Wayne's World aka School Sink (04-13-2005)

[CaptainSpeleo]

This morning was my first dive in Wayne's World in about a year. It was also my first dive here wearing a sidemount rig. John and I were diving together here for the first time. He had never seen any other part of this system, except for the long route/short route circuit, so we decided to take the short route and head west down the Mainstreet tunnel.

Once we were through the sinkhole restriction and had reached the main T-arrow, I was surprised at how tannic and murky it was. Visibility was less than 10'. I remained positive and figured the visibility would improve as we progressed further into the system.

By the time we reached the Mainstreet tunnel, it was obvious that visibility was not going to improve. The "T" had been removed and had been replaced by about a 10' gap. I closed the gap and we proceeded west down the Mainstreet tunnel. The halocline layer was with us for most of the time in this tunnel, which didn't help to improve visibility any. After swimming for 300' - 400', John called the dive, so we turned and returned to the short route line.

We finally reached the sinkhole restriction after having a bottom time of 46 minutes. We made 2 decompression stops for 3 minutes at 25' and 6 minutes at 15' before we surfaced. Maximum depth was 107'. John used EANx 32 and I used EANx 36.

I've been diving this system since 1995, and this probably one of the worse diving conditions that I've seen. It'll likely take a few weeks without any rain in the area before the visibility returns to its more normal 25' - 30'.

[Tegg]

This morning was my first dive in Wayne's World in about a year. It was also my first dive here wearing a sidemount rig. John and I were diving together here for the first time. He had never seen any other part of this system, except for the long route/short route circuit, so we decided to take the short route and head west down the Mainstreet tunnel.

Once we were through the sinkhole restriction and had reached the main T-arrow, I was surprised at how tannic and murky it was. Visibility was less than 10'. I remained positive and figured the visibility would improve as we progressed further into the system.

By the time we reached the Mainstreet tunnel, it was obvious that visibility was not going to improve. The "T" had been removed and had been replaced by about a 10' gap. I closed the gap and we proceeded west down the Mainstreet tunnel. The halocline layer was with us for most of the time in this tunnel, which didn't help to improve visibility any. After swimming for 300' - 400', John called the dive, so we turned and returned to the short route line.

We finally reached the sinkhole restriction after having a bottom time of 46 minutes. We made 2 decompression stops for 3 minutes at 25' and 6 minutes at 15' before we surfaced. Maximum depth was 107'. John used EANx 32 and I used EANx 36.

I've been diving this system since 1995, and this probably one of the worse diving conditions that I've seen. It'll likely take a few weeks without any rain in the area before the visibility returns to its more normal 25' - 30'.

That "T" isn't gone... there should be a "brass clip" that someone most likely just wound up...

That was done so that people diving here in the low vis would not get confused and simply ride the 'loop' to the exit.

Personally I leave it "snapped" but some people feel the need to unclip it from time to time...

[CaptainSpeleo]

The old "snap and gap", huh? Thanks for making me aware of it. It's real easy to swim by and miss in that crappy visibility. I'm going to give it 2 - 3 more weeks before I return there, and hope it doesn't rain there much in the meantime.

I would highly suggest to anyone diving there who hasn't dived there before to dive it with someone who's made a few dives in there and who knows the layout of the short route and the long route. This is one cave system where you don't want "the blind leading the blind".

[lonestarfl]

The old "snap and gap", huh? Thanks for making me aware of it. It's real easy to swim by and miss in that crappy visibility. I'm going to give it 2 - 3 more weeks before I return there, and hope it doesn't rain there much in the meantime.

I would highly suggest to anyone diving there who hasn't dived there before to dive it with someone who's made a few dives in there and who knows the layout of the short route and the long route. This is one cave system where you don't want "the blind leading the blind".

Maybe low vis but it's more diving than I have done in the past month.
You will have to take me there when conditions are better. All the rivers in the area are in flood...only Devil's and Manatee are open to diving.
I had planned a Tallahassee dive last week, but cancelled due to a chest cold. I've got a new dive vehicle for the out of town trips and it is 40' long with an enclosed Well's Cargo trailer for the gear.
BTW, how did you like sidemount in Waynes World?
Lee

[Tegg]

BTW Frank...

Contact me to schedule a sidemount dive in WW and I'll take you down some of the sidemount places (to small for backmount and silty, but fun none the less)

8)

[CaptainSpeleo]

Talk about good timing. I was just getting ready to E-mail you at work when your Cavers Forum message popped up in my Inbox. Did Lucy tell you that I called yesterday while on the way home from Wayne's World? I already figured that you haven't called me because of everything there being flooded.

You would NOT have enjoyed that dive for the first time being in there. Once it gets back up to 25' - 30', you'll really enjoy it.

The steel 95's worked fine, but I have to move the bands up another 1/2" - 1" and get the valve heads down a little lower. One of the matching Scuba Pro second stages has a slight hissing to it which results in a slight free-flow during the dive. It's better at depth and worse in the shallows. I'll need to have you adjust it for me the next time I'm there.

John LaManna told me that Steve Forman can get mirrored 300 BAR DIN valves for my Genesis HP 120's, so I'm going to contact him soon.