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H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2014 7:23 pm
by H20doctor
well i just returned from 7 days on the island... I stayed at Pensacola's House with my girlfriend aka Echo here on the Board..
we flew out alaska air from seatac and TSA didnt like my dive light batteries as always , but Oh well they never do , Here is the famous Cloud shot
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arriving at the Island ...
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A quick phone call and chad was there to pick us up and take us back to his Nice Home... Wed was our first day of diving so we spent tuesday getting our gear put back together and ready to go... I had to re assemble my light Rig, and get cameras ready to go... Here are some shots of the dive Garage..
Chris Kniight Vip a Tank
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so for Wed the Trade winds were good and the swells were Low so we were Lucky enough to head out To the Seatiger and the Y O 257.. All if not most of the diving here requires finding the Mooring Ball for the site... This means you have to get on the water at an early time to beat out the cattle boats with tourist divers.. If there is a Boat on the mooring ball you have to wait .. such was the case for the YO257 wreck... So once you pull up to the site, a person has to don a mask and fins and jump into the water with the anchor line... Once on the surface you have to swim down 15 feet and run the line through the eye on the Ball... This was done by me a couple of times, and chads friend Chris Kniight...
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this is done on all the sites here in order to protect the reefs and the wrecks.... we only dropped the anchor 1 time on a wreck called the LCU.. Most of the Viz on this trip was 90 + feet on some of the sites I could see the boat from the bottom of the sand....amazing ... the water is a deep Blue and very clear... My girlfriend was armed with a 5 mega pix camera and got some good shots with it for a first time Photog... I took video everyday and im in the process of getting it color corrected and i set my gopro 3 Black in Protune Raw...

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2014 7:27 pm
by H20doctor
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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2014 8:04 pm
by H20doctor
Me filming underwater
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one of the best dives is when chris found a sleeping shark in the sea cave we dove, and he herded the shark over to us with his Genesis DVP
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Chad and Chris On the Deco Line
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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2014 11:31 pm
by H20doctor
so the first Of many videos to come from my trip out to chads first up is the Sea tiger wreck....

Info :
The Sea Tiger did not go down with pirate treasure, or in the storm of the century, or attacked by kamikazes, this intentional wreck peacefully slipped underneath the waves. The history of how our simple Sea Tiger became a wreck is quite interesting. I found this 1999 article in the local newspaper.

On February, 1992 it was know as the Yun Fong Seong No. 303 when it was carrying 93 illegal Chinese immigrants. Harbor master was trying to hail the ship but there was no answer, just the vessel barreling to the pier. There was one harbor police officer to handle the 90 + illegal aliens. They did not resist.

The five crew members severed various prison terms in what immigration officials called Hawaii's largest seizure of illegal immigrates. The Justice Department seized the Yun Fong Seong No. 303 and sold it at auction in the first of several ownerships.

One guy bought it at auction for $1, took one look at it and then abandoned it. No one ever saw him again. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society bought the ship for $40,000 in 1992 and planned to use it to harass and ram fishing vessels that lay drift nets. The Yun Fong Seong No. 303 was to be renamed UN Resolution 42/216, after the United Nation resolution that bans drift nets. The society's plan fell through and the Yun Fong Seong No. 303 ended up with a Vietnamese fisherman who renamed it the Sea Tiger.

He sold it in 1994 to a man who frustrated environmental and Coast Guard inspectors because the Sea Tiger kept leaking oil and fuel into Honolulu Harbor. With all the problems it lay still at Pier 40. The state was planning to tow the Sea Tiger 12 miles out to sea and drop it.

This was until Voyager Submarines bought it for $1. It took Voyager two years of paperwork and $250,000 in cleanup and preparation costs to get all the approvals from the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, health department, U.S. Coast Guard, and the Army Corp of Engineers. They spent $100,000 getting rid of the last 100 gallons of fuel and oil.
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This wreck was really nice , I stayed up mostly on the deck at 85 to 90 feet as i am my girlfriends main dive partner through this whole trip... I watched Chris and Chad explore the wreck on there scooters as we swam and explored the fish...
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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 9:31 am
by Norris
Cool video Chris, looks like a good time!

