: City of
Westminster, Max Depth 36.9 metres, Run time 63 minutes, Viz 6-8 metres
The City of Westminster was a 6,094 ton 470 foot long ship
that was originally a German ship called the Rudelsburg, she was handed over to
Britain as part of war reparations in 1919. She sank in 1923 when she was
carrying maize from Belfast to Rotterdam after hitting the Runnel Stone in thick
fog, all of 73 people on board were rescued.
All of the above is totally meaningless as this dive should
have just been called the Runnel Stone. Gordon, the skipper, said the shot was
in by the boilers at a depth of 30 metres. (Later that evening someone else said
the boilers were at 20 metres) Myself and Kieran were the first ones in and when
we got to 37 metres we found the shot where it had landed, no drag marks, on the
sea bed. We did a search around, as did everyone else, but no one on our boat
managed to find the wreck.
The reef itself is not a bad dive with a lot of jewel
anemones. We saw a couple of congers and managed about 30 minutes bottom time
before starting our ascent.
Back on the surface it was apparent that there was a
problem, not helped when we saw a helicopter coming our way. Fortunately this
was en route to the Scilly Isles and not what we thought. When the boat came to
pick us up we were told that the winch cable had broken when trying to lift
Danny “fat b@st@rd” Burchett aboard.
He denies that it was his fault, of course, but then again
it’s me that writes the trip report not him.
So no problem, we would just get back on board with the
ladder that ALL(?) boats carry. Unfortunately this one didn’t!!!
Lou & Jason, Rob & Natasha had been picked up by a
RIB and were transferred to the boat that way. Kieran and I were not so lucky.
We arrived at the tail lift and were told by Gordon that not only had the cable
snapped but the platform and the handrails had fallen back and needed to be
recovered. So Kieran and I went down a couple of metres to recover it. This was
not as easy as it first seemed as we got quite a battering from the various bits
of metalwork, and this was in relatively calm water. Eventually we got the
handrails and platform back in position so that we could at least stand on the
platform waist deep in the water. Then we had to dekit helped by one of the
divers who had come over from the RIB. This took a little time and much more
stress, this also involved trying to lift my twin set aboard while still
attached to me via my suit inflator. More about this at the start of the second
dive.
For our surface interval we went into Newlyn which gave
Gordon time to fix the cable on the tail lift winch.
Dive
2: Alice Marie, Max depth 25 metres, Run time 39 metres, Viz 6-8 metres
The Alice Marie was a steel barque which sank in 1909 after
hitting the Runnel Stone, she then sank in Mounts Bay.
A RIB was tied up to the buoy on this wreck so we had quite
a surface swim from where we were dropped. Then as soon as we started to descend
my suit started to flood from the inflator area. I signalled to Kieran to
continue alone while I aborted the dive. Back on board when I took off my
“dry” suit the source of the problem was obvious. The threaded backplate on
the inside of the suit was loose, having probably slipped a thread when being
pulled earlier. So I quickly kitted up again and went back in by myself.
The wreck itself is well broken up and there are some
conger amongst the plates and other debris. I didn’t take in any deco gas on
this one as the wreck was supposed to be at 18 – 20 metres, but I spent most
of it at about 25 metres, so this turned into another deco dive mainly because
of my “chosen” back gas.
On the Saturday night we used 2 cars to go out for a meal,
as the local wasn’t currently doing food, then returned to the local pub for a
few beers. It was jazz music night
at the pub and so we decided to sit outside, and it was bloody cold. We were
entertained by various tales from Kieran, I won’t go into any details here,
(fortunately,) but these stories involved: thumbs, fists, fat birds and many
other practices which are probably illegal in most “civilised” countries.
Sorry folks but you had to be there.
Sunday
Dive
1: Hellops, Max depth 37.8 metres, Run time 48 minutes, Viz 8 metres
As I was going down the
shot I realised that I hadn’t changed my back gas and deco gas on my computer.
It was still showing 75%, so I spent the first few minutes of this dive lying on
the sea bed at 38 metres resetting the gases on the VR3. By the time that I
reset everything my apparent CNS loading was about 700%
There are plenty of fish to
be seen on this wreck especially at the stern where there are some very large
bib, and pollack. The rudder and prop are also still there.
About 15 – 20 minutes into the dive I was aware that I
was having some difficulty moving forward, and there was no current. Then I
looked behind to see that my reel had snagged and I had about 20 metres of line
behind me wrapped around various bits of metal. So I spent the next 5 minutes or
so rewinding all this spaghetti before continuing the dive.
Dive 2: Conqueror,
Max depth 18.0 metres, Run time 35 minutes, Viz 6 metres
The Conqueror was a 1,157 ton, 240 foot long
trawler that ran aground on Boxing Day 1977 carrying a cargo of frozen
mackerel.
We were originally going to dive the wreck of the Lincoln
but the sea had become quite lumpy so this was about all that was on offer,
other than Low Lee Ledges.
Another longish surface swim to reach the buoy, approximately 40 metres or so this time. Somewhat annoying this particular trend. The wreck itself is nothing special, there are a couple of swim throughs, and is probably a good training dive for novices. But we got fed up quite early on. Danny and I had set off in opposite directions and managed to pass each other 4 times in the first 15 – 20 minutes, so to say that it was small would not be an exaggeration.