Stolt Dagali...revisited...again. Aug. 5, 2006.

I had a boatload of work to do at my house, as we were in the middle of redoing our kitchen. I was on vacation from work and was in shock when I got the approval from the boss...aka...my beautiful wife, to go diving. She was the one who actually suggested it, and I wonder if she was just a little shocked when I said I would go, when there was more than enough work to be done at the house. I wonder if she expected me to say something like "no honey, we have too much work to do here." In reality, I was like....yea baby....and was checking with my local dive shop for a charter before she knew it. Unfortunately, my shop had no charter for the one and only day I was able to dive, so I had to resort to other means. I checked the local dive forum for an open boat, and called my old reliable dive buddy. I ended up on the Independence II out of Mantoloking, NJ, just south of Seaside Heights. They had a charter to the Stolt Dagali, which is a wreck I've done two or three times. There's something to be said about diving a wreck that I've never been to before, and I was really hoping for something new. The Stolt is a great dive, so the Stolt it was going to be.

I met my dive buddy, Scott, at the boat at the very early hour of 6:30. I've never been down Rt. 35 past Seaside Heights, and was impressed at the homes along the beach in Bayhead. I may have to look into that town when it comes time to retire. The first thing Scott and I noticed was that we were the only two on the boat that didn't know everybody else. There were a total of nine paying divers and a crew of four (not including the 9 year old son of a crew member) on this boat, which was the second nicest dive boat I've been on. The first is the Seeker, which was out of Brielle, NJ, before Dan Crowell sold the boat to an outfit out of Newport, RI. This boat was made for diving, and the people on it were the real deal. I've been diving off NJ seriously now for about six years, and really felt like an amateur around this group. Scott and I had the only set up with single tanks. Everyone else had doubles with stage bottles, or rebreathers. Many were wearing t-shirts commemorating the 50th anniversary of the sinking of the Andria Doria, and the trip the Independence II made to this site. Scott and I commented to each other that we felt slightly out of place, but we agreed that by the time we got to the Stolt, we'd be chatting it up with these guys like old pals, and we were right on the money. Each guy was a class act; no slouches in the group.

The Stolt Dagali was an M-class tanker that was sunk on Thanksgiving day in 1964 as a result of a collision with the luxury liner Shalom. Nineteen people lost their lives that day. The ship was cut in half, and only the stern sunk. The bow was towed into port, and actually attached to the stern of another ship. NJScuba.com has a super write-up on this wreck with some great pictures.

Now I knew that Stolt had a max depth of 130' to the sand, and the wreck starts at 60'. The proper nitrox fill for this depth is 28% EAN. Anything higher would keep me off the bottom, and away from where the lobsters would be waiting. I filled my tanks Thursday night and did a crappy job. I gave myself 30.5% EAN. I dive with a P02 of 1.4, which is the way I like it. If I chose to change it to 1.5, than the 30.5% mix would get me to the sand, but I chose to keep my P02 in my comfort zone. I'm not into deco diving yet, and didn't want to start just on the off chance that I would pull a lobster out. My max. depth would be 116', so if I wanted to bring home dinner, it would be fish or mussels. And lets face it...I suck at catching lobsters.

Enroute to the Stolt, one diver pulled out the deck plans for this ship. I've never seen a diver actually pull out deck plans for a wreck. This guy was planning his exact entry point, and knew where he wanted to go. I don't remember his name, but he said he has 30 dives on this wreck. He talked about going in here, through there, up this hallway, through some other room.....and so on. Way too much penetration for my comfort zone.

We arrived on the site to find the Jeanne II out of NY, already there. This boat was filled with ladies! It was chartered by a women’s only diving club. The only males I saw were the Captain and crew. From what I saw, these ladies were real divers. I saw drysuits, doubles, stage bottles, and solo diving. Good for them.

