Outdoors Maryland; 908; Wreck Diving in Ocean City

Coming up the dark penetrating cold of the deep Atlantic a swirling murky silent world lures the curious who swim the reefs and wrecks on Maryland's Sandy sea bottom next. Outdoors Maryland is produced in cooperation with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. DNR. Inspired by Nature. Ah if. You're. Were the call of the sea is

primordial life began on Earth in the great oceans and each of us begins our life's journey blissfully submerged in a tiny sea within the womb were the surface of the earth like our bodies is mainly composed of water without water. Virtually all life on the planet would vanish. There are adventurers among us who are driven to return again and again to the watery realms. The vast alien universe beneath the waves that humans will never dominate. Julie last year has been diving since 1977. I feel when I'm suiting up I feel like I'm about to go into another dimension almost through the looking glass I feel like Alice when I jump in the water. I am the stranger the fish are the normal creatures of the sea. And it really puts you in a different position on the earth that humans tend to rule the surface. But the fish rule the

city and each time a fish will come and look at me. I feel so accepted and I feel a great joy from being connected with the sea life itself. Off the ocean shores of Maryland in the mid Atlantic seaboard deep sea diving is mainly wreck diving a testament to the invincibility of the sea in the restless world beneath these waves storms currents and shifting sands. Scour the ocean floor leaving no foothold for marine life. We're under water visibility can be very low sunken ships are punctuation marks on this otherwise barren underwater landscape the foundations for new life organisms in the food web from coral to sharks converge here for shelter and nourishment. With the demise of a ship's aboveboard life as a support vessel for humans

its second perhaps longer underwater life begins as a reef for marine life and a mecca for deep sea divers. Ted Greene is a master diving instructor and owner of Tidewater aquatics in Solsbury Maryland. He knows wreck diving off Maryland's coast. I've been diving since 1973 and pretty much all around the world in the Fiji through the Pacific the Caribbean or most my diving is the East Coast from Florida. I'm going as far north as Maine and Maine interests are shipwrecks. We're generally when we're diving we see fish in several different areas. The main part is down on the shipwreck and we have fish and refer to as bottom dwellers. We have flounder there's sea bass there top dog and we have fish in the mid-water in the mid-water fish can often be

bluefish striped bass and Dishan of that. When the Gulf Stream the warm water comes up from the Caribbean often we get tropical such as trigger fish and spade. We're often asked about sharks off Ocean City and we dive and we do see sharks there usually two or three different species that we normally see and the Sharks know that we're there and they're really not interested in us we look like where we belong or underwater and they generally tend to avoid us. Late July and the beginning of August off for the mid-Atlantic. Best bet for good underwater visibility. The Titan America owner Greg Hall carries an eager group of experienced divers from Ocean City bound for today's diving bright sun. Calm winds and a quiet surface seem promising. But the sea is always a mystery. No one can tell for certain what underwater conditions and currents will be.

Arena. Dolphins are a common sight voyaging from Ocean City. Ted Greene his dive master for the travel organizing the divers and equipment and planning with the captain the sequence of Rx for test dives in search of good conditions. First stop is the JR Martin a tugboat sunk not in a nor'easter but deliberately. The Ocean City re foundation sinks environmentally cleaned wrecks off Maryland's coast to create reefs for marine life thereby bolstering offshore fishing and diving opportunities. The JR Martin lies here in 70 feet of water. Bill Hartman is ship's mate. He'll conduct the first test dive to check underwater visibility for this is in divers lingo.

When you are the anchor your first one down you get to see her get the first glance of the sea life. That's pretty nice. I dive as much as I can I mean on that you know weekly. And you know that every day once you're hooked you're hooked and it gets in your blood. All right. Well now their little face is real cloudy right. There. This is the way of the fitful mid-Atlantic. The

divers know hurry up and wait is part of the routine. In fact it whets the appetite. And it is time well spent. Getting to know your diving partners. They're the ones on whom your life may depend in case of trouble in the deep. Julie knows the importance of trust among diving partners. Some of my very closest friends have been diving buddies and everything. Is very technical. And things could fail at any moment. If you get stuck in a crevice and you can't pull yourself out someone will be there to help you if you run out of there with someone your diving buddy will be there to provide that second source of air to get you to the surface. And this is created a very close bond between me and all of my dive buddies. Rick younger is the trip's captain. The sea is his life. During the week Rick is captain of a Department of Natural Resources research vessel.

Weekends. He books his captain on dive charters. He's been a diver for more than 15 years. Diving could be considered an extreme sport. We're going you know an environment and a world that is completely different from ours. So we have to take it pretty much advanced life support equipment with us. But statistically it's very very safe. On some Caribbean diving Mexico Florida Keys. I think the diving I really like best is right up here off Ocean City. You come up here and it's an adventure. Tropics is a nature walk it's all beautiful colors and can't really touch anything but the diving up here that we do is all diving on shipwrecks which are very historical and we have a story every time we want to record different out here. I can't get enough of it. The next site is the Paul Russell an old mystery record probably sunk in storm nearly a century ago.

