That Sinking Feeling …
Air!
Slipping into the water, from the charter boat, anchored off Bracebridge, Ontario, into the Muskoka Lake down the mooring line, into the dark depths below, Graham descended, after deflating his buoyancy compensator device — or the BCD as it is called. Hand over hand, as gracefully as possible, with 36 pounds of lead strapped to his waist on his weight belt and another four pounds of lead in two separate, two pound ankle weights, each at the bottom of his legs.
Down he went, sucking breaths of compressed air from his SCUBA tank, as he fought to maintain some semblance of buoyancy. Alternating small presses on the inflator on his BCD and dry suit chest inflator did nothing at first to stop his rapid descent. After a couple minutes, his descent quickened as the pressure at depth compressed the volume of both BCD and dry suit. Longer presses of both BCD and dry suit inflators soon slowed the descent as he neared bottom some 30 meters below the surface.
Coming to rest on the fore deck of the wreck, he took stock of his depth and air gauges, including a quick compass bearing. Thirty (30) meters on the deck was the equivalent of four atmospheres of pressure. With only 2500 psi in his aluminum 80 cubic foot tank remaining, Graham calculated quickly — based on his known breathing rate — how much time he had remaining at depth. Even given the Dive Tables…