We tied in behind the Jeanne II, which gave us a long, almost horizontal, trip down to the wreck. We were at least 200 feet off the wreck. Scott and I decided to splash in last, since the runtimes of everyone else on our boat was at least 20 minutes longer than our planned 35 minute dive. It was the right thing to do. Let these guys in, stay out of their way, and then do our thing. The diver who set the hook said there was not much in the way of big and/or mature fish on the relief, so we left our pole spears on deck. We decided to make this a sight seeing tour.

We splashed in and began our descent. The water on the surface was clear and warm. I got a reading of 79 degrees on the surface, and 55 degrees on the bottom. Viz. was a good 50 feet until I got the thermocline, which was at about 45 feet. The particles increased, and a slight current was felt. The viz really cleared up once we got on the wreck. I was ahead of Scott and landed on the wreck first. As a matter of habit, I set up the wreck reel on the first appendage I saw. The viz. was at least 40', and maybe as much as 60'. In hindsight, I wish I never ran my reel. Now I was forced to go back the exact way I came, but the viz. was so good that my reel was just a waste of time and energy.

I hit a max. depth of 102', and had a run time of 34 minutes, one minute less than our plan. There were lots of little cunners around the wreck, in fact they were all over the place. I even saw a cod, and a few other odd looking fish. This was a dive where I wish I had my camera. Looking up from the 90' mark, the ambient light was incredible. The viz. was outstanding, and the fish were all around. This was a picture if I ever saw one...but it doesn't do a bit of good without a camera. Oh well. I didn't do any penetrations on this dive beyond sticking the top half of my torso into a hole or door. My HID light was out of action, and I was using a plain old 8-cell Princeton Tec handheld light. This kind of light used to be good enough for me, but once you go HID, you don't go back. Plus, Scott had his Dive Rite 10 watt HID canister light with him. I could piggyback his light. What could go wrong? Uh...do I hear Murphy's law knocking? Scott's light crapped out on him almost as soon as we hit the water. It flickered on once or twice, but that’s it. Scott went to his backup, but in reality, no lights were needed unless we did a penetration dive, which we didn't.

So I'm down on the hull after coming up from depth. I'm at about 65' and I'm near the anchor chain of the Jeanne II, and what do I see but a diver from the Jeanne II in trouble. Not the kind of trouble which required any lifesaving, but just that "oh shit, I'm in over my head" kind of trouble. She was diving solo, and if she had a buddy, she was nowhere to be seen. She was holding a goodie bag which was loaded with some artifact, or maybe some weights, because it was heavy as shit. She was also holding both of her stage and/or deco bottles. None of these three items were attached to her rig, and she was struggling to hold onto them. I gave her an "ok" sign as I approached and she gave me one back, but with that "holy shit, please stay and help" look on her face. I grabbed her goodie bag, and it was heavy... really heavy. I clipped it to her rig and then clipped on each stage bottle, front and back. She was good to go. I can't imagine why she ever had these bottles unclipped at depth. Maybe she left them at the anchor with the intention of clipping them on for her ascent. I don't remember seeing them earlier. Hmmmm..... Anyway, she gave me the head bow and rolling hand motion, which I know as "you are the man...and if you were single I'd take you to lunch" sign. Off we went, like two passing ships in the night. Yea right.

Time to go up. One minute at 50 feet for the halfway point, and 4 minutes at 15 feet. Our total run time of 34 minutes, just one minute under our plan. Time to get out of the water. I swam underneath the boats to the one what had the Christmas tree ladder. I know the Jeanne II had a regular ladder, but when I came up on the ladder, I had to look at the name of the boat to make sure I was on the Independence II. Bikini's. I saw bikini's on our boat. We had only male divers...how can there be bikini's on ours? Did I mistakenly sign on to a "special" trip? Apparently a few of the divers from the Jeanne II knew the crew from the Independence II and swam over to say hello. To make matters even more interesting, the Jeanne II had a crew member (maybe the Capt?) who was dancing. Not only was he dancing, but he was wearing leopard skin underpants and leather chaps. Really. I'm not kidding. He also wore a cowboy hat and some type of tribal garb on his chest with beads or bones. The salsa music was blaring and he was dancing. The ladies were putting dollar bills in his pants. I kid you not. We were yelling "Y.M.C.A" as he was raking in the dough. Again, I wish I had my camera. It was about this time that a few of the ladies swam over a ziplock bag of margarita's, a bag of meat from the grill, and some cob salad. To the ladies of the Aquanauts...thanks! The surface interval was interesting to say the least.

