Sea Empress - Deerfield Beach /Florida
It wasn’t dark this morning. Of course I was heading out for an afternoon dive but still, it wasn’t dark
I was meeting a group of divers in Deerfield Beach to dive the Sea Empress., a 90 ft. barge sitting upside down in about 70 feet of water. It was originally loaded with cement conduits (those big round cement pipes they use for storm drains and sewers) which spilled out and into the sand. The group I am going with are all friends and their diving ranges from Cave divers to new divers.
The day was beautiful, 78 degrees and cloudless blue skies, the water was a bit choppy but not a problem.
This wreck offered our diverse group a little bit of everything. The upper level of the deck was at approximately 45 feet with a wide band of openings which allowed divers to see or drop down inside the interior of the barge. At the sand where the were large cement pipe sections providing hidey holds for an array of sealife and sponges and corals. At the sand level along the barge were several additional access openings to the interior.
After a tour of the exterior of the wreck all around and some swimming around and through the pipes in the sand, my buddy (a cave diver) was dying to get into the wreck. I was not so excited so we agreed he would swim through and I would swim at the openings above. And in he went.
This is where it gets interesting. You can yell “Stop it!“ Through your regulator. Do sea creatures understand you? I think so. As my buddy disappeared under the barge I went to swim up and out of the corner of my eye saw movement in the sand. Like the mothership in a science fiction movie this huge mass lifted up and out in a cloud of sand. A stingray about 4-5 foot across. (it was as wide as my arm spanned so that is how I figured it). And it immediately swam towards me. Now going through my mind was Steve Irwin, The Deep (I dont understand it, it just did), the SciFi channel... It veers off at the last minute and now I am just a wee bit nervous. I mean I have mondo knife right? Trust me last thing on my mind. This ray now circles and comes back, repeating the same path again. I am now moving up the side of the barge trying to get to an area where the other divers were and this ray repeats the path 2 more times. Now being the mother of 2 boys, I have had enough and in my mother of all mother modes kicks in and I just yelled “Stop that!” through my reg. And he did.
Finally getting a visual on my buddy I follow along the length of the barge until he comes up to meet me and in trying to describe the ray to him a smaller one of about 3 foot swims by and I can see him grinning in his reg.
We make one more circuit of the wreck and in and out of the pipes and there in the next pipe is a GI-NORMOUS green eel. Longer than me, longer than my buddy (god I hope he wet his suit then for laughing at my ray story). And so we slowly back out and start to fin away. Our friend, Mr Mean and Green..... Follows us. Now going through my mind is all the advice I have been given so far about alligators and sharks....I only have to swim faster than one other person, unfortunately there is only one other person with me, so I keep him between me (a hand on his tank helps that) and the eel as we slowly move towards the anchor line. About 2/3 of the way there Mr Mean and Green gives up and moves on.
I still have almost 1000 lbs in my tank and my big brave dive buddy looks at my gauge and thumbs up. Not sure I can swim faster than him in an emergency I agree. As we head towards the line the smaller ray comes into sight again, and as we watch him, what rises out of the sand below? The mothership. My buddy just looks at me and I nod. We sat at the anchor line and just watched these two rays swimming around and after a while I peeked down through the slats in the barge and swimming there like a big floating ribbon was our buddy the eel.
We watched a bit longer, they are amazing creatures and their movements are so graceful and then up the line we went. 75 degrees, 45 minutes at about 69 feet.
Upon surfacing, we were discussing our encounters and the Captain explained that these guys had been living here for some time and for many years divers fed both the rays and the eels and they were very used to looking to divers for food. A ban was put in place stopping this practice as several divers had been bitten, especially ones without snacks for the fishies. Hence why they were so quick to approach us.