Advanced scuba class continued.
The early evening dive, the second of three we did on the Dan Safety Barge just a couple miles from shore. We didn’t expect any different dive conditions, the visibility was still 10-15 feet and the surface conditions remained the same. We put on our equipment and jumped into the water. I was the first to the bottom but I was surprised by what I encountered. When I descended to the bottom to find the anchor chain just laying on the bottom with no wreck in sight. I looked around but the limited visibility didn’t help. I ascended up the chain and told the students to hold onto the chain until I figure out what’s going on.
I made my way to the surface to look for the boat dive master and the captain said he was at the end of the chain so I went back down and found him waiting at the end where I saw a beacon light and the anchor itself. I got the divers and literally 2 feet from the end of the anchor was the wreck. It was an awesome sight because it just popped out of the murky water. All the divers made their way around the wreck staying very close to it for safety. As I made my way around I took my flashlight and started looking very carefully in every little space that you could see along the top edge of the structure. I came to one of the large rusted out cleats and shined my light in the rusted out section I saw a little crab but the coolest thing I saw was a fire worm. I had not seen one of those in over 30 years in Panama City Beach.
I did a little research on the fire worm and they say that if you where to just brush up against it with you bare skin that a bunch of the little hairs it has will inject a neurotoxin that is worse than a lion fish or a Portuguese man of war. You could have respiratory and heart issues in some cases, in other words DON’T TOUCH. The one I saw was about 6-8 inches long, 3/4 inches wide and about a 1/4 inch thick. It was looped inside the cleat but as I illuminated it with my flashlight it started to move towards me and about that time the dive master saw it and started trying to yell at me to get my attention so I didnt touch it even though I had my gloves on. I really knew better. We returned to the boat for our 1 hour surface interval to wait for the sun to set and prepare for the night dive.
When it was dark I put the chemical stick lights on everybody’s first stage yoke and to give anyone who only has one flashlight a spare light. Before we jumped into the dark ocean we noticed a lot of squid swimming just below the surface. We jumped in and started our descent to the same wreck we made our dusk dive on. This time when everyone turned on their flashlights they where greeted with thousands of squid swimming around us because the light attracted thousands of small fish. It was a great dive and everyone loved it so we got back on the boat for our travel back to the dock. I have made thousands of night dives and I never get tired of it.
Keep making bubbles and dive safe.
– Russell Miller, NAUI instructor #59999