With the surface interval done, it was time to go back. Before going in, one of the divers told me about a fairly safe penetration that I might be comfortable with. He described going to the anchor, up the hull to the cut, and finding what was a partially covered walkway. He said there is lots of light and many ways out. Scott and I agreed we would give this a look. We were descending the line to find another diver from our boat coming up. He waved us over and he opened his hand. He had a little seahorse. I've never seen one in New Jersey before, and I was intrigued. It had its tail curled around his version of a twig. I'd say it was three or four inches high, all brown, and cute as can be. I've heard of seahorses being seen in NJ, but this was a first for me. We played with him for a few seconds and then he was set free, bobbing around with the current.

Scott and I hit the anchor and began our planned dive. Up the hull, down to the cut, and sure enough, right to the (what used to be an inside) walkway. This was just the right kind of penetration for me. It began at about 65 or 70' and I followed it down to the mid 90's. The wall, or what was at one time the floor, was terracotta colored tile. I cleaned off a few and saw they were perfectly intact. I tried removing a few tiles, but no such luck. Next time I'll bring a hammer and chisel. After swimming through this walkway, I found a hole about twice the size of a manhole leading into a cavernous area inside the ship. I peeked in to see ambient light coming from an even larger hole about thirty feet away. I'm not usually the one to suggest such a penetration, but I did. I motioned to Scott that we should go in and swim to the other exit. Without hesitation, Scott entered the hole with me right behind him. This area was big, really big. Just like expected, we swam towards the exit that I saw from the entry point. I couldn't swim through this hole without having to turn sideways. This was an exhilarating experience. With the exception of a dive I did in the St. Lawrence Seaway, where I penetrated an upside down coal carrying wreck end to end, this was my most extensive wreck penetration (ok, so the one in the St. Lawrence was only 40' long), and it wasn't over yet. There was a large entry point into what appeared to be an engine room. Scott went in about 30' while I kept it a little closer to say....20', maybe 25' if I stretch it. I think that if either of us had a real light we would have ventured farther, but it was not to be. I think Scott knew he went far enough when he looked back and saw my fins going the other way. He's a little more adventurous than I am at this point, but give me time...lots of time. Anyway, we exited this room and continued back up the walkway, exiting near the cut. We went to the hull just underneath where we tied in and began pulling mussels. Man, these little guys sure put up a fight. I filled my bag about halfway while Scott filled his about a third. We clipped them to the anchor chain in anticipation of continuing our dive, but after only a minute, we decided it was time to call it a day. I hit a max. depth of 96 feet, and a run time of 41 minutes.

One point of interest was when the Jeanne II pulled their anchor and began heading home. I pulled up my t-shirt to show off my manly chest to the ladies on their charter. I was pleasantly surprised when one lady, who was sitting high atop the boat, gave me a "back at ya" reply. Although it was in the distance, it is nice to know that I got a little reciprocation. Thanks.

As for dinner, several lobsters came up, probably four or five. Most were in the four to six pound range, with the smallest being at least two pounds. One guy got a few dozen scallops for his girlfriend in Philly. Gotta keep the ladies happy so we can keep diving!

On the way in, we were dragging Scott’s bags and mine behind the boat to clean the mussels. About five minutes into it, something went tragically wrong, and my bag went to the bottom of the sea along with about twenty servings of mussel’s marinara. Scott got lucky. He was also kind enough to give me about half of his catch so I didn't go home empty handed.

All in all, it was a great time with the crew and divers on the Independence II. I wish I had some pictures to post from this dive, but I didn't bring the camera. Check back later for pictures from my next trip to the Stolt.