Bikini Dive Operation

In This Site

Dive Log

This page is still under construction.
Most dives are my notes only at this point.

Dive 1. Wednesday afternoon. USS Saratoga, check-out dive.

This dive was postponed due to high winds.

Dive 1a. Wednesday afternoon. USS Saratoga, check-out dive.

Run Time: 63 minutes
Max Depth: 104 feet
Decompression Schedule: 2min@80feet; 2@40; 15@20; 2@10
Water Temp: 81

Today the wind was better in the morning. Thank God. The plan was to do the dive that was originally scheduled for yesterday afternoon. The goal of this dive was to get acclimated to the environment and the operations of the boat and the style of diving on Bikini. It give the diver a chance to work out any kinks and for the staff to check you out in a controlled situation before we move to tougher wrecks later in the week. We motored the 3 miles out from the dock to the wreck. The highest point on the bridge of the Sara is at 40 feet. After we all met at 40 feet at the top of the gun director we slowly sank down to the flight deck. We crossed over the main elevator used to raise planes up from the lower hanger deck. From here we moved over to the port side and looked at the various guns; 5 inch guns and anti-aircraft stations. We also looked into a room used to store dozens of the 5 inch shells (all still live). We then swam across the flight deck. Here you begin to get an idea of how big the wreck is. The flight deck stretches off into the distance. The Sara is over 600 feet long and you can only see about 100 feet. The deck is also quite wide. We move over to the number one gun still pointed to the sky. From here we go up two decks to the navigation bridge. At one point we pass the voice tubes that carried commands to other points on the ship. The brass labels (ammunition room, etc) are still readable. gas masks We pass the binnacle and steering

clocks,

compoass, steering.

clainet bugle phones bottles lights, chart table.

clocks; compass, lights phone

up to gun level

out

Great dive !

Dive 2. Thursday afternoon. USS Saratoga - Hanger Deck.

Hanger deck; hell diver; great cocpkit; gauges, flight controls;bombs;torpedos;other planes

rear damage area

up and out;more guns; smashed smokestacks

play on bridge; bathrooms; lanterns; admirals china; mess plates; coffee mugs

office areas

Dive 3. Friday morning. USS Arkansas.

Large guns; shells; anchor chains; upside down; laying on stbd side; some aneom, clown fish; oil;; crush hull

Dive 4 Friday afternoon. HIJMS Nagato - Stern.

Wreck is so hugh; laying on port side; several sharks; 4 props up in air; very wide beam. big rudderr; huge stern guns.

Dive 5. Saturday morning. USS Lamson.

To me, this was the nicest dive yet. This is a US detroyer sitting upright in 170 feet of water. Destroyers are smaller and faster than most of the other larger ships here. The Lamson is about 300 feet long, so you can take a nice tour around the entire hull in the 25 minutes of bottom time allowed. The diver starts on the port side at the depth charge launchers. The depth charges were fired into the air and away from the ship. We then moved to the stern to see the more "traditional" depth charge launchers where they were rolled off the back of the ship. We then did a short swim through a stern deck house where there were sinks. After exiting up the starborid side we swam past several tourpedo launchers (big) and various size guns both anti-aircraft and ship to ship guns. We then moved to the bow to see the blast tower and blast measuing devices. These were added to the ships to measure the force of the nuclear blast (the Lamson was about 300 years away from the smaller Able blast). We then turned and came down the port side of the ship. At various points we saw the binnacles and telegraphs (beautiful red glass insersts), bowls and china