Dive Master Ted takes a turn checking conditions. OK let's go to this rock we're not really sure exactly sure what it is it's an

older wooden rock the part we believe to be the bell stands up off the bottom a good 15 feet or so from that section. You've got a row ribs sticks out of the sand and there's about 50 feet down one song and almost a hundred feet down the other side. This rock typically holds a lot of fish. We were in the latter part of last week and we actually saw some sharks in the air and they just they're very docile they lay on the bottom and a lot of times past we never even see them they're just so well camouflaged. So there's the males having other questions about the rock. OK let's go not in. Any way whatsoever. No. No. No. Calley onus is one of the world's top underwater cinematographers.

He takes over toward the State of the art digital camera vacuum sealed in specialized waterproof casing. The other divers soon follow. Through the eyes of a diver first entering the water. The sea change is immediate. This is another realm an alien world to be explored on its own terms. Why. We're the wreck of the

Paul Russell has grown almost indistinguishable from the sea bottom except for a multitude of fish and other marine life for arriving among the encrustations of coral and plant life. We're. We're a diverse unexpected appearance does not go unnoticed.

Here we present the unfamiliar face. We're we're. Ray some creatures remain still counting on camouflage to foil any potential threat. Some bottom dwelling creatures may spot us before we see them and

simply move on. Others hover close to get a better look. An astonishingly flat flounder glides away to hide elsewhere. RM. We we.

We. Re sea Robins hesitate torn between the flight instinct and wide eyed curiosity re an angel shark lies in wait for prey by burying itself almost completely in sand. These are docile sharks but alert to every underwater vibration rule. Divers breathing through a regulator make an enormous disturbance underwater.

At the same time the divers streamlined form and swim. It makes them look like creatures of the sea. The angel shark certainly knows that diver is here but is simply not much interested. In. Sharks divers fear the man eaters like Makos and the great whites usually hunt in much deeper waters and are not considered bottom dwellers. They're not likely to be encountered among the rocks off Ocean City. Ask divers about their favorite dive and it's likely to be the one they just finished or the dive tomorrow. The next morning dawns like a promise.

First dive of the day is the Kathleen Reagan's in 60 feet of water this clam dredge was sunk in a storm and moved from shipping channels to become part of the Basque grounds reef. Diving off Ocean City inevitably raises comparison and even rivalry with diving in the Caribbean or other tropics. The differences lie well beyond preference. The equipment needs vary according to colder water temperatures here visibility and surface conditions can change drastically within moments. In the mid-Atlantic or computers or work in these parts the vigilance of ship's captain is of the utmost importance. The very first step. Yep. Dana Mason grew up on the Chesapeake Bay. She's been diving for more than 10 years and

knows the challenges and joys of diving off Maryland shores for diving 11 years. I have always been a water person. I grew up around the Chesapeake Bay grew up on boats and I had my first ocean dive here off of Ocean City. And I was hooked from there and it was just an incredible experience. The wildlife that piece the come in the colors it's just fascinate me ever since there's always something new and different. There are several steps that a diver goes through in getting ready to get in the water. You set up your gear. Some divers wear a wetsuit which gets wet. Other divers wear a dry suit which is a little warmer. Because it keeps you dry. It has stronger seals in the water doesn't permeate the sewer. You put the tank on your back by putting the B.S. on like a basket. After you have your PC on you put your hood.

Protect your head. When you put on your mask. And your fans. And lastly put on your glasses. Other divers finish suiting up and enter the water. This morning Julie and Ted are diving partners. For some like Julie the hunt is on the treasure an

unforgettable experience. I live my life after another and diving provides that adventure. And it brings back the history of the. Be

be. You swim around in beautiful fish beautiful sea life. But then you notice the door. You go through the door and then you enter the world of the people that worked on the

ship and you get a sense of history from the vessel itself. You're connected to the people. I'll pick up something simple like a bucket. And you're connected to the people. When you surface you feel truly you've been in that person's world. For diving partner Ted the experience of diving is a dream come

true. Quite literally diving tends to preoccupy most of my life and yes quite often I dream often times when we're going off to a new rack or a new location and we don't know what to expect one often has dreams about finding things underwater that one always wants to find a ship's bell maybe yours and China or something along that lines. Diving is a is definitely different from any topside activity you do any time that you go underwater obviously. There is an element of risk that's involved. Consequently when you dive you become pretty much 100 percent focused on what you're doing this is not a recreation you do in daydream. The people that come out on the boat and dive take what they're doing very seriously they're very serious about their equipment. Following good safety procedures and this is probably one of the safer sports you can do simply because you're completely focused on it and when you're under water it is a very intense type of recreational part of what makes it so enjoyable is you've left the world behind. The only thing that you're thinking

about is the diving and everything that goes with it. B before I go I used to dream about flying. I suppose the biggest surprise for me in diving was that I felt as though I could fly underwater because I'm weightless and I do sometimes dream about diving but I've never dreamt about flying so. We are in a different world when we're diving we're physically and mentally connected to the sea. And then we notice on our gauge that we

have either run out of time or air and we need to make the physical separation from the city. So we start up the anchor line and then we see the sun filtering through the sea beckoning us back to the other. As we progress up the line we'll see the shape of the boat and maybe see it. It's caring and it's comforting because usually at about that time we're starting to be concerned about our air supply. When we break through the service we're broken at the world other physical reality. Drop in to our website at w w w dot MP t dot o r g

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