Edmonds and Alki Pipeline - 15-Oct-2022

Tell us your tale of coming nose-to-nose with a 6 gill [--this big--], or about your vacation to turquoise warm waters. Share your adventures here!
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iotium
Frequent Bubbler
Posts: 33
Joined: Sat Feb 27, 2016 4:33 pm

Edmonds and Alki Pipeline - 15-Oct-2022

Post by iotium »

Arrived at Edmonds and the wife/dive buddy and I were immediately distressed to see that the driftwood orca thingy on the jetty is gone! Anyone know what happened? After getting over the shock we suited up and had a great dive, going out on jetty way to the lopez pontoon and then back on cathedral. 99 minutes of great visibility and minimal current. Topped it off with lunch at pancake haus - nothing like potato pancakes with sour cream and applesauce after diving!
hooded nudibranch
hooded nudibranch
perch school
perch school
curious ratfish
curious ratfish
the genius 2
the genius 2
the scene on top of lopez pontoon
the scene on top of lopez pontoon
the jetty doing a tropical aquarium impersonation
the jetty doing a tropical aquarium impersonation
Video of large lion's mane jellyfish

Then we went down to Alki and attempted to dive the pipeline. We'd never done this one before and we couldn't find any info that was less than 10 years old so we weren't sure what to expect. We got in near the intersection of 63rd and beach drive and swam SW on the surface… and couldn't find a pipeline. We swam around for a while and just saw more and more eelgrass. Eventually we decided that maybe the pipeline was buried close to shore, so we swam out a long ways WSW, dropped down in what was still only 10 ft, and then swam SE on the bottom with the idea that we must eventually hit it.

We saw nothing but eelgrass for a long time, with a random smattering of schools of tubesnouts, crabs, and nudibranchs so it was pleasant. Then it started getting deeper (to 15ft) and the eelgrass suddenly ended and it was just barren sand. We kept going and it got down to 30ft then out the murk we suddenly hit the pipeline, only about 20 ft before it ended! This was a miraculous discovery because (as we discovered) the pipeline emerges from the sand only ~50ft before it ends so it was actually a very small target for us to find.

There's a big pile of rocks where the pipe emerges from the sand and from there to the end is a beautiful scene - rocks and concrete covered in metridium, with tons of rockfish, lingcod, kelp greenling, and ever-present clouds of tubesnouts.

After exploring the area for a bit we headed NW back to shore, which was a loooong swim over a mix of barren sand and eelgrass. We swam fast because we both have leaky drysuits and needed to warm up. We did stumble across a skate in the sand which was a nice surprise. At first I thought it must just be a square of sheet metal or plastic garbage lying on the bottom.

Does anyone have any tips for finding the pipeline? I don't think we could reliably find it again.
rockfish and metridium
rockfish and metridium
end of the pipe
end of the pipe
skate
skate
KeithBoll
Compulsive Diver
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Joined: Tue Jun 21, 2011 8:42 pm

Re: Edmonds and Alki Pipeline - 15-Oct-2022

Post by KeithBoll »

Glad to hear that the viz has improved and that you had some nice dives!
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60south
Pelagic
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Joined: Sun Aug 10, 2008 1:24 pm

Re: Edmonds and Alki Pipeline - 15-Oct-2022

Post by 60south »

Love the skate! Wish we could see more of those.

...And we need to come up with another name for ratfish. They're elegant, goofy, and beautiful in their own way, and the name ratfish just doesn't do them justice.
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