April 6, 2013 (5:53 P.M.)
It’s a sickening feeling before you lean off the side of the
boat and fall into waters known to harbor Great White sharks. It’s an even more
sickening feeling when you’ve personally chummed for and seen dozens of them in
the very spot you’re diving in. In that instant right before you hit the water,
you cannot help but flashback to every shark you’ve ever seen here; the
aggressive ones, the timid ones, the small ones and the big ones; especially
the big ones.
There’s less than a second between you and the water and yet
it seems to go on forever. It cannot be more than a meter in distance from the
edge of the boat to the surface of the water, but it doesn’t feel that way and
as your head starts to dip down and the image of your fins flying up
disappears, you realize there’s no turning back.
At this point, you’ve
already watched the other divers casually lean backwards, but they’re
geologists and have not seen what you’ve seen. They’re here to get rock samples
from the ocean floor and that’s the only thing on their mind. They haven’t been
on the boat with you as four-meter dinosaurs charge from every which direction
to steal the very tuna head you’re meant to keep from them. They were not there
with you as these massive, intelligent creatures seemed to learn you motions
and predict your movements, inevitably stealing your bait; always stealing your
bait. The geologists were not there on the countless times you’ve poured
gallons of fish blood into these very waters in the hope of attracting the very
thing you currently want to avoid. They don’t know. You cannot be afraid of something
you know nothing about and as you float there in the water, you understand
obliviousness is the ultimate tool.
As you buddy up, making sure to check all your gear, you
can’t help but keep looking down. You think if you see the shark right before
it attacks, it will help. In your mind, you cannot be attacked if you have your
eyes looking in every direction, as if spotting the shark ahead of time will
somehow cause it to accept defeat and swim away. The reality is quite different
though. These predators can swim up to 25 mph while hunting cape fur seals that
are much faster and you think you’re more elusive in the water than a seal?
Please.
When you look down, realizing how poor the visibility true
is, you understand you have no chance of spotting anything besides your own
hand. It’s an eerie sensation knowing you can’t see something while that
something can clearly see you. It’s ok though. As a precautionary tactic, we were
all given metal rods to prevent shark attacks. A meter-long metal pole is the
only thing standing between you and your demise and as you look down to see it
firmly grasped within your left hand, you know it’s useless as a defensive
weapon, but that doesn’t stop you from holding
on to that stick harder than you’ve ever held on to anything before.
Below you, the shark cage is peacefully resting about six
meters in the water. You wish nothing more than to be within its protection. Of
course you hide your emotions because everyone around you seems to be content in
potential shark-infested surroundings, but that doesn’t change the fact you’re
a little nervous. You know the cage will not go any deeper than its six-meter
depth, but you wish it did. You wish you could rest within the metal
constraints as it’s slowly lowered to the bottom, giving you a safe escort to
and from your destination, but it won’t. It’s only there as protection during
the ascension.
While we spend the necessary decompression time at the
appropriate depths during our rise to the surface, we will use that cage as a
safety stop until our dive computers tell us otherwise. Since Great Whites sharks prefer to attack
from below, we’ll need it as we hover within their prime attacking level. The
last thing you want to see as you’re meters away from the surface – and safety –
is a lovely dorsal fin heading you way.
As the signal to start our descent reaches everyone’s ears,
it becomes clear this is really going to happen. From the surface, the safest
method is to swim to the bottom of the ocean as quickly as possible. The longer
we stay in the middle, the riskier it becomes. Great Whites won’t attack anything
beneath making the floor of the ocean the best place to be.
As you duck your head into the water, the realization of the
situation hits you. Sharks swim here; often. I wondered if the sharks had been
waiting for this opportunity for a while...
“There’s that kid that always pulls the bait away from us at
the last second. Get him!”
You try not to look around as you descend. Right now, the
only thing you want to do is reach the bottom. Bottom equals safety and safety
equals relaxation. The water at the surface was sitting at a soothing 21
degrees Celsius. What you don’t expect is the thermocline.
As you swim down, popping your ears with each progressed
meter, you can’t imagine the water getting too much colder. From where the boat
was anchored, the water depth was around 30 meters, but it said nothing of the
temperature at the bottom.
You know the feeling when you jump into a pool; the moment
where you’ve left the edge and no matter what you choose to do, you’re going to
get wet? Try and imagine that instant freezing feeling upon initial contact
with the water and that’s what the thermocline was around 25 meters down.
