THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 6, 1995 TAG: 9508040234
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY LANE DeGREGORY, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 152 lines
SLUMPED ON ITS side beneath 140 feet of sea water, the crumpled World War II freighter was invisible from the deck of Roger Huffman's dive boat.
The tepid, tea-colored ocean hid the sunken vessel's broken, twisted stern. But you could smell the old shipwreck, 17 miles off the Cape Hatteras coast, from 100 yards away.
Even with a stiff southwest wind and a thunderstorm rolling in across the waves, the stench of the Empire Gem settled beneath mid-morning clouds - and alerted members of the Atlantic Wreck Dive Club that they were about to get down.
``This British carrier transported sulphur until the Germans torpedoed it in January 1942. It was one of the first ships they sank in the war. It's been leaking sulphur ever since,'' said Clif Darby, a computer scientist from Laurel, Md., who has been diving deep wrecks for more than 30 years.
``It's about 500 feet long, broken in half, with part upside down. I got the old boat's bridge from here about five years ago. The helm is in my foyer from another dive trip,'' Darby said, zipping his black wetsuit as Huffman dropped anchor. ``We soak the artifacts in solutions first, to remove the saltwater, then we clean them up and add polish.
``Wreck diving is the greatest form of diving. You never know what you'll see or find,'' Darby said.
``Sometimes, you're the first one on the ship since it sank.''
Darby and a group of six other deep-sea scuba divers have been exploring Outer Banks wrecks since 1978. Their Silver Spring, Md.-based dive club goes on at least three underwater excursions each month. They sleep in a 65-foot recreational vehicle parked next to their charter boat's slip. Their RV tows a trailer packed with more than 100 tanks carrying air, Nitrox and oxygen.
In their years on the road and under water, they have swum around - and retrieved souvenirs from - hundreds of sunken ships dating to the Civil War, many that now rest in the Graveyard of the Atlantic.
Last weekend, the group spent three days with Huffman, a Colington Harbour resident whose ``Rapture of the Deep'' dive boat runs $560-per-day charter trips from Hatteras Village. The Atlantic Wreck club has been working with Huffman for seven years. Together, they know almost every sunken ship from Ocracoke Island to the Virginia border.
Doug and Penny Bickley, a Bethesda, Md., couple who helped organize the dive group, keep a scrapbook of wrecks they've explored in a large, plastic photo album. Besides taking snapshots of each other with underwater cameras, club members research the shipwrecks and collect old postcards, blueprints and photos of the vessels before they sank. That way, they're also diving into history when they delve the ocean's secret depths.
``Sometimes, when you roll overboard, it's all cloudy at first under there, and you can't see anything,'' said Matt Walters, 36, strapping a neon green gas tank around his shoulders, across his back. ``Other times, when you're walking down the anchor line, going head first, you can see everything - all around. You're with marine life, up close. For a little while, you get to be a part of another world that most people never get to see.''
Extreme, experienced divers who have practiced their sport all around the world, members of the Atlantic Wreck club go deeper than most recreational scuba divers. Average recreational dives are 80 to 100 feet deep. This group regularly goes to 150- and 200-foot depths, with Doug Bickley boasting the deepest trip: 330 feet.
All of the divers have horror stories about people they've known who died during underwater cave dives, friends they've had who were attacked by sharks, and days they've spent in hospital recompression chambers, waiting for their bodies to readjust after swimming over the ocean floor.
But each agreed that the thrill - and tranquility - of deep wreck diving were well worth the risks.
``It's exploring history, being alone in another, undiscovered world and finding a haven below the sea's surface,'' said club member Ron Wallace, 49.
``If you walk in the forest, all the animals disappear. They run away from you,'' Darby said. ``You can't really experience their world because once you've entered it, you've altered it.
``Under water, though, all the fish come right up to you. Those sea creatures aren't scared. It's the most wonderful experience in the world.''
With their gear strapped on and hoses in place, the divers are a sight that might scare some landlubbers. Although the Atlantic was warm last week, 79 degrees, wreck club members donned full wetsuits, thick gloves, tight-fitting hoods beneath their wide masks and high-top aqua booties inside their flippers. They have to cover all skin in case of jellyfish.
From extra oxygen tanks to an oral inflator that adjusts the air in divers' suits in case their automatic hoses don't work, every piece of equipment they wear has a back-up device, Darby said.
Divers adjust the pressure in their air suits with a button, trying to create a neutral weight under water as they swim. They breathe through three tubes attached to two or more tanks on their backs. They carry special computers that calculate how long they've been under water and how long they have to wait at 30-, 20- or 10-foot depths before resurfacing.
Sometimes, they strap on as much as 200 pounds of equipment before going overboard.
``When we started this sport, we each had a mask, fins, one regulator and one tank. Now, we're wearing at least $5,000 of equipment each when we jump off the boat,'' Darby said. ``It takes at least $1,500 just to get started with the bare minumum.''
``I've probably got $30,000 invested in the stuff,'' estimated Walters, a computer engineer. ``But I know the experiences I've had are worth much more.''
During their 140-foot dive last weekend, most members of the Atlantic Wreck club spent a half hour at that depth. Although it took them only a few minutes to descend to their desired level, they had to take their time resurfacing. On the way up, they had to ``hang,'' holding onto the anchor line, for 5 minutes at 20 feet below the sea's surface and for 21 minutes at 10 feet.
Then, they climbed back onto the boat and checked each other with Doppler medical devices for bubbles in the blood - a symptom divers get that is often known as ``the bends'' and can result in paralysis.
Darby had a red rash across his stomach, and his chest made gurgling noises when Doug Bickley passed the Doppler across it. But since the thunderstorm caused Huffman to call off their second dive of the day and the boat headed back to shore, Darby said he really didn't need to worry. ``It only counts as the real bends,'' he said, smiling, ``when you have to go to the (recompression) chamber.''
Penny Bickley retrieved a double brass gear from the Empire Gem during her first dive last week.
Club member Bob Swarm brought back some beautiful shells.
An 8-foot-long sand shark sat on Doug Bickley's head.
But Huffman - who doesn't dive with his charter groups but often does on his own - said the hangs are always his favorite part of the underwater experience.
``You're just floating there, breathing slow, watching barracudas glide around or fish flit overhead. Those are the best times, to me,'' Huffman said.
``You're coming back up. But you're forced to wait and watch and wonder. That's when you really get into the Zen of deep-sea diving.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by DREW C. WILSON
Ron Wallace climbs on the dive boat after exploring the Empire Gem,
a British carrier sunk in World War II.
After experiencing an unusual skin rash thought to be caused from
not enough decompression, Clif Darby, center, was checked for
nitrogen bubbles in his bloodstream by Doug Buckley.
As the Rapture of the Deep heads between wrecks, members of the
Atlantic Wreck Dive Club grab a snooze.
DIVE SHOPS
Area dive shops include:
Hatteras Divers, Hatteras Village - 986-2557.
Nags Head Pro Dive Shop, Nags Head - 441-7594.
Sea Scan Dive Shop, Nags Head - 480-3467.
Ocracoke Dive Shop, Ocracoke Island - 928-1471.
Dive boat Capt. Roger Huffman, who led the charter trip featured
in this article, can be contacted at his Colington Island home at
441-2393.
by CNB