The support team had about 30 minutes of anxiety from the moment the divers started the decent until they shot the first SMB from 90 meters on the way up. The entire dive was enjoyable for all, and everyone was in high spirits throughout and happy to be involved in such a project.

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180 meter on the Yolanda

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Full Report

The wreck of the Yolanda lies at the tip of the Sinai Peninsula at the Ras Mohammad National park. Hundreds of thousands of divers dive the pieces of the Wreck and its cargo every year. The Yolanda carried bathroom fittings when wrecked. Lavatories and other items such as toilets, bathtubs, pipes etc… One could say it is some of the most visited sanitary products in the world.

In 2007 Leigh Cunningham conducted several dives on the wreck of the Yolanda. He pinpointed its actual position and documented some of the wrecks intricacies. Oxana Istratova (dirrus.com) and the Red Sea Explorers team have been considering a visit to the Yolanda since we heard about successful dives to it. We decided to take 2007 as a period of building up our progression to the Yolanda dive. Starting from mid-March Oxana and our team were conducting dives deeper than 100 meters on a regular basis.

In March we went for a few 110 meter dives on the Ras Mohammad caves known as the Devil’s Eye, which had been explored by a team  that went before us and where Oxana had supported the exploration efforts. Mid September Red Sea Explorers was part of a project to push to the end of the Ras Mohammad cave to explore an area dubbed the "Void" by previous the team, we reached the end of the cave (about .8 KM) to discover that the “Void” was a big room spanning from the depth of 130 to 150 meters. We later named it the Devil’s Crack. Finally, in October, Oxana and I went again for another interesting dive, as part of the Deep Chart Project, on the SS Maidan to 120 meters on the South Side of Rocky Island.

A few more hundred meter dives towards the end of the year and the team was ready to dive the Yolanda and had what it takes to do the dive safely and with ease. The plan was to descend following the debris and spend 10 minutes at an average depth of 165 meters and a maximum depth of 180 meters. The planning of decompression profile and gear configuration started early 2008.

An important part of planning this dive was having a bullet proof support plan. We also needed a support team that would be able to sustain the in water time and provide assistance when required at various parts of the ascent. For this we were joined by a group of divers trained by Oxana and holding various levels of dive qualifications from Normoxic trimix to advanced Nitrox club. At the helm of the support team was Red Sea Explorer's Mo “Mario” Hammoud; he was in charge of all surface procedures. The support plan will be discussed in detail further on in this report. It suffices to say that the support plan was executed to the T, all the support members were where they needed to be at the designated time with ample emergency gas if it were to be required. It went just like clockwork.

Most of the equipment for this dive was provided from the MV Tala’s arsenal of technical dive gear. Only two sets of 20 liter double tanks were organized by our friend Leigh Cunningham and delivered to us to Ras Mohammad one day before the dive so that we can test them in the water. Besides that, scooters, CSI video Camera scooter, all the gasses, stages and other equipment was from the gear already available on the MV Tala.

The Crew of the MV Tala being highly experienced in supporting and providing assistance to technical dive teams to conduct such dives with ease and comfort. From a surface logistics point of view they were all outperforming themselves on the day of the dive. The Zodiak (surface support vessel) remained over the divers at all times, more than 5 hours. The crew helped the push divers in and out of the water and delivered the support divers on time to the markers where they were meant to descend. The MV Tala itself was live with engines running all the time. The five hours the team spent in the water meant heightened alert mode on the boat for everyone. Even the chef was constantly busy feeding the 25 people that where all eating at different times as they went in and out to deliver their part of the support.

The dive was a fantastic experience and things went mostly smooth all through. Oxana had a leak in her dry suit and was pretty cold for the last segment of the decompression. The cold and the tight dry suit caused Oxana to suffer from a little soarness in her knees for some time but she was feeling good when she was nice and warm after the dive. Oxana has had these symptoms before when diving in cold water locations such as the Black Sea or other, where she is exposed to cold long decompressions in the prone position. We had a small free flow at depth was from my back up regulator at depth, but it was easily managed by repositioning regs and the loss of gas was insignificant. Other than these two points the entire dive went as planned with great success.