As I’m swimming down, temporarily forgetting about the
potential predators stalking my every move, I couldn’t help but feel warm and
toasty. I had a 5 ml wetsuit on with gloves, booties and a hood. I had goggles
over my eyes, a torch in my right hand and my shark-repelling pole in the
other. The other divers complained about the coldness, but at that moment I couldn’t
have been content.
Then it hits you. It’s as if you’ve jumped into another
pool; a colder pool. The freezing temperature hits you directly in the face and
no matter what you do to prepare, it’s going to hurt. In that instant, it
becomes harder to grip the pole and flashlight. Your fingers instantly stiffen and
the air escapes you. It surrounds you with no escape. The temperature, within a
half a meter, drops from 21 degrees Celsius to 9 degrees Celsius (roughly 70 to
48 degrees Fahrenheit).
As you take a minute to adjust to the temperature drop, you
notice something else too. The visibility is gone. At this depth, you can
barely see your hand in front of your eyes, making the whole scene even eerier.
It’s cold and you can’t see a thing. You’re all alone 25 meters under the sea,
except for your buddy. You’re buddy...
In the time it took for you to adjust to the coldness and
the visibility, you’ve manage to lose track of the one thing that matters, your
diving buddy. In this visibility, there’s no way to find him and in your
attempts to try and locate him, you will most likely only get lost.You’re only chance is bubbles. Bubbles mean air and air
means a diver is close by. The worse thing to do in this situation is panic,
but panicking seems like the logical choice.
Since left and right are useless in the pitch blackness, you’re
only hope is up or down. You can use your own bubbles to determine the up and
then swim in the complete opposite direction. In your head, you assume your
buddy is also looking for you and the logical answer would be to meet at the
bottom. You take a big deep breath, relax and exhale. As the bubbles rise above
you, your head begins to look down. It looks pretty intimidating down there,
but you’ve come this far already, what’s a few more meters going to do?
As you start to swim down, trying to relax the best you can,
you start to notice the cold again. Being alone more than 25 meters under the
surface is different than you imagined. You always imagined the water being
like it is on the surface and you start to wonder what could live down here. It’s
freezing, it’s dark and it’s desolate, but some fish have to live here. It is
the ocean after all and there are fish that live miles under the sea, so why wouldn’t
there be fish that live down here?
That’s when the greatest site you have ever seen makes its
appearance; bubbles. You never thought you would be so happy to see pockets of
air underwater. You frantically swim in their direction, hoping to not lose
sight of them. The bubbles are getting closer and you begin to feel relief.
Just when you were beginning to lose hope, bubbles came to the rescue.
When you see your dive buddy, it might be the single
greatest feeling on the planet. He gives you the dive signal, asking if you’re
ok and reluctantly you reply with a yes. Saying no down here could be dangerous
and it’s extremely difficult to communicate outside of basic signals. Sure you
were stressed, worried and lost for a little while and sure you were nervous about
shark attacks, but oddly you’re ok. Seeing your dive buddy instantly changes
your feelings.
As the two of you swim around together, you tend to look up
toward the surface. You can’t see it, but 30 meters above you is another world.
Down here, it’s different. Down here, it’s like being on an entirely different
planet. Sure it’s cold and you can’t see a thing, but it’s amazing nonetheless.
In this situation, the last thing you would want to do would
be to lose track of your air supply. When you look down at your levels, you
want to see 100s and 200s, rather than 50. Seeing the number 50 when you’re 30
meters underwater would be a bad thing and unfortunately that’s what I saw. It
takes about 20 minutes alone to decompress from this depth and I have maybe
about 10 minutes left of oxygen. Oddly enough, I wasn’t too worried. I was dumb
to not make sure I had plenty of air before the dive, but still not worried.
I swam to my buddy and showed him my oxygen level. He
initially looked worried, but when he saw my composure, he changed his whole
attitude. He had more than enough air for the two of us and an extra regulator
as well. When I would run out of air, I would switch to his and we would begin
to surface.
As he took the last of his pictures, I took the last breath
from my tank. I grabbed his arm, gave him the signal and calmly took his regulator.
For a scary situation, it was seemingly flawless. I was fine. As chaotic as this
dive was to begin with, it was only fitting for it to end like this. We began
our ascent as if nothing went wrong at all.
The rest of the ascent went off without a hitch. When we met
up with the other divers near the surface, they asked if we were ok,
considering I was using his regulator, but we both gave the “O.K.” signal
calmly.
As I climbed out of the water and on to the boat, I felt
satisfied with what happened. I did it. Sure it was scarier than jumping off a bridge,
but I did it anyway. Like I said before, fear is temporary, but regret lasts
forever. Now I can say I scuba dove in Great White shark waters.
My scuba certification card... makes me laugh.
