98 replies to this topic

[Basslet]

Hey Perrone. I also saw that comment about South Jersey vs. North Jersey and being from Jersey (north BTW) I didn't get it either.

[Geek]

North Jersey is mostly New York suburbs. South Jersey is more Philadelphia suburbs. People may care to be associated with one vs. the other, but I don't think there is any substantial difference in dive training or techniques between the two.

While I don't think either one of us wants to hijack the thread off into a DIR discussion, it is relevant in that GUE training is relatively uncommon in this area and the subject of what training they had from which agencies is relevant. I don't know what agencies these divers trained with, but PADI and TDI training would be common in this area.

By DIR "attitude" I am simply referring to the flame wars we have all seen on the Internet. Around here I think if someone said that he had taken a GUE Fundamentals course it would prompt a question of "How did you like it?" On the other hand, if someone said "I am a DIR diver." I probably wouldn't want to dive with him and a lot of other folks would react the same way. This isn't about dive skills. It is about attitude toward diving. BTW: I'll dive with almost anyone as long as they aren't a PITA.

Chatterton and Kohler are from around here and are sort of home town heros. If you watch Deep Sea Detectives, you'll see different gear from dive to dive. I've seen all sorts of colors, split fins, etc. on them on television. I don't recall seeing a Halcyon logo. I've also never heard either of them criticize another diver of lesser skill. Criticism of lesser skilled divers seems to be associated with DIR. I don't know of any other agency that has a term like "stroke" in their vocabulary.

A good example of DIR attitude is the discussion on this same topic going on right now on another board. Many of the posts on that board would have to be seen as disrespectful of the divers who died.

Edited by Geek, 20 March 2007 - 03:10 PM.

[Hipshot]

I received the following today from the New Jersey Council of Dive Clubs. It appears that all four divers penetrated the wreck, but one left early. He was the one who survived.

A shower of silt believed to have doomed 3 divers

Monday, March 19, 2007

BY LAURA JOHNSTON AND CARLY ROTHMAN

Star-Ledger Staff http://www.nj.com/

Swirling silt likely blinded three New Jersey divers and blocked their exit from the pump room of a sunken Navy ship, officials and scuba experts said yesterday.

The three men, Jonathan Walsweer and Scott Stanley of Westfield and Kevin Coughlin of Chatham Borough, died Friday after running out of air in the belly of the USS Spiegel Grove, 134 feet underwater, six miles east of Key Largo, Fla. A fourth diver, Howard Spialter of Westfield, escaped.

"Visibility went to zero," said Tom Doherty of Old Bridge, a dive instructor who knew all four men and spoke with Spialter after the accident. "Howard managed by feel, literally, to find the hatch opening in the floor and drop through it. That's how he survived."

Although the Monroe County Sheriff's Department originally reported Spialter stayed outside the wreck while his friends explored the labyrinth within, officials said yesterday all four divers swam to the pump room, a particularly dangerous part of the ship that was supposed to be sealed shut.

According to the sheriff's department, Spialter said the divers weren't sure where they were, but he thought he knew the right direction. As he ran low on air in his tank, he tried to tell the others which way to go, but they didn't listen. "He went one way and they went the other," Detective Mark Coleman said. "He lived because he went the right way and got out."

The Spiegel Grove, a 510-foot Navy landing ship dock, was sunk five years ago as an artificial reef and diving attraction. Each year an estimated tens of thousands of divers visit the wreck, though only the most experienced venture inside, where intense dark and strong currents can be disorienting.

The men dove the wreck about five other times, including on Thursday, when they also explored the pump room, friends said. They were experts, and all except Coughlin were instructors.

Spialter, 52, is a prominent Union County attorney and former Union Township municipal court judge.

Stanley, 55, a karate instructor and father of two grown children, was co-owner of the Carpet Mill outlet in East Hanover. Coughlin, 51, had battled back from homelessness and alcoholism to amass significant property holdings in New Jersey and elsewhere, said his friend, Bob Moran. And Walsweer, 38, had two young sons and worked as a financial adviser for Smith Barney in Roseland.

