Читать книгу Into the Abyss. Diving to Adventure in the Liquid World онлайн

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Giving each other an OK hand signal, I took the snorkel mouthpiece out of my mouth and stuck the breathing regulator 2nd stage into my mouth. I took hold of the mouthpiece and corrugated hose from my ABLJ and held the mouthpiece up as high as I could. Pressing the dump valve on the end allowed all the air in the ABLJ to escape. The air rushed out from my ABLJ and, from having been positively buoyant on the surface, I now became heavier - negatively buoyant.

I sank down, slowly at first but with increasing speed until I landed on the seabed kicking up a cloud of white sand like a helicopter landing. Colin arrived down beside me gracefully and gestured that I should now get back neutral buoyancy. I took a long draw on my regulator and then took it out of my mouth and inserted the mouthpiece for my ABLJ into my mouth. Pressing the open/dump valve on it I then breathed exhaled air into it and it puffed up a bit – but I was still too heavy. I replaced my breathing regulator back in my mouth, took another long draw to fill my lungs and then repeated the laborious process of breathing out and into my ABLJ mouthpiece - giving it a bit more buoyancy. (In the following years this laborious process, something of an art form at the time, was ended when a direct feed whip for air was introduced which ran from the 1st stage straight into the ABLJ. Then, at the touch of a button, air could be bled directly into the ABLJ without having to remove your regulator from your mouth.)