The Basil is a 338ft long, 3,220 ton steamer which sank in 1978 after colliding with the French steamer Margaux.
Slack was estimated at 1.00pm which made for any relaxed breakfast watching Steve and Simon working out how to take over the world with their new diving computers. With the boat prepared, four sets of twin sets and various stages stowed it made the four divers, myself, Steve, Simon and Julian, with Jacqui boat handling, actually look like they knew what they were doing.
The sea was a little lumpy with 0.5m waves making for a slow journey out to the wreck. We still managed to arrive in plenty of time for Julian to put the shot in.
With buddy checks completed. Simon and Steve with instructions to put a lifting bag on the shot and move it to an easy location to recover it later; we entered the water in two waves. Me and Julian first, Simon and Steve to follow.
The shot was perfectly located, taking us over the wreck, close to the bow, as we descended. The deck was at 32m and the viz about 2m. Moving away from the bow along the top we saw crates of cargo through holes in the deck. Eventually we came to the large engines which could be clearly seen. Julian recovered a few mementos from his last visit which were swiftly dispatched with a lifting bag.
After Julian had fought a couple of edible crabs, who were lucky to find him without a spare goody bag the bottom time was approaching 35mins and it was time to ascend. At 6m my computer suggested 20mins deco.
Once safely back on the boat and having recovered Steve and Simon our attentions turned to recovering the shot. At which point it was disclosed that the lifting bag had not been attached to the shot which was also still in its original position. After several unsuccessful attempts to get the shot up we unfortunately had to resort to a sharp knife (for the rope) and accusations (for the guilty).
An hour later, two portions of chips and £140 of fuel, we admired the recovered booty and considered another successful BUDC trip. (SMc)