"The dive friends, everyone kind of came from different backgrounds and really got along well," said Walsweer's wife, Regina. "They were older than he was, but they really bonded together."

Drawing the men -- who planned their trip in November -- were 166 species of fish, including barracudas and bull sharks, and the history of the ship, which was commissioned in 1956 and once carried Navy amphibious craft to Cold War hot spots.

"It's a thrill," said Tony Donetz of Flemington, who dove at Spiegel Grove last year with all four men. "You never know ... what's going to be around that corner. It could be nothing. It could be some nice fish. It could be a shark. That's why you're exploring."

Spialter declined yesterday to speak to reporters. But friends in New Jersey, divers with whom he had made dozens of trips, spoke with Spialter. "He was just hysterical," said Marianne Stanley, Scott Stanley's wife. "I said, 'You did everything you could do.'" Spialter had grabbed Stanley by the hand, friends said. But when Stanley tried to help another friend, he lost his grip.

"He (Spialter) lost more than just a dive buddy," said Jim Flanagan, president of the Ocean Wreck Divers of New Jersey. "He lost his best friend."

The whole scary ordeal must have taken place about 20 minutes into the men's dive, said Doherty, explaining a tank could hold about 20 to 25 minutes of air at that depth.

The men had brought extra "stage tanks" with them, but left them closer to the entrance, unreachable once the curtain of silt descended, sheriff's officials said. And they didn't have dive reels -- spools of line tied to the dive entrance so divers can find their way back.

"It doesn't take very much movement to kick that silt up and cause problems with your ability to see," Coleman said. "Without a line to follow out and with lots of silt in the water, it would have been virtually impossible for them to find their way out of the wreck."

The men did set up strobe lights at the entrance and exit to each room, separated by narrow passages, friends said. Small, high-intensity lights, they can be dropped "like laying bread crumbs" as divers move through a wreck, said R. J. Hartman, owner of the Treasure Cove dive shop in Westfield that brought the men together.

But in the silt -- sand stirred up from the ground and rust raining down from above -- the strobe lights were not enough. Silt can take up to an hour to clear, even outside of wrecks, Doherty said.

Sheriff's officials also contend the men did not have a dive plan, something their friends dispute. Donetz said he spoke with Stanley last Monday and knew their plan, which included exploring the pump room.

The bodies of Walsweer and Stanley were brought to the surface Saturday after a team of rescue divers found them.

Two other divers had brought Coughlin's body to the surface on Friday. A boat from the Atlantis Dive Shop, of Key West, Fla., was out by the Scuba-do, the vessel which had taken the four Jersey friends out to the wreck, Atlantis co-owner Spencer Slate said yesterday.

The two divers on his 40-foot commercial boat the Starfish Enterprise, then went into the water, Slate said, but they were not immediately aware of the tragedy unfolding.

The divers told Slate they were swimming along the left side of the Spiegel Grove's deck, when they came upon Coughlin, who wasn't moving. It took them only a minute to surface with Coughlin, and a Coast Guard boat was there to take him away. "He had about made it, he was almost in open water," Slate said. "He must've just blacked out from exhaustion. He was just 70 feet from the surface."

Autopsies were scheduled for yesterday, but results were not available. The sheriff's office investigation is ongoing.

"It's a terrible tragedy," Doherty said. "I don't think we'll ever clearly understand what happened."

Staff writers Suleman Din, Ralph Ortega and Alexi Friedman contributed to this report.

[ScubaGypsy]

I see alot of North Jersey/NYC guys come up to RI to dive our wrecks. The charters that I have been on where guys penetrated were a progression style. Strobes on legs are common here in night diving, and occaisionally in the daytime, for open water. Prior to this incident, I had never heard of strobes being used in wreck diving.

I have yet to see any of these guys, or the local RI/MA guys, ever carry a reel, canister light, long hose or any Halcyon gear. In fact, I've been rather hassled several times about using the long hose. About half use doubles while others use ponys with 95-130 singles (both aluminum and steel). The first and only place in New England that I have seen Halcyon gear, and DIR divers, is at Brownstone Quarry in Portland, CT, where GUE instructor Ed Hayes is a part owner.

