122 m (Solo) - CAVE Ras Mamlakh

06.03.2007

The aim of the dive was, first, to pass along the new route, from the surface through the windows; second, to further explore the deep water part of the cave. The possibility to enter the cave through the gaps has been already discussed by Sergey Andreev and me. After that Andrey Chiskyakov has performed all the preparatory work, in particular, installation of the floater.

We commenced the dive at about 08:00AM. It was pretty windy, the water was low. Passing through the reef was, to put it mildly, uneasy. Telling the truth, I was totally exhausted forcing my way through the shallow reef, studded with small corals, with all the equipment. Having found myself in the open water at last, I got to the floater quickly, went down to 60 meters- the “window” entrance, left two stages by fixing them to the floater rope - EAN40 and Oxygen. I took only run-gas Tx 21/24 with me to the cave.

As I entered the cave, I moved 10 meters from the wall with the gap to the place with a quite wide passage- I really did not want to squeeze myself through the crack during the solo-dive. I placed a standard round marker on the guiding rope and drew the guiding rope down from it. At the depth of about 90 meters I reached our red (deep) guiding rope. I connected to it the same way, via the marker. So now the white and the red guiding ropes are connected under the windows, which may help a lot in case of a quick emergency exit from the cave through the window. I went further by the familiar route along the red guiding rope; then-along its extension, my new one, down to the mark of 116 meters. Then I misbehaved a bit and went about 15 meters without laying a guiding rope. The matter is that there are really no other options in that place – only the bottom and two walls. Though certainly one must never do that- in case of light breakdown and due to the mud there may be a problem coming up.

An unexpected meeting occurred at the exit from the windows- I came across a huge black Sting Ray, face- to –face, which, apparently, wanted to enter the cave through the gap. After swimming around me for a couple of minutes, it has left with high level of dignity.

Photo (by Andrey Chistyakov): The floater installed on the windows. The white rope leads from the large (passable) gap; the floater is subsurface, at the depth of 10 meters.

Configuration of equipment and mixtures:

Bottom: TX 10/55, twin steel cylinder – 2 of 15, 210 bars - 50 bars left (that’s too little, please note it when planning from the point of view of safety)

Run-gas: TX 21/24, 12 l., aluminum, 210 bars - 50 bars left (that’s too little, please note it when planning from the point of view of safety)

Decompression gas 1: EAN40, 12l., aluminum, 200 bars - exhausted (reserve cylinder remained unused)

Decompression gas 2: Oxygen, 12 l., aluminum, 110 bars - exhausted (reserve cylinder remained unused)

Two VR3 decompression. The total diving time was 152 minutes. By the 26th minute I have come back to the gap (the exit), i.e. I was lower than 60 meters for about 20 minutes.

Light - Metalsub, head HID200. Emergency light – four lights UnderwaterKinetics on the helmet (very convenient during a solo-dive with no light man), a tiny Tektite (4LED). Main light was just excellent, sometimes I simply forgot that I was inside a deep cave!

Conclusions. The cave entrance through the windows was a bit disappointing due to quick reaching of the bottom. I might say I felt no special time advantage. But decompression at the outer reef is unconditionally more pleasant than swimming back and forth the canyon for two hours. Besides that, the rope leading from the gaps to the red guiding rope may be really useful for an emergency exit from the cave. Thus laying of the new guiding rope supports safety of future deep dives a bit.