313 meters - Now that's deep! Part 2
Posted By Mark Ellyatt on 13 August 2004
I had built my dive plan for a deeper dive before deciding whether I was dive fit following my decompression incident. During these months, I returned to dive fitness (on my own estimation) and at 10 months post accident felt my confidence and fitness levels were high enough to attempt a deep dive.
Once the date of the dive was agreed, support divers would need arranging and briefing and the dive tanks filling. The tanks alone for myself and fourteen support divers would take 3 full days to fill, and use almost 60 cubic metres of helium. The tanks were filled just two days before the dive; this (in hindsight) was too close as the process was stressful along with loading the dive boat during a squall that had recently blown in. I had insufficient sleep that night and would have made an excuse to postpone the dive had the weather not been decided that by providing gail force winds that day.
The team met early that morning, my feelings were not of confidence at all and I felt relief that the weather was simply undivable. Normally, I feel quite optimistic pre dive, but the sheer relief I felt of not going that morning was incredible. To postpone the dive was an expensive exercise for me, I could afford to fund one more attempt and then would shelve the project until I had saved enough to repeat the process. I had wanted to dive during a period of small tidal movement and the next window of opportunity was 2 weeks away and exactly 1 week before Christmas day. I did think of rescheduling until the new year as I did not relish the thought of Christmas Dinner in the recompression chamber and also the usual nagging doubts I kept having were taking there toll.
During the next few days, I felt like the storm clouds were passing in my mind, I started to feel as good as I would need to soon. The following week passed easily and I managed several practice dives in less than ideal conditions. The day before the dive I went to bed early mindful of the current windy conditions. I woke up to blue skies and calm seas and I felt as carefree as a 6 metre support diver! The journey to the divesite was 4 hours of smooth seas and I felt absolute confidence, which helped to ease all the support divers anxieties and put the whole boat into business mode.
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