Both deep divers felt very comfortable and relaxed all the way down, at depth and back up. We felt the dive was no different from any odd 100 meter dive. The support team did have about 30 minutes of anxiety from the moment we started our decent until we shot our first SMB from 90 meters on the way up. . The wreck itself is anti-climactic as the wreck is almost completely blended into the reef and offers no possibility for penetration. The entire dive was enjoyable for all and everyone was in high spirits throughout and happy to be involved in such a project.

The team used no software or dive computers as they use Ratio Deco or deco on the fly. Their knowledge of decompression and understanding of physiology, allows the divers to plan the decompression profile using common sense and proper ascent techniques. On the dive the plan was on teh wetnotes, but it was ever needed as it was simple and straight forward and the divers did not deviate from the plan. A detailed decompression profile will be provided further down in this report.

We would like to extend our thanks to everyone that supported this project on the boat, in the water and in all preparations. We would also like to thank everyone who believed in us and in our ability to conduct safe and pleasant dives to this level. We wish the best of luck to others out there that are doing this kind of diving and hope they have great experiences and safe diving.

Dive Details

Profile

Gear configuration and team equipment:

Both divers used the standard Hogarthian/DIR Unified Team Diving approach to equipment configuration.

The Support Plan

The support team will start offering in water assistance to the divers at the 57 meter mark. We decided not to send the support divers deeper to keep them with a minimal deco obligation. A support diver with serious deco obligation would be more of a liability. The deep divers will send the first SMB from 90 meters only 30 minutes into the dive. This would be around 15 minutes prior to arriving at the 57 meter mark. Giving the Support team enough time to gear up and head down to meet the divers as they arrived at 57 meters. A small SMB indicates that all is good and we are on schedule and a big SMB would indicate that there is a problem. A big SMB might have a wetnote attached to it to indicate what the problem is. The support team used 21/35 which is the deco gas that the deep divers used so they did not need to carry any extra gas other than their own decompression cylinders. The support team also used scooters so as to keep up with the deep divers and be nimble in case of an emergency.

The first team would take all empty stages from the divers, accompany them on their way up untill they arrived at the 36 meter mark and the next team of support divers would be already on the way down. Every new team of support divers shoots a small SMB to indicate to the surface that the divers are well. A big SMB again would imply a problem. The 36 meter support divers would be breathing Nitrox 30 and can donate to any of the Deep divers if the need arises. Again this support team will accompany the divers all the way up to the 21 meter stop where another team of divers joins in with ample gas and an extra bottle of 50%. Once the deep divers are approach 6 meters the support team will provide an extra bottle of O2 and check up on the divers from time to time.

On the boat, Mo ”Mario” Hammoud was in charge of keeping everyone on time and making sure they all had the required  gear for the dives. He also had all the emergency scenarios planned out with contact information for all sides that might be involved in any kind of rescue or medical operation. He also kept the time log, clocked everyone on and off the boat . The schedule went as follows

Actual support timing:

Time Event

0757     divers Descend

0829     small smb Surfaces @ 32 min

0845     1st Support team Decends @ 48 min

0903     2nd Support team Descends @ 66 min

0913     2nd small smb Surfaces @ 76 min

0930     3rd Support team Descends @ 93 min

0950     2 water bottles sent in

0957     Call to Dr Adel of the Sharm Hyperbaric Chamber to inform all is OK

0957     1st Support team Surfaces @ 120 min

1007     2nd & 3rd Support Surface @ 130 min

1124     4th Support team Descends @ 207 min

1152     Seva surfaces gives positive feedback

1225     Faisal Surfaces

1230     Oxana Surfaces

For any questions or more detailed information about the dive please do not hesitate to contact us!!

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