King 'Cuda

Immediately after graduation from basic Deep Sea Diver school, I was sent on a 9-month Western Pacific Deployment aboard the USS Hector, an old floating repair factory that could fix anything a sailor could break. I flew from California to the Philippines to board my ship, and then sailed on to a God-forsaken place called Diego Garcia. You might find it on a globe 400 miles south of India, just a small coral atoll with a high spot 6 feet above high tide... It belongs to the British, but the Americans leased it as a resupply depot. In reality, it's just a pitstop for any US Warship passing from the Indian Ocean to Hawaii. Back during the Iranian Hostage Crisis, there was a lot of traffic in that part of the world. Keeping the Hector (AR-7) at Diego meant that broken warships could get a quick fix a long way from home.

As the junior diver in a 6 man shop, the days were long and hard. Almost everything inside a ship is connected to the ocean, and you can't take the pipes apart until a diver plugs up the holes from the outside. Every time a ship's mast crested the horizon, we'd start looking for our flippers... But- we relished every dive! We'd escape the tropical heat and headtrips of the military world above and enter a prehistoric world that few have seen: Back then, the British didn't allow anyone except military divers to enter the waters due to fierce tides, vicious and poisonous sea life, and no emergency recompression chamber in case of diving accidents. We were the lone exceptions :-)

On every dive, we'd be working 15'-30' underneath a vessel in crystal clear water, and could see clearly for hundreds of yards. The flat bottom of the coral lagoon was a mere 80' below us, and we would watch the passing sealife while doing some of the more mundane parts of our underwater work. Huge schools of fish, sharks, sea turtles, manta rays- it was like being inside a National Geographic special every day at work.

One afternoon, we load the 50' dive craft for routine diving and head out past 4 vessels alongside. The Chief continues out towards the mouth of the lagoon and announces we get an afternoon off for "training dives" and, say, where are those spearguns anyway....

We draw lots, and I get to make the first run with diving officer whom we nicknamed "Thunder Thighs." We anchor out, suit up, and hit the water near where the lagoon opens onto the Indian Ocean at about 100' of depth. I'd always wanted to see how fast I could do a controlled drop and then cruise along the bottom, and this was the perfect spot. We agreed to meet at a particular coral rock, set our watches, and dropped.

I dropped like a stone head-first and gathered momentum. At about 80', I started pulling out of the dive- and came 3 inches from pulverizing myself on beforementioned coral head at Warp 2.... (This should have been my first warning.) I cruised for yards over the coral beds as my speed bled off. Finally, I stood up on the bottom and began adjusting my equipment. As I get settled, I notice: No Partner. Look forward, No Partner. Look up, No Partner. (This should have been my 2nd clue.)

I turn around and find my facemask 18" from the biggest barracuda I ever heard existed. Probably 9' long and 24" in diameter. Eyes the size of saucers, just hovering there, inches from my face, first one big black eye- then a slight twitch of the head for the other big black eye.... deciding whether I'm fair for lunch or not...... mouth big enough to take my thigh in a single snap...

All my orifices seize shut. The adrenaline hits and I become an instant goose-bump. Tunnel vision. Hi, Bruce, meet Death. Seconds pass and... nothing. He's just hovering there, watching... I remember I'm wearing an air tank, so my brain finally lets my body have a gasp or two. Still there.... OK, now what....what did the Master Diver say back in school???

• Pacific King Barracuda:
• Absolutely unpredictable and aggressive
• Attacks man without warning
• Extremely territorial
• Attracted to shiny objects
• If confronted, too bad.

Let me see if I covered everything... Shiny bubbles, shiny regulator, shiny facemask, shiny tank buckles, shiny watch. I might as well be a Banjo Minnow w/ Pheromones® and have the words "Eat Me" painted on the side. AND, I just dropped into this prehistoric carnivore's kitchen carrying a speargun. OK, so much for school. I realize that this speargun isn't big enough to do anything except get me in trouble, so I let it slide down my leg to the coral. First one big black eye- then the other. No place to go. He backs off a couple of feet, then gently begins a long, lazy circle once around me. He's deciding if I'm lunch, and I know it, and he knows it. He circles around again, and I slide out my brand new, just sharpened, Navy-issue, SHINY deep sea diver's knife that can cut thru sheet steel....

He stops and hovers as before... and I prepare for the death strike that doesn't happen. Time seems suspended. Nothing at school prepared me for this, what else?? Religion? Better than being lunch, and 8 years of being a Catholic Altar Boy HAS to count for something... "OK, Lord... Are you Listening???"

Nothing. "OK, Lord. When I get back aboard, I'll go see the ship's Chaplain and I'll go to mass every Sunday we're on this patrol."

Nothing. "OK, Lord. I'll do some missionary work when the ship pulls into Africa next month, AND I'll go to mass every day for a year."

Nothing. First one big black eye, then the other.... Adrenaline is reaching epic proportions.

Nothing. "OK, Lord. Let me out of this one and I'll teach Sunday School when we get back to the States."

And then it happened: He slowly turned, suddenly as bored with me as if with last week's funnies. I watched him glide across the coral heads towards the open ocean until he disappeared from sight, then started shaking with the realization that I was alive after all! I slowly drifted to the surface and climbed onto the platform. I thought I had handled it all rather well until the Chief had to pry my fingers from my knife....

As I began my acrobatic drop and glide at the start of my dive, my partner had spied this monster fish rocketing over the reefs at me, and stayed at the surface watching the 3 minute ordeal unfold. "Thunder Thighs" was convinced I was fish-bait when at the very last instant, I ran out of steam and came to a sudden stop on the bottom. This caused the fish to suddenly stop its attack and started my adventure. Do I think the Lord is responsible? Who can tell? Will I tell this story to a bunch of kids in a church basement one of these days before I get too old?

You Bet.

WebMaster