A Perfect Barrel Dive
One day, I was invited by a close Phil. Marine Soldier friend to dive at a suspected treasure site at Laguna Province, Philippines. He told me that he was convinced by a man claiming to have started digging operations in his land by reason of a live pointer and that because of their reaching a certain ?water trap?, his team of operators hurriedly went up and out the hole they dug and can?t get the water flushed out even with the best pumps available - water keeps on coming as I have told. SO, IT WAS a man-made SINK HOLE! The ?site owner? further claimed that since water is vital for the preservation of Gold Bars, their predicament with the ?water trap? was the vital sign for the clear-cut presence of the bars and that one of his diggers indeed saw the gold bars as they scamper one at a time out of the death-trap.
So we came, first to find, first to dive?
As I examined the pit of darkness where my people will venture to be one of the richest men in the Philippines, I scratched my head in perplexity looking at the risk involved in becoming a bullion certificate holder like Marcos. The water was muddily murky and it?s absolutely zero visibility. Flashlights will not work but I ordered them nonetheless as essential. Since it was fresh-water diving, computations for the dive time factors vary. Roping is a must and the dive down hundred feet the very narrow hole requires a one-by-one descent of each diver for the organized team of four divers.
We planned and donned our gears?
Lead weights for the waist for our stability was way above normal requirements to also give us a push against the water coming out of the hole. We just planned to ditch them should a necessity pops up. After submerging the guide rope with weights down the shaft, the ?owner? of the site wanted a ?down payment? of Php5,000,000.00 prior to our inspection. He insisted but to our digression by following the rule: ?To see is to believe.? He claimed that gold bars abound in the huge chamber at the end of the abyss that we will encounter soon. And so, one-by-one we descended through the narrow pit of nothingness without buoyancy compensators - if not to avoid, but minimize on entanglement. We violated one of the most important rules of diving just like signing a death wish. Down we went through the black hole like astronauts of the 2001: A Space Odyssey movie but the only difference is: WE WERE BLIND! As we creep down this tube I felt like being in a transient euphoria with the cold water and silt gushing and countless air bubbles dawdling our faces, except for me being the lead, the frigid nippy rope slides between our legs while each one intermittently taps the end of the diver?s fin ahead of him to make certain on each one?s distance. The only way to communicate is by using our previously made-up tapping codes and forgetting one of them will spell confusion and disorder which is a menu for disaster. ?No room for error? is the order of the day? We can feel the shaft as we went down with the fingers of our free hand very lightly grazing the wall to know that we are still at a tethering phase through the shaft. As we went deeper, the element of fear seems to have surfaced and our panache of being macho derring-do divers? ego seems to be drowning fast as we went downwards. Distances of one to another diver seem to have differed and furthered as planned and each of us were tapping harder than what is normal. No one can turn back because a panic of one will open a disastrous situation to all divers as not one of us can twirl or twist going back because the pass is a ONE-WAY TICKET WHICH IS DOWN, DOWN, DOWN?
Behold, we finally reached the chamber! Our hands, and at arms length cannot reach a wall or any solid surface at this point. Nothing to touch. Nothing to reach. There is no more shaft enclosure for our fingers to latch on. It?s finally live-and-let-live inside a room of darkness and we went down deeper away from the base of the cavity via the rope with our breathings becoming heavier and faster in anticipation of the gold bars! I gradually slowed my rope-crawl downwards to feel the expected tapping on my fins and there it was, the second diver also signals the presence of the diver behind him. Errors not within the room! Slowly in a snail pace in total darkness, I felt disoriented somewhat confused of which way is up and down but the rope was my admonisher as my hand naturally feels that my thumb is pointing downwards as I haven?t made changes on my griping pattern on the rope through our descent. Deeper as I go and my buddies in the line behind me, I suddenly and unexpectedly bumped my head on the floor of the chamber and felt mud and particles propelled on my face like being powdered at a downtown barbershop with a towel strapped on my eyes. At this point I changed my orientation and knelt on the floor guiding each diver in descent to follow suite and as agreed above, to form a football huddle with no single diver to detach a hand from the rope. With our planned search formation, completely deprived of sight, groping hand to hand, we attached another line from the main rope and gradually started our circular search pattern pivoting from the center of the sinker weights of the main rope. All our movements were coordinated just like a Spanish tap dance ? in slow mo! With our grip of the secondary line and at tapping distances, we were like four blind beggars crawling on the floor of a church chamber searching for a coin thrown by a wealthy nobleman. I can weirdly hear the bubbles of the diver besides me and the regulator?s intake and outtake ventilating sounds in low pitches discordant to what it would normally emit making me feel like both of us diving in a sealed water barrel. In those darkest moments, I can hear my heart beating rapidly with the anxiety building up faster. Sometimes, I can feel a little dizziness and a lot of uneasiness - or was it just a tinge of nyctophobia giving me the creeps!? Sensations were changing fast and a variety of thoughts, apprehensions, and angst with some derangements from fear to calmness and some second thoughts to fearlessness was giving me the cold feet in this other world.
And, suddenly, A METAL OBJECT!
