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Maggie,

Thanks for the detail explanation, I just want to make sure I understand
correctly the NE procedures.

If any diver got drifted away from the wreck for any reason, the diver would
have no choice but to do drift deco. Is it true that this diver is on
his/her own then ? No chase boat will be deployed ?

Phi

> ----------
> From: 	Maggie Owens[SMTP:mmowens@pa*.co*]
> Sent: 	Thursday, May 13, 1999 1:20 AM
> To: 	Kevin Connell; techdiver@aquanaut.com
> Subject: 	Re: Jersey ascent line ???
> 
> May I be so bold as to explain why this doesn't work for us here? I guess 
> the conditions topside must be pretty different in the Northwest.
> 
> Many of the areas where we dive here see heavy shipping traffic. So if you
> 
> do a drifting deco, there is the chance of being run over by a big ship. 
> Furthermore, conditions are often rough (not that we don't have many days 
> "as smooth as the glaze on a plate"). In heavy or even moderate seas, it 
> can be difficult to spot a diver's lift bag or differentiate a breaking 
> wave from a bag at a distance. In heavy swells, the lift bag can spend a 
> lot of time in the lower part of the swell, making it nearly impossible to
> 
> spot from the boat. And of course in fog, it is hard to see much of
> anything.
> 
> The general practice here is to send a diver in to set and release the 
> hook. As I am not too experienced with either of these procedures (yet), I
> 
> don't feel qualified to comment on why the wreck can't be hooked securely 
> -- or unhooked) without the assistance of a diver, but it seems like it 
> would be a difficult procedure.
> 
> In any case, if there are divers on the wreck expecting to come up an 
> anchor line and the boat has gone off to fetch someone whose drifting 
> along, well, things could get kind of hectic, divers coming up all over
> the 
> place, and the boat trying to pick them up without running anyone over.
> 
> I think that the dive boats used in the NE tend to be a lot bigger than
> the 
> boats used in many other areas. Many of our wrecks are more than an hour's
> 
> ride from the dock. Combined with the often rough conditions, it is 
> obviously not practical to go diving off a small Zodiac here. Perhaps a 
> truly enormous dive boat could bring a Zodiac with it and use it as a
> chase 
> boat to pick up the drifting divers, but as far as I know this is not a 
> common practice.
> 
> There was an incident here a couple of years ago (I was on the boat that 
> day) where a diver (who was equipped with a line and bag) decided to do a 
> drifting deco for some reason I never learned. He drifted quite a distance
> 
> -- about a mile I think -- and was picked up by a sailboat that happened
> to 
> be passing by when he came up. This happened right around the time that
> the 
> boat captain was getting ready to ask the Coast Guard to send a
> helicopter. 
> Incorrect rumors of all kinds about the incident appeared all over the NE 
> dive community within 24 hours, and I think it was the subject of some 
> discussion on this list as well.
> 
> Hope I've done the matter justice and not mis-stated any important facts.
> 
> Maggie, who seems to be a northeast-wreck-diving-geek-and-boat-monkee
> 
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