Richard Lundgren
05-22-2006, 07:20 AM
Wakulla uppdate - New monster sized tunnel discovered
Written by Anthony Rue
Just in case someone out there might be interested, here's a quick update on this weekend's WKPP activities at Wakulla Springs. I'm sure Casey and Mark Messersmith will have a full narrative once they've had a few hours of sleep, but I've seen several notes today from people interested in finding out how it went.
The weekend's dive was extremely rewarding. A crack team of support divers began placing deco bottles on Friday afternoon so that the breather teams could get an early start Saturday. Conditions were similar to two weeks ago-- perhaps a bit more blue to the water, but still murky with ~75' of vis in the basin. We started off at 6am Saturday with approximately 25 in-water and surface support. The extended range set-up team took off at 7am for another 7-to-7 dive.
JJ and Casey were over the ledge and into the cave just before 9am. From 10am on, support divers took turns pulling shifts that put most of them in the water for five to seven hours. I'll leave it to Mark's report to give all the thanks, but I'll say that from this pesky photographer's perspective I've never seen a more cohesive and professional show by the team. It started with the surface managers Hunter and Sonya, and extended through the friendly new surface support. Fantastic job all around. I finally got a chance to talk to JJ and Casey in the habitat at 1am Sunday morning, and I've never seen either of them so amped up after such an extended dive-- especially with 5 more hours of deco to go. Here is Casey's outline of the result:
Jarrod and Casey's Profile - 260ft for 410 minutes w/ 14 hours of decompression. In at 9am Sat and out at 6am Sunday. 5 scooters and 5 drive bottles.
Results - Q-Tunnel discovered off P-Tunnel at 17,000ft. 3,000ft of line added for a total distance around 20,000ft. Monster sized cave heading S-SW towards Spring Creek and the Gulf of Mexico - 60ft floor to ceiling and 75ft wide in spots.
It has been a long time since the team ran a 24 hour dive. Everyone should be proud of the effort that went in to making it a success. Get some sleep now that we have Q-Tunnel to map...
Also, the Tallahassee Democrat ran a story about the project on Saturday morning. They've posted a nice quicktime video that shows a quick inspection of a few of the flow meters-- be sure to click on the media link on the right side of the article. Here's a shortcut to the article:
http://tinyurl.com/e62rl (http://tinyurl.com/e62rl)
Best,
Anthony
Written by Anthony Rue
Just in case someone out there might be interested, here's a quick update on this weekend's WKPP activities at Wakulla Springs. I'm sure Casey and Mark Messersmith will have a full narrative once they've had a few hours of sleep, but I've seen several notes today from people interested in finding out how it went.
The weekend's dive was extremely rewarding. A crack team of support divers began placing deco bottles on Friday afternoon so that the breather teams could get an early start Saturday. Conditions were similar to two weeks ago-- perhaps a bit more blue to the water, but still murky with ~75' of vis in the basin. We started off at 6am Saturday with approximately 25 in-water and surface support. The extended range set-up team took off at 7am for another 7-to-7 dive.
JJ and Casey were over the ledge and into the cave just before 9am. From 10am on, support divers took turns pulling shifts that put most of them in the water for five to seven hours. I'll leave it to Mark's report to give all the thanks, but I'll say that from this pesky photographer's perspective I've never seen a more cohesive and professional show by the team. It started with the surface managers Hunter and Sonya, and extended through the friendly new surface support. Fantastic job all around. I finally got a chance to talk to JJ and Casey in the habitat at 1am Sunday morning, and I've never seen either of them so amped up after such an extended dive-- especially with 5 more hours of deco to go. Here is Casey's outline of the result:
Jarrod and Casey's Profile - 260ft for 410 minutes w/ 14 hours of decompression. In at 9am Sat and out at 6am Sunday. 5 scooters and 5 drive bottles.
Results - Q-Tunnel discovered off P-Tunnel at 17,000ft. 3,000ft of line added for a total distance around 20,000ft. Monster sized cave heading S-SW towards Spring Creek and the Gulf of Mexico - 60ft floor to ceiling and 75ft wide in spots.
It has been a long time since the team ran a 24 hour dive. Everyone should be proud of the effort that went in to making it a success. Get some sleep now that we have Q-Tunnel to map...
Also, the Tallahassee Democrat ran a story about the project on Saturday morning. They've posted a nice quicktime video that shows a quick inspection of a few of the flow meters-- be sure to click on the media link on the right side of the article. Here's a shortcut to the article:
http://tinyurl.com/e62rl (http://tinyurl.com/e62rl)
Best,
Anthony