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 9:56 am
by sitkadiver
Thanks for all the background information. I love reading about the history of dive sites. Good on you bro.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 3:20 pm
by pensacoladiver
Great report. Very nice read. Love the pre sinking pics.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 6:31 pm
by H20doctor
dive Number 2 for the day was the Yo 257...
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Info :
Gasoline Barge (Self-propelled):
Laid down, date and location unknown
Launched, date unknown
Delivered to the US Navy and placed in service as YOG-72, date unknown
Redesignated Fuel Barge (self-propelled) YO-257, date unknown
Assigned to Naval Station Guam
YO-257 was loaned to the US Coast Guard from 16 September to 12 November 12, 1963
While assigned to the Coast Guard YO-257 supported the establishment of a LORAN A-C Station at Yap in the Western Caroline Islands
YO-257 wasn't equipped to take on the 400 mile trip from Guam to Yap. No radar or other navigational equipment was on board. Each afternoon a plane would fly over and give the ship any course corrections needed. The rear gun mount was sealed and a shower head installed. Since the ship could only carry enough water for drinking, rainwater was relied on to replenish the gun tub water supply for showers. YO-257 carried water based asphalt to be used for a runway for planes servicing the new LORAN A-C Station. In order for the crew to have lockers and bunks, they were removed from other ships mothballed at Guam.
Placed out of service, circa 12 November 1963, at Naval Station Guam
Reactivated, date unknown and assigned to Naval Station Subic Bay
[Per decklog entry of Thursday 4 January 1968 for USS Orleck (DD-882)]
Struck from the Naval Register, date unknown
Sold for scrapping, 1 August 1982, by the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service
Final Disposition, reefed off the coast of Oahu, Hawaii, near Waikiki
After decommissioning, the ship was purchased by Atlantis Submarines Hawaii, who sank it as an artificial reef. The sea floor surrounding the ship is approximately 100 feet (30 m) deep, and the top deck of the ship is roughly 85 feet (26 m) deep. Directly abeam to the YO-257, colloquially called the YO by area divers, is the San Pedro, intentionally sunk by Atlantis Submarines in 1996. The two ships are visited frequently by Atlantis and are popular dive sites. There is sometimes a strong current at the surface, which eases as you approach the wreck. A decent line is always rigged to mooring buoys on the wreck. The typical dive profile is 90 feet for 20 minutes.[5] There is a preponderance of marine life on both ships, mostly turtles and reef sharks, such as the whitetip reef shark.
Type: Oil barge
Displacement: 440 t.(lt) 1,390 t.(fl)
Length: 174 ft (53 m)
Beam: 33 ft (10 m)
Draft: 13 ft (4.0 m)
Propulsion: General Motors Diesel engine, single screw, 640shp
Capacity: 200,000 gallons fuel
Armament: two single 20mm AA gun mounts

This ship was massive and i wish i had more time on it... it was prob the best wreck of the trip, full of life and fish, tons of fish, its one of the main dives that all the local charters use... The funny thing is seeing the SUB go right by you full of vacationers in the underwater sub...

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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 7:05 pm
by pensacoladiver
Great vid. Who says you can't run a rEvo on its back? :-)

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 6:37 am
by Jeff Pack
Chad, your legs are as white as mine... whats up with that? :)

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 7:33 am
by pensacoladiver
The camera removes 4 shades of tan.

Why are you looking at my legs? I'm flattered.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 8:14 am
by Jeff Pack
pensacoladiver wrote:The camera removes 4 shades of tan.

Why are you looking at my legs? I'm flattered.
Cuz I had to check my white balance on my display :)

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 11:48 am
by H20doctor
Its thursday On the island and its like im stuck in the movie Groundhog day... fill tanks, rinse tanks, load the boat, unload the boat... come home tired eat, go to bed... rinse repeat was my motto for this diving adventure.. we were up and heading out to Waianae ( why En Eye )
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this was due to the wind forecast for most of the trip, this side of the island is diveable almost any time.... Most of the time as we were on the water doing a S I i would see a turtle floating on the surface... but when i got down for the dive they were gone...
This wreck was called the M/S Mahi, it was a cool wreck, this was my first time hearing wales underwater singing and making noises...

Wreck Info
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Admirable Class Minesweeper:
Laid down 22 February 1943 by the Winslow Marine Railway and Ship Building Co., Seattle, WA
Launched 16 May 1943
Commissioned USS Scrimmage (AM 297), 4 April 1944
Naval Vessel Register of 1 January 1949 lists plan for decommissioning and placing in reserve as December 1945
Decommissioned 22 June 1946 at Orange, TX
Reclassified as a Fleet Minesweeper (Steel Hull), MSF-297, 7 February 1955
Struck from the Naval Register 1 April 1960 and sold
She became a British merchantman named Giant II and used as a cable ship
Sold in March 1968 to the Dillingham Corp. and leased to the University of Hawaii as a research vessel
Renamed M/S Mahi
Sold in 1982 to Dacor Scuba Diving to be sunk as an artificial reef
Sunk approximately 1-mile off the Waianae coast in 90 feet of water.
Specifications:

Displacement 945 t.(fl)
Length 184' 6"
Beam 33'
Draft 9' 9"
Speed 14.8 kts.
Complement 104
Armament: One 3"/50 dual purpose mount, one twin 40mm gun mount, six 20mm gun mounts, one depth charge projector (hedgehog), four depth charge projectors (K-guns) and two depth charge tracks
Propulsion: Two 1,710shp Cooper Bessemer GSB-8 diesel engines, National Supply Co. single reduction gear, two shafts.