My hand accidentally touched a solid object and removing my gloves I definitely have landed on a metal and seemingly polished object. Heavy as it seems though with the discomfort that its shape reminds me of something that I must have known or have touched before, nevertheless, THIS IS IT! - I was blown away and overwhelmed by the fact that all the risk involved suddenly paid up with the diving objective at hand in finding a metal object that can be the key to any man?s dream of a large swimming pool, a yacht, a mansion, a Land Rover or a Lamborghini, a world tour, a condo, stocks, bonds, etc., etc., and WITH MY TWO BARE HANDS I touched it with pride and glory. I stood on the surface of the chamber?s floor and shouting in mind I said: ?Mama, I?m bringing home the bacon!?
Suddenly, I felt mixed-up again. I realized with my two hands holding the object I left loose of my line hold. I immediately knelt and tried to reach with my left arm my nearest buddy while holding firmly with my right the precious commodity. HE WAS NOWHERE TO BE REACHED. He was gone. They were gone. I am in deep trouble! I became frenzied and dismayed. In total darkness and disoriented, I cannot even hear some regulators and bubbles now. I made clinking sounds with my knife and tank but there was no diver touching me in more than 5 minutes. I trembled. I have only one option to choose from - two already in mind. Either clinging on to the precious item and wait for help, or find my way out without the heavy baggage. If I hold on, stay in one place and wait, I must calculate mentally my tank air supply. Pressure gauge reading is impossible. This may be a guess work therefore. ?But I don?t want to guess in this mind-bending dilemma!? - I figured out whimsically. On the other hand, if I find my way out at that very moment, my buddies may panic if they reckon my previous position, and not being there, proceed to search for me in the chamber with all divers depleting rapidly their air supply to the damnation of all. I?m crossed! I?m bubbling rapidly. My mind is fretting with distress and imaginations of my body being fished out of the sink hole drowned and bloated ? I hate that! ?Wait, I remembered something?? While still knelt, I prayed ??though I walk in the valley of the shadow death, I will fear no evil..., Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me?? ? word-for-word: PSALM 23. After deeply and solemnly reciting it, I became composed. Only the space between my eyes and the glass of my mask reminded me of life above this time chasm. Without having the chance to see it, I dropped the precious cargo! Goodbye Range Rover!
Before they re-dive I must be coming up for the good of all. That was the plan at the back of my head. I dropped two of my weights and I became buoyant. Suddenly, I was like dreaming. I felt I was in a lucid dream as an astronaut in deep heaven floating in darkness without knowing which way is up and which way is down. Panic seems to have vanished. I mentally calculated my air supply. After estimating the probability of a time factor that my buddies would have done a brief search of me and ascended to get additional tanks and implement our emergency rescue procedure, I tried to reach the floor but it?s gone. I?m loose and directionless. Floating in the chamber, I evaluated my last grip of the rope and tried to swim on a straight line to reach a wall. I was going in circles, up, horizontal, and down, in my first finning effort of finding the wall of the chamber. I pulled my flashlight but it was fainter than a firefly?s light even at a 3 inch pointing distance to my face. Silt and mud! I?m sucked! I?m going mad!
I suddenly recalled my NAUI lessons from Master Madz so I bubbled heavily. Not feeling my bubbles I changed and move about until I can feel my bubbles touching my face and ears and with my flashlight head pressed firmly on my mask, I dimly saw traces of the bubbles sliding upwards the glass of my mask. Spreading my legs like a frog I gently propelled my body using my fins following the bubbles? direction. In about 5 minutes or so, my head slammed on a wall, but this time, it?s the chamber?s ceiling! Hope is there! The Lord surely guided me with His staff! Pinning my head on the ceiling, I made myself buoyant by ditching off the remaining weights. Remembering the Ice-Divers? technique, only grossly different, with the tip of my nose touching the ceiling?s surface, and in glimmer my eyes can see my air bubbles illuminated by my flashlight with the head pressed on the side of my mask, I followed the bubbles crawling on the ceiling?s surface using also the senses of my left hand?s skin above my head knowing these bubbles naturally will go upwards to a hole, somewhere at the center ? to THE SHAFT!
And so I did get there, a light at the end of the tunnel where water and mud seem to have turned brown from black - I am to leave a near-fatal trial in a dark insidious chamber AND A PRECIOUS CARGO LEFT BEHIND WAY DOWN BELOW.
Following the water flow through the shaft upwards I felt some ropes with weights being sunk but suddenly stopped. I knew now my buddies must have seen bubbles bursting on the mouth of the shaft and they must have known I?m on my way up. I grappled the rope and upwards I easily but slowly pulled my way up. When I reached the surfaced, I hurriedly removed my mask and shouted ?Hey bros, I?m alive!?
I was bewildered to have realized my buddies were not smiling. No celebration for Mr. Error. My buddies who held on to the secondary line indeed searched for me. Yes they did not find me. BUT THEY FOUND MY PRECIOUS CARGO ? they told me!! But why the long faces?
Then I saw one of them right-handed buddies holding his BIG BOOMER ? a Precision Custom Crafted 1911 Colt 45 ACP with Match-Grade Barrel and laser sights, AND IS SINISTERLY LOOKING AT THE ?SITE OWNER?.
He is holding something with his left hand?
IS THAT MY BOOTY!? I pondered?
?Oh my!? ? I said to myself - a cut and sawed railroad rail track 12 inches in length!
Now I know, IT REMINDED ME OF SOMETHING?
Make My Day!!!
by:
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