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Big ol' gator

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BrokenolMarine
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Re: Big ol' gator

Post by BrokenolMarine » Sat Oct 17, 2020 8:34 am

Team Roper wrote:
Sat Oct 17, 2020 6:54 am
BrokenolMarine wrote:
Sat Oct 17, 2020 12:16 am
I dove in Hawaii for three years, and my dive partner was my pastor's wife. He knew she was safe with me on multiple levels. We had a signal for emergency surface if you were within reach but the partner was looking away, pinch them hard.... :o

We were diving "Shark's Cove" so called because from the air it was shaped like a dorsal fin. When you entered the water and swam seaward, there was a large bowl, twenty feet or so deep, then farther out a larger bowl as the cove widened, thirty feet, farther out, an even larger bowl closer to fifty feet. Each bowl had structure in it, like coral, large rock formations, and the bottom was rippled from the surge. Great cove to find shells.

To hold a position you had to kick against the outgoing surge, and ride the incoming surge, kick against the outgoing, ride the incoming. I was on the bottom, having hit a sharktooth jackpot, fighting the surge... When I felt a burning pain in my right thigh. I pulled the inflator on my vest and shot to the surface...

As I rose I saw a huge moray pass under me, twisting and snapping his jaws, he had to be six or eight feet long six to eight inches thick, and pissed. I watched him swim around the reef, still on the bottom, and vanish.

My dive partner popped up beside me grinning. "Sorry, you were about to become lunch." ;)

"I saw, what was his issue."

" poor guy was sitting in his hole in the reef, waiting in ambush for lunch, when the surge pushed you back and you kicked him in the face two or three times to hold against the surge. Just as he was going to bite your fin, and maybe your foot, the surge reversed, and you flew the other direction... He's a foot out of the hole, looking hot! The surge pushes you back and you bat him around like you are mo and curly. "

She is dying laughing now.

"I managed to get there just as he shot full length out of the hole, following you in the surge ride away.... :shock: "
Oh man, that is so funny. You really scared me though when you said you pulled the inflator and "shot" to the surface. I am happy you didn't have the word " embolized" in your sentence.
We made some great night dives in the Caribbean and the creatures that show up at night in the dark of the water are things out of a Jules Verne movie. Some gave me great concerns but what an experience.
My partner and I didn't do any of the deep dives that required decompression. Hawaii had so many great spots to dive in relatively shallow waters, I never felt the need anyway. All those dives, I never had a shark encounter, but did have one with a barracuda. My other dive partner was a spear fisherman and had several "catches" in his game bag. I was twenty or thirty yards behind him when I saw him hanging vertically in the water, lining up a shot...
... And a three foot silver torpedo blasted by and struck that mesh bag of fish. Is wasn't a clean pass, the ties were 1/4 poly. The cuda was shaking his body trying to rip the bag loose and his scales were strobing in the sunlight... :twisted:

I saw another flash as Patrick drew his six inch serated dive knife, and then it was quiet. We swam clear and surfaced.

"I thought you were going to try and add big silver to your game bag.". :o
" I'm not an idiot, I probably would have made him madder. I just wanted to cut those ties, now I know why the bag came with the cheesy ones. " ;)
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GunnyGene
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Re: Big ol' gator

Post by GunnyGene » Sat Oct 17, 2020 8:47 am

BrokenolMarine wrote:
Sat Oct 17, 2020 8:34 am

I saw another flash as Patrick drew his six inch serated dive knife, and then it was quiet. We swam clear and surfaced.

"I thought you were going to try and add big silver to your game bag.". :o
" I'm not an idiot, I probably would have made him madder. I just wanted to cut those ties, now I know why the bag came with the cheesy ones. " ;)
The Dacor I carried around the Pacific for a couple years. Repurposed it a few years after I retired. Had a chisel point originally.

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Team Roper
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Re: Big ol' gator

Post by Team Roper » Sat Oct 17, 2020 10:50 am

I am really showing my age here. I can't even imagine how my Aqua Lung dive knife got in my Dacor sheath. Been many years since I wore that on my leg, James Bond style.
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combat jump 2/67
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jumped with the Army Parachute Team, The Golden Knights.

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clovishound
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Re: Big ol' gator

Post by clovishound » Mon Oct 26, 2020 10:47 am

I always carry a small knife on my BC. It's for fishing line and such. I also carry a pair of EMT shears in my BC pocket. Some of the fishing line cannot be easily cut with a knife.

When I first started diving, I got hung up on fishing line a lot. After years of diving, I seldom got tangled in it. Don't know if it was a difference in the fishing line that didn't break as much and litter the bottom of the river, or if I was doing something different in my technique on the bottom that kept me from tangling.

The only time I got seriously hung up when SCUBA diving was when my octopus got wedged in a crack in a rock ledge. Visibility was zero and I was at the end of the dive heading back up the bank. Scary moment for a while. Ended up getting out of my gear. Once it was in front of me, I was able to ascertain the problem, clear it, and headed for the surface. Made me rethink the 500 psi reserve limit in certain situations.
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Team Roper
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Re: Big ol' gator

Post by Team Roper » Mon Oct 26, 2020 1:51 pm

clovishound wrote:
Mon Oct 26, 2020 10:47 am
I always carry a small knife on my BC. It's for fishing line and such. I also carry a pair of EMT shears in my BC pocket. Some of the fishing line cannot be easily cut with a knife.

When I first started diving, I got hung up on fishing line a lot. After years of diving, I seldom got tangled in it. Don't know if it was a difference in the fishing line that didn't break as much and litter the bottom of the river, or if I was doing something different in my technique on the bottom that kept me from tangling.

The only time I got seriously hung up when SCUBA diving was when my octopus got wedged in a crack in a rock ledge. Visibility was zero and I was at the end of the dive heading back up the bank. Scary moment for a while. Ended up getting out of my gear. Once it was in front of me, I was able to ascertain the problem, clear it, and headed for the surface. Made me rethink the 500 psi reserve limit in certain situations.
Besides my EMT shears and a small diving knife, I also have this attached to my harness. It's a Trilobite EEZYCUT. Diver's Supply has a video on their use. https://www.divers-supply.com/eezycut-trilobite.html
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Army Paratrooper
173 rd Airborne Brigade, 2nd/503 rd. Airborne Infantry, Vietnam 66-67, point man, tunnel rat
combat jump 2/67
82 nd Airborne Div. 1st/505th Airborne Infantry, Vietnam, 68, Sniper
jumped with the Army Parachute Team, The Golden Knights.

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