Wreck Dive – 24 August 2019
The morning in Jūrmala started the way it always does before an early and important trip—I hardly slept. As usual, nobody is ever willing to drive to Ventspils the day before. One person even moved the departure to an even earlier hour, only to cancel at the last moment.
At the boat launch in Buliņciems, Ventspils, we discovered that the boat’s Jack V1 fuel pump wasn’t working properly. Whatever… we fixed it, and continued towards the yacht harbour.
From the marina we headed out to sea. The harbour itself is excellent—typical Ventspils: everything is spotless and perfectly organized.
Out at sea, however, things were a little different. The waves were so big that for almost half of the journey we were literally airborne. After every „flight“ came an equally violent landing, leaving you wondering whether your spine or the boat would break first. Losing the diving equipment would be unfortunate, but losing my own life would be considerably worse.
At that point I was already convinced that something between my L5 and S1 vertebrae had been compressed again. Hopefully, even if the dive failed completely, I’d still be able to climb out of the boat on my own.
There wasn’t even time to think about seasickness. Both hands were needed just to hold on. Otherwise the Baltic Sea would simply take whatever it decided to take. I also had to make sure I didn’t smash my teeth against the twinset (D12) secured beside me.
Eventually we reached the position where the cruiser SMS Bremen was supposed to lie.
The sonar showed absolutely nothing.
Then somebody spotted a buoy.
Haha… apparently someone had left a permanent marker for future generations. Very cool.
The divers from Liepāja entered the water first—but somehow managed to drag the buoy away with them.
Damn.
The captain suggested I descend where their bubbles were rising.
No thanks.
I preferred to wait until the buoy returned. I didn’t want to ruin the dive before it had even started.
Finally the buoy appeared again.
The line looked solid enough. I secured our boat to it and began my descent.
At around 20 metres I overtook the Liepāja divers and continued deeper.
My dive computer indicated that I should already be on the wreck…
…but I saw absolutely nothing.
Until my hand suddenly touched the barrel of one of the ship’s guns.
Visibility was unbelievably poor—almost zero. About one metre at best. It was practically a touch dive.
Simply hanging onto the line seemed rather boring, so I decided to explore the wreck.
I was effectively moving blind. I had no real idea where I was, despite spending several evenings studying the ship’s plans beforehand.
Then I suddenly realised I had entered some kind of enclosed compartment.
That didn’t feel like a particularly smart place to be.
I immediately turned back.
Unfortunately…
I could no longer find the line.
Surprisingly, I stayed completely calm.
I still had plenty of gas and assumed that, using a bit of logic, I would eventually locate it again.
After searching for a while I decided there was no point wasting time.
It was time to ascend.
I was wearing a drysuit, so I figured I could probably survive 24 hours floating on the surface—assuming my friends in the boat didn’t find me first.
While ascending, I also wondered how the others were getting on.
The ascent followed standard decompression procedures and went exactly as planned.
At the surface I deployed my DSMB, lifted my head above the water…
…and discovered that the boat was only about 50 metres away.
They spotted me immediately.
At that very moment I realised that the evening event back in Jūrmala would, after all, include me.
Mission accomplished.
The dive was carried out on air only. Unfortunately, I had no Nitrox or oxygen available to shorten decompression.
Configuration:
- Open Circuit
- Twinset D12
- One 12-litre stage cylinder
- Bühlmann GF 93/93
25 August 2019
After yesterday’s concert at the Dzintari Concert Hall and the subsequent afterparty, it seemed that Sunday would be quiet and peaceful. However, news that the sea at Ventspils was completely calm made me head towards Kurzeme in the afternoon. I was late for the agreed time, but my colleagues were waiting for me.
Upon arriving at the port, I was told that the objective had been set — some small merchant vessel at a not-too-great depth. That did not excite me much, but I quickly motivated the others for a „heroic deed“: to go to the Bremen wreck. Said and done.
We reached the spot, but then catastrophes began — almost like a sign. One inflator hose popped off; me, with all tools at hand, we fixed it quickly. Then our only woman, Agnese, had a fin burst — I hate plastic parts!!! Agnese stayed in the boat with the captain. The three of us went down; I went ahead with quick steps.
I reached the forward main gun and stuck my hand in it to make sure it was not fake ;). I did not repeat yesterday’s mistake — I went with a line until I pushed off against a rope of the same colour leading from the buoy to the wreck, and understood why I had lost my way yesterday. Visibility, of course, just as „good“ as yesterday — simply put, there was none.
We wandered around the deck a bit, but my colleagues did not want to go into decompression and headed up. Unfortunately I had neither nitrox 50% nor O2 and could not shorten decompression, so I decided to go up with my colleagues. I left my torch on the deck so the captain could try to solve yesterday’s puzzle. My computer was not too conservatively set — I was the first to the boat.
And then Agnese went down with the captain… About 20–25 minutes passed and both were back up. It turned out Agnese’s computer battery had died at the bottom (who has a mobile phone with spare batteries???) and she had stayed by the buoy line, but the captain had not understood there was a problem and had gone around the deck. Without knowing decompression procedures, it was quite an unenviable situation for her. Fortunately she did not panic and waited for the captain to come around. The captain is a TEC diver — all OK, a happy return to the boat.
Well, nothing much — one instructor or another with ten years of experience had never been in the Baltic Sea at 45 metres (this is not Dahab at 70 metres), but here the girl had checked off SMS BREMEN. Everything, of course, with Coast Guard permits — completely legal.
Nearly 300 sailors lost their lives on this ship. Today this shipwreck is listed among nationally protected cultural monuments.