Technical Scuba Diving
After we had spent some time at Farnsworth Banks, we decided to go dive the Midnight Hour. After all, I can't go out for a dive day and not dive on some rusted metal! I had heard about the Midnight Hour but didn't know much about her but did know that she was a squid [...]
Farnsworth Banks are a series of underwater sea-mounts about 1-2 miles off the shore of Catalina. They are a relatively famous dive site in Southern California but are a bit "out of the way" since they are on the backside of Catalina and about mid-way which means you need to go all the way around [...]
This was my first dive in 2022. I had planned on doing more research to identify the wreck before publishing but I have quite a few other projects I'm working on so I decided to publish it without an ID. I was with Ray and Kyaa on the Sundiver Express for my first dive of [...]
After doing some searching for targets and doing a dive on an unknown boat near Hamilton Cove (more on that in another post), I figured it might be fun to go dive the Infidel. The last time I was there was July of 2020. We had such great visibility on the first dive of the [...]
Background After we did our dive on the UB-88, we moved to another close-by wreck site that has traditionally gone by the name "Yesteryear." If I remember correctly, according to Ray Arntz, the moniker is based upon what fisherman used to call the site. This specific wreck is a bit of a mystery that we [...]
Background I first dove this ketch wreck back in July 2020 with Ben Lair and Justin Judd after we did a dive on the Infidel. It is a really nice and picturesque wreck but, unfortunately, I really never got any good pictures on that first dive so I didn't publish anything about it. Tyler has [...]
Background There are two types of technical divers. Those who "tinker" with gear constantly and those that ... WELL, NEVER MIND, there is only one kind of technical diver.... This post will mainly be gear related, but don't worry, there will be some pretty pictures with fish at the end! I had a business / [...]
Intro / Background I first read about the Grumman Goose at Catalina in an on-line article by Joe Dovala. It has been on my "hit list" ever since. I finally got a chance to dive it this past week. I have to admit, I think even with the increases in technology, Joe got better pictures [...]
There has been a lot written about the Valiant and it is a pretty common wreck dive to do at Catalina. It is at recreational depths and so it has been dived a lot. The short version is that it was a 162 foot luxury yacht that was built on the east coast in 1926 [...]
Justin Judd at the prop of the San Vito Intro This wreck is not visited very often as far as I can tell. Most references to the site are generically as the "Tuna Clipper." However, the actual name of the vessel is the San Vito. It sank on Feb 18, 1985 on the West End [...]