Logbook Scuba Dive # 321 - Fujikawa Maru
| Logbook Scuba Dive # 321 - Fujikawa Maru |
Good| Cylinder Set #1 | |||
| Cylinder Type: | Cylinder Size: | Working Pressure: | Supply Type: |
| Alumimium |  20 litres |
200 bar |  Open Circuit (OC) |
| O2: | He: | Min. PPO2: | Max. PPO2: |
| 21% | 0% | - | 1.4 bar |
 EAN 21 |
MOD: | EAD: | END: |
| 56.6 m | 56.6 m | 56.6 m | |
| Start Pressure: | End Pressure: | Diff. Pressure: | |
| 188 bar | 49 bar | 139 bar | |
| Avg. Depth: | SAC Rate: | ||
| - | - | ||
| Cylinder Set #2 | |||
| Cylinder Type: | Cylinder Size: | Working Pressure: | Supply Type: |
| Alumimium |  11 litres |
200 bar | Open Circuit (OC) |
| O2: | He: | Min. PPO2: | Max. PPO2: |
| 50% | 0% | 0.19 bar | 1.6 bar |
| EAN 50 |
MOD: | EAD: | END: |
| 22.0 m | 10.3 m | 22.0 m | |
| Start Pressure: | End Pressure: | Diff. Pressure: | |
| - | - | - | |
| Avg. Depth: | SAC Rate: | ||
| - | - | ||
| Avg. Depth: | SAC Rate: | ||
| 15.45 m | 20.61 litres/min | ||
| Gas Mixture: | |||
| Air (O2=21%) | |||
| DIVING AT CHUUK LAGOON I made the short walk to the Blue Lagoon Dive Shop at 8 a.m. to unpack and setup my dive gear. A set of manifolded twin aluminium 80s (11 litres) with DIN valve fittings were waiting for me. (I needn't have packed my OMS dual cylinder travel bands and two Apeks DIN to Yoke adapters.) I queried the length of one of the bolts on the bands but was told it would be okay. Of course it turned out it wasn't okay and we had to adjust it later on the dive boat. Thankfully Peter Fear had some tools with him on board. There were two snorkelers and sixteen divers in our group, so Peter Fear had organised for us to have three dive boats. Peter Fear, Peter Chew, Laurent Ailleres and myself had all come equipped to dive using twins, so as to allow us to plan decompression dives with longer bottom times. We also planned to use stage cylinders with EAN60 on most dives to accelerate our decompression times. As our dive profiles would be quite different to the others, we took one of the dive boats for ourselves. Local Ansauo Renis was our boat captain and Tryvin Aisek our dive guide. FUJIKAWA MARU Our first wreck was the Fujikawa Maru, a large aircraft transport with six holds. Tonnage: 6,938. Length: 132.6 metres. Beam: 17.8 metres. Launched: 15 April 1938. She was sank by a single torpedo that hit starboard amidships, just aft of the superstructure. The Fujikawa Maru sank slowly by the stern while at anchor landing most orderly, almost perfectly on an even keel in 37 metres (120 feet) of water. We rode out to the dive site in the twin Yamaha 40HP outboard powered dive boat with Ansauo steering the way. We anchored on the dive site, and after Tryvin's briefing, geared up for the dive. No stage cylinder for this dive as we wouldn't be staying on the bottom long enough to go into decompression. With 4 kg of lead in my weight belt and just wearing my non-buoyant Thermalskin for protection against scratches and stingers, it turned out I was well over weighted. I initially had some equalisation issues, but everything soon settled down and I was descending down towards the Fujikawa Maru. The 30 degree centigrade water was the warmest I'd ever dived in. Anyone got some ice cubes to cool it down? As we started down I could see this awesome form lying below, like the body of some dead leviathan. Then came the straight lines that betray something man-made in the midst of everything else natural. A collection of geometric shapes of varying shades of blue. Squares, Rectangles. Circles. They gradually resolved themselves into the bridge, different deck levels, open holds and hatches, cargo booms, ladders, railings, cables, piles of debris. And guns. Several different impressions vied for centre stage in my mind. The size was enormous. The books said 132 metres (434 feet) in length with an 18 metre (58 feet) beam, but these are just numbers. I soon figured we could easily spend weeks just investigating this one ship. The Quiet. Aside from the usual reassuring bubbling of used air, the clacking of shrimp and munching of parrotfish, the sensation was one of, to coin a phrase, deathly stillness. Exactly the opposite of what it must have been like that cacophonous day it went down. Life. In direct contrast to the sombreness of the dead ship was the profusion of underwater life covering it. Just about anywhere light reached, something grew. Splashes of brilliant colour and fantastic shapes encrusted the length and breadth of the Fujikawa Maru. The delicate, rainbow hued tree corals in particular excited my imagination, suggesting a master pastry chef had gone wild with his tubes of icing. The leather corals were huge in size and dense in numbers. Also in abundance were large, jagged-mouthed oysters. Sea whips. Frilly, white algae. Sponges. And so on. I couldn't help thinking that there was something very ironic about having all of this beauty slowly but surely covering these weapons of war. We headed to the large forecastle which has a large windlass. However, it is dominated by the large, old fashioned 1899 cruiser gun of 15.2 cm (6 inch) calibre, located on top of a circular platform. The barrel is slightly elevated and trained forward which suggests it was in action. Though it's hard to believe that such a flat trajectory, single purpose gun would have been much use against attacking aircraft. In the bottom of the first forward hold we found several drums scattered around, with spare propeller blades, heavy machine guns and aircraft wings. Large six inch shell casings can also be seen, plus a large quantity of shells arranged in rows with their tips protruding above the brown sediment. It is probably ammunition for the bow gun. There is also a lot of small arms ammunition, an outboard boat engine and drums orderly stowed. The tween decks of the hold have propeller blades, engine cowlings, aircraft fuselage parts, a torpedo body, tyres, coils of communication wires, porcelain insulators, and welding tanks. Ascending out of the hold and back on deck was the large winch house. The view up the mast was breathtaking and beautiful. Down in the bottom of hold two we found several fighter aircraft. They were now an odd assortment of cockpits, fuselage parts, wings and tail assemblies. The tween decks of this hold contain radial engines and engine cowlings. We passed over the third hold heading to the amidships area, through into the bridge and then onto the galley with its very large stove which extends almost the full width of the room. We came across a head, or bathroom, with toilet bowls and urinals. We headed down into the engine room. The catwalks looked particular eerie at first. Plenty of machinery is to be found at various levels in the engine room, and at the bottom are the two rows of three cylinder heads of the main engine. Exiting the engine room we passed over the rear holds and headed towards the deck house at the stern. On top of the deck house is the second of the 15.2 cm (6 inch) calibre guns. We then turned around and headed back towards the bow and our anchor line. As we ascended I did a two minute deep stop at 15 metres before rising to 5 metres where I used the EAN50 deco cylinder hanging from the boat. Officially, this was our check dive where Tryvin could gauge for himself just how competent we were as divers. Thus it was a no decompression dive, to a maximum depth of 28 metres with a total run time of just 53 minutes. After successfully completing a simply magnificent dive we headed back to the Blue Lagoon Dive Shop. After a 20 minute wait to be served and then 40 minutes for the wrong order to be delivered to the table, lunch at the Truk Blue Lagoon Resort was finally over. Thankfully I didn't want the chips that were part of the dish, because they were cold. |
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