I’m on a roll; I wanted to get back into the water again.

Plus, I promised to bring some North Korean wine and mushrooms to barbecue for debriefing.

I’m returning to my old macho self – all I have to do now is get back to cage fighting, but I just have a feeling I will get my ass beaten down more so now, than before.

At least my beard isn’t coming in grey.

Anyway, I made it down to Terranea resort a little before 8 am.

It was very obvious that we were not going to go diving.

I met Reverend Al, Jeff, Nice Bob and a diver named Jiles.

Jeff and Reverend Al confirm my judgement.

Even the cove looked shitty.

The NSA looks for illegal aliens and terrorists off of our coast.

On the radio this morning, I had heard that there was a diving accident off of the oil rigs.

One diver apparently had an uncontrollable descent and disappeared, another diver got the bends and had to go to the hyperbaric chamber at Catalina.

Jiles apparently was on the trip, so I can give you a third or fourth hand account of what happened.

It was on the Pacific Star dive boat that was chartered from some Meet Up group.

Two buddy divers were diving off the Elly oil rig when one of the divers, who was in his 50’s, lost consciousness.

His buddy noticed that he did not have his regulator in his mouth and was descending rapidly.

The buddy chased him, trying to put the regulator in his mouth and make him buoyant.

The unconscious diver just kept sinking; at 170 feet the buddy couldn’t do anymore and did a rapid ascent to the surface to get help.

The buddy was flown by the Coast Guard to the Catalina hyperbaric chamber.

According to current local news, the Coast Guard had found the body of the other diver in more than 200 feet of water.

A toast to no diving!

We will try the North Korean debrief barbecue the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

Local news regarding the diving tragedy is here:

Dead Body of Missing Diver Recovered Off the Coast of Long Beach

Update: Search for diver missing off Long Beach coast suspended on Sunday

Having not been able to put a SCUBA diving trip together for several years, I stumbled onto the diving trip of a life time.

It is a group tour in July 2017 that originates in Vladivostok, Russia… and after eight days, ends back in Vladivostok, Russia.

I wired my deposit last week.

Other than that, I really shouldn’t say anything else – but I’m sure it will be an adventure.

Lobster season is coming up, and I’m doing my final preparations – renewing all by licenses, making sure my lights are good and practicing my lobster death grip.

I’ll be on the Bottom Scratcher this Friday night – yeah, I don’t like big boats for lobster hunting, but it’s slim pickings this year.

Having stayed the night in Palos Verdes, it was easy for me to show up right on time at 8 am in the public spot of Terranea Resort.

We went down and checked the conditions.

Reverend Al and I would have easily made it out from the Point, however, it was high tide and the receding swells and the pounding waves were intimidating.

Since we didn’t want to perform any rescues, we decided to go off the Cove.

The crew consisted of Me, Reverend Al, Nice Bob, the other Jeff, Rob and Blue Steel.

On the way down, Rob blew an O-ring and had to turn back.

It was an easy entrance and visibility looked promising…

Logged SCUBA Dive #502

Dove with Nice Bob and the other Jeff

120 Reef, Terranea Resort, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA, USA

In With: 3000 psi
Out With: 1500 psi
Max depth: 43 feet
Waves: Flat with some extreme rouge waves
Visibility: 10 feet with some silt
Water Temperature: 64 degrees
Air Temperature: 80 degrees
Total Bottom Time: 31 minutes

We swam to the rocky finger just off of the cave and submerged.

I followed Nice Bob and the other Jeff.

Visibility was not great and there was a large amount of surge on the bottom.

Throwing a pass with a sea hare.

After touring the 120 reef for about 20 minutes, Bob started leading us back.

It was an all-sand dive similar to Veterans Park; the visibility really sucked – 5 feet at best.

But, Bob lead us right to the Cove; we all made easy exits.

As we were walking back, a HUGE rouge wave started towards the beach and crashed into the rocks; every rock on that beach was wet.

A second smaller wave started to form and I was able to get a picture of that one.

If we were delayed by five minutes, someone would have gotten hurt during their exit.

Two minutes later, some people who were sitting on the rocks came up soaking wet.

We did our traditional debrief in the parking lot…

The other Jeff, Me, Nice Bob, Reverend Al and Blue Steel.

Let’s get ready for Lobster Season!

Happy Hunting!