[Latitude Adjustment]

This used to be a commonly used technique, but once the use of reels migrated from the cave diving community into the wreck diving community 15-20 years ago, that became standard.

Generally the folks who are going to do penetration diving, spend a lot of time at Dutch Springs, going in and out of the various things sunk on the bottom with instructors or buddies, before they enter their first wreck off the coast.

There was some discussion about tech vs. rec dive operators in FL. Around here, most of the diver operators require a redundant air source, lift bag, and reel to get on the boat. Those items would certainly be considered standard equipment. On a typical "recreational" boat half of the divers will have doubles, the rest have pony bottles of at least 30 cf. As a result, the rec vs. tech distinction is not as meaningful as it might be in FL. The dive operators do want to know how long you will be in the water so they know when to get worried about you.

A little history here, in the early 70's when we were doing pentetration on steel 72's with J-valves, no ponies and I had one of the two long hoses in the whole club a few of our divers were laying line but not from a reel like now, basiclly wound on a stick like a small Jersey upline.

Dutch wasn't open yet! We used Willow Springs in Pa. and Farmers Quarry in Washington NJ

[Geek]

I see alot of North Jersey/NYC guys come up to RI to dive our wrecks. The charters that I have been on where guys penetrated were a progression style. Strobes on legs are common here in night diving, and occaisionally in the daytime, for open water. Prior to this incident, I had never heard of strobes being used in wreck diving.

I have yet to see any of these guys, or the local RI/MA guys, ever carry a reel, canister light, long hose or any Halcyon gear. In fact, I've been rather hassled several times about using the long hose. About half use doubles while others use ponys with 95-130 singles (both aluminum and steel). The first and only place in New England that I have seen Halcyon gear, and DIR divers, is at Brownstone Quarry in Portland, CT, where GUE instructor Ed Hayes is a part owner.

I am very surprised to hear of people doing penetration without a reel. In fact, there are reels that are advertised as "Long Island Wreck Reels" and of course there is the infamous Jersey upline. Long hoses are common, so I don't know who the guys are you're seeing and if anyone is hassling you over a long hose they must have been living under a rock for the past decade. That's the kind of lousy attitude no one needs.

The tank set ups and non-Halcyon brands sounds normal.

Canister lights would be uncommon if you don't plan penetration as they are expensive, but lighting is critical if you are going to do penetration dives.

I'd be curious to know what shop(s) these characters frequent. PM me if you don't mind sharing that.

Thanks

[ScubaGypsy]

I am very surprised to hear of people doing penetration without a reel. In fact, there are reels that are advertised as "Long Island Wreck Reels" and of course there is the infamous Jersey upline. Long hoses are common, so I don't know who the guys are you're seeing and if anyone is hassling you over a long hose they must have been living under a rock for the past decade. That's the kind of lousy attitude no one needs.

The tank set ups and non-Halcyon brands sounds normal.

Canister lights would be uncommon if you don't plan penetration as they are expensive, but lighting is critical if you are going to do penetration dives.

I'd be curious to know what shop(s) these characters frequent. PM me if you don't mind sharing that.

PM sent.

[maninthesea]

Well thanks for the info. I was wondering if anyone knew if the pumproom used to be sealed off but was now open. I did a dive on the wreck with a groop from DiveRite when DEMA was in Miami. Wreck was on its side then but I spent around an hour on it and I could not recall any penetration that I considered dangerous enough to kill 3 decent divers. Also it seemed pretty free of silt from my memories????

Well thanks again
Im back to getting ready for BIG dive trip with BBC

Guam, Chuuk, Pulawat, Yap, Ulithi, Kayangle, Palau and some other place between Yap and Palau that starts with a K. Ends with 300meter dives in Palau with NewtSuit. I wont get to wear the suit just being there is kewl enough.

Look for the special coming I belive on Discovery channel titled something like Pacific Abyss or Pacific Wreck Abyss.

Jim

[dustbowl diver]

Have a great trip and don't forget to post a report!!!