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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 6:05 pm
by oldsalt
Chris: I am especially grateful to you for these posts. The Sea Tiger was one of my last dives. The Mahi was the last dive I did with my wife (20 years ago). The Mahi was fully intact then, we swam through the passageways and into all of the compartments. I also appreciate your including the history of each ship. I spent a lot of time underway on various ships in the navy and remain an enthusiast of all things nautical. While I never served on a YO, I certainly refueled from them many times. I have sailed on many minesweepers. Your videos, in fact your entire set of posts, were outstanding.
-Curt :salute:

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 7:15 pm
by pensacoladiver
Curt,

The Mahi has recently collapsed even more since when I arrived last year.

The front end is severed and completely impassable now.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 8:02 pm
by Jan K
Chris,
Great trip reports. I appreciate the amount of work you put into them. Thank you for sharing.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 8:55 pm
by H20doctor
oldsalt wrote:Chris: I am especially grateful to you for these posts. The Sea Tiger was one of my last dives. The Mahi was the last dive I did with my wife (20 years ago). The Mahi was fully intact then, we swam through the passageways and into all of the compartments. I also appreciate your including the history of each ship. I spent a lot of time underway on various ships in the navy and remain an enthusiast of all things nautical. While I never served on a YO, I certainly refueled from them many times. I have sailed on many minesweepers. Your videos, in fact your entire set of posts, were outstanding.
-Curt :salute:
thank you very Much Curt... I had no idea about these ships and there history until I started doing research on the internet.. To know that the Mahi was a minesweeper is really cool.. Im just glad i got a chance to see these wrecks .. Next up is a dive on 2 LCU ships

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2014 3:06 pm
by ArcticDiver
To add to the history of the Mahi:
That is the place the owner of one of my favorite dive ops died. He was also the skipper of his company's dive boat. The way it was told to me is that he went overboard immediately after recovering the customers from their deep dive. He had weights on and went straight to the bottom. By the time anyone could get dressed and down there it was all over.

Sad

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2014 5:54 pm
by Echo
I had a great time. Seeing new things hearing the whales sing on almost every dive. I left on Wednesday feeling like I didn't get enough diving in. Like I needed a whole extra week to dive.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2014 11:18 pm
by Tom Nic
Echo wrote: Like I needed a whole extra week to dive.
Describes every dive vacation I've ever been on! :)

Great vids Chris, and looks like you guys had a blast.

Hopefully I'll be back in the islands in the next couple years, and will definitely use your info next time I'm on Oahu!

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2014 11:10 am
by H20doctor
we did to dives on LCU's.. Landing Craft Utilities .. I have combined both dives into one to show them... the first wreck we did i think is the LCU west, this wreck has large slabs of concrete next to it to act like a reef... the next LCU was just the ship in the sand ... the fun part of these wrecks was the insane crisp viz we had, infact the whole trip was clear viz..

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After this i have 3 more videos to go
airplane canyon
Sea cave
Reef dive

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2014 11:51 am
by pensacoladiver
Gotta love those sand clouds.

Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 6:06 pm
by H20doctor
well after a day of diving out on the water a mystery package shows up at the door .... seems our good friend Mz / Mike sent a care package from the main land ...
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so its steak for dinner and fresh yummy crab... except someone cant eat cold crab !!! :rofl:
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So we did a dive on a site called black Rock / Ulua Cave... our first time on this site the current was ripping on the down line... when echo and i got to the bottom , i sat there wonder how impossible it was going to be for us to get back to the bouy.. after about a min of us just looking at chad and chris on there scooters... chad signals to me to just let go and drift down to the sand.. once on the sand and behind the cliff there was no current... we explored the cave and hit out bottom limit... chad gives a look of are you going to make it ? i gave him the Boat signal and then the tow signal... chad stepped up to the Plate and towed us in the wicked current back to the line :supz: :supz: :supz: , Love the Magnus 950, top gear , 3 divers , No problem...Once on the line we headed back up to the boat..
this movie Is 2 dives Put together , as we did this site on 2 different days... the 2nd time there was No current at all

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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 6:26 pm
by H20doctor
another day of diving has come to an end and i beat ... load the boat... unload the boat... clean gear.. charge batteries... dive rinse repeat... we have to get up early as i said in order to beat out the trade winds... im up at 530 am ... and by now im actually waking up earlier than my alarm..LOL
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the bug runner is getting action every day...

but at the end of the day I am getting fat from the huge meals we eat every night at chads house... tonight for dinner is shrimp gumbo ..with sausage...
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so its get up ,grab some coffee, a muffin, dramamine so i dont puke.. get on the boat load go dive ...
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we head Out to a site called airplane canyon... this was one of the best reefs i saw the whole trip, there were nice coral structures here , tons of fish, and critters to see.. one of the rare things here is a type of Trumpet fish, that isnt a trumpet fish, and its kinda some type of Pipe fish also ... what ever the case is, they are only here at this site ...So you will see them in this video.. we got 2 dives here also during my trip, and this place was really nice for the video peeps like me ...

shot of the land from the boat
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And here is the video for this dive

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Re: H20doctor Diving Vacation On Oahu

Posted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 7:29 pm
by pensacoladiver
I don't eat cold crab because.... Well, because I don't have to.