Tuggerah 06-03-10

We love diving the Tuggerah. This was our fist deep dive after completing our Advanced Nitrox and Decompression Procedures courses with Plunge Diving at Chowder Bay. There was some current at the surface and it took us several attempts to hook up. That's when we realised how strong the current was. The mermaid line and deco bar were swept well back from the boat. We put on the crossover which refused to go down the anchor line, and then fitted lines from bow to stern to pull ourselves to the front.

As soon as I hit the water with twins and stage I was glad I had the pull line in my hand. I would have been swept away very quickly. After pulling hard up to the anchor we immediately descended, dragging the cross over with us. The cross over line is long enough to reach from the deco bar to the anchor at the bottom but on this dive it refused to come down any further than 32m due the the current pulling on the line.

At the wreck we found the anchor had a very precarious hold on a piece of metal sticking up out of the sand near the stern, not on the wreck itself. IN calm conditions we would have carried the anchor across and secured it to the wreck. As it was, all we could do was tie it tight.

The viz was pretty good but at 14 degrees a bit cold for my unprotected head and semi-dry. The wreck is always covered in nanniegai but this time there were schools of stripeys around the stern. A small wobbiegong rested under the deck in front of the boiler, could only see his tail.

Our bottom time was 27 mins and we wasted time getting the anchor free. Knowing it would drift away too quickly for us to catch, we made sure that we both had hold of it.