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

86 страница из 133

That afternoon, six hours later, the second dive of the day would be on Port Napier again. My memories of that dive consist solely of the trouble I had getting on a now freezing wet, wet suit in bare feet on the wet tarmac of an open, wind swept car park above the pier. The wind had picked up since the morning and it had started to rain. The old hands, used to this form of sadomasochism, produced a thermos of hot water, which was poured into the wet suit before you put it on, easing the initial shock.

Whilst wreck diving was it for me from now on, I was realising the limitations of diving in a wet suit in Scotland. Although it was the prevailing way of diving at that time, a new type of diving dress, called a dry suit, was just hitting the shops. The drysuit was essentially a dry bag that had waterproof seals around your neck and wrists. The prospect of diving dry promised warmth both underwater and in dive boats. Until then only a few people had used old ex-Nato attack frogmen black rubber Avon suits - which were usually very easily holed and held together by Isoflex patches.