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OSPREY’S INCREDIBLE DEEP SEA ARCADE

WE DON’T KNOW HOW MANY, BUT AT LEAST SOME EXPLORERS VISITED OUR PART OF THE WORLD BEFORE JAMES COOK. SOME, SUCH AS THE POLYNESIANS WHO COLONISED TREVOR JACKSON & NEW ZEALAND, MADE JOURNEYS THAT WERE MORE DIFFICULT AND PERILOUS THAN EVEN SIMON MITCHELL COOK’S EPIC VOYAGES. YET ASK ANY AMATEUR HISTORIAN TO NAME THE PRE-EMINENT SEA-GOING EXPLORER IN OUR REGION AND THEY’LL ALL NAME COOK. SO WHAT MADE IMAGES BY SIMON HIM THE ‘PEOPLES’ CHOICE’ EXPLORER? MITCHELL © 2014

he answer is that Cook bought us were unable to provide. We were happy back images, descriptions and the truth was out, but it constantly niggled Tmaps that connect us to this day to us that we’d failed to provide proof for what he found. Cook documented his what at the time must have seemed to discoveries compellingly; others didn’t. many, an outlandish claim. We would not We learned this lesson in a practical make that mistake again. sense 10 years ago. On 14 May 2002 we made the first dive to what was In 2009 we were aboard the Mike Ball assumed to be the wreck of Australian Dive Expeditions vessel MV Spoilsport for Hospital Ship Centaur , torpedoed off a week at Osprey Reef. On a routine drift Brisbane in the Second World War. dive along one of the vertical dropoffs it We discovered that the ship officially seemed our eyes had begun to play tricks recognised as the Centaur was the on us. The low afternoon light extended wrong wreck, but our video light its prying fingers into the deeper reaches imploded during the descent and we of the dropoff, like a torch into a returned without evidence. We had no darkened room. From our planned depth proof to connect people to the of 50m it appeared that something discovery. Our claim was subsequently strange happened to the wall 5 or 10m investigated by the navy, and their below. It seemed to disappear. In the dim sonar images became the evidence we shadowy light we figured it out… it looked like there was a massive overhang, and intriguingly, it looked like there was some sort of exuberant growth underneath it.

Thinking about it later we decided we must have been imagining the growth. Opposite: Every diver knows that coral life > Higher up the wall in shallower depths there’s deteriorates rather than improves the more light and and some of the best large coral deeper you go, right? Below 30 or 40m fans you’ll ever see. Photo Damian Siviero. its usually a waste of time looking for > It wasn’t only the deeper divers who got to see photogenic coral. But the mental image of these unusual corals. Small pockets with similar a sub-60 overhang with Jurassic Park species were found in shallower water too, with growth, whether it was a narcosis-fuelled this example at 25m. imagination or not, played on our minds. This page: The stunningly beautiful deep coral Perhaps more than anything else, the arcade extends along the wall between 60 and 70m at North Horn, Osprey Reef. Breath taking! potential of this site was the catalyst for Nikon D800 with 14-24mm f/2.8 Nikon lens in an annual ‘deep reefs’ expedition on Subal Housing, ISO 800, 1/80th @ f/8. Twin Spoilsport . The concept was that both Inon Z240 strobes on manual combined with recreational and technical divers would twin Light and Motion Sola Video 2000 S/F be encouraged to come on a trip lights on full power. Photo Simon Mitchell. >

00 sportdiving magazine april/may 2014 www.sportdiving.com.au carefully scheduled to take in sites get the job done, to bring back definitive suitable for diving in both the normal documentation of a dive site we thought recreational depth range and in the was about to redefine deep ocean reef deeper range opened up by rebreather diving. The penultimate dive took place technology. Importantly, these expeditions on a perfect day with a mild current would allow the exploration of sites like flowing along the reef. Our plan was to this overhang to be undertaken safely and descend to 65m up-current of where we properly, and non-technical divers could thought the overhang started and drift share in the excitement of it all. along the wall until we hit it. This worked The opportunity now presented itself, on perfectly. We came to the overhang Deep Reef 2012 we’d take the right gas, which extended perhaps 100m along the the right equipment, and go and find out wall almost exactly where and when if we’d been imagining things. What we expected. What we didn’t expect, found was a revelation. however, was the sumptuous visual feast It hadn’t been an illusion; there really was we found there. After decades of diving, growth, extraordinary growth… like genuinely new experiences are hard to nothing we had seen before. Even in the come by, this was one of them. The walls limited light of our small torches, the of the overhang were festooned with psychedelic palette of colour was eye- hanging coral growth; there were some of popping. But again equipment issues the usual soft corals but it also seemed would plague us. that everywhere we looked there were Opposite: Simon explains : species we’d never seen before, and in > A typically happy “Literally weeks before the trip I’d retired every colour and hue imaginable. It was Spoilsport crew ran a my old Nikon D300 for a D800 in a like a cross between a children’s fairy tale fabulous trip in which technical and non- beautiful hand-made Subal housing. I was and the jungle sets of the Avatar movie. technical divers were shooting with a 14-24 lens which is so This was a discovery crying out for able to dive the same big that it has to be attached to the documentation, but at the end of our sites; just to different camera through the barrel of the housing bottom time, a glance down the water depths! after the camera body is mounted inside. column suggested it went deeper and > Even the ‘bare’ Early in the phase of getting used to this further; we’d need to come back surfaces are speckled configuration, every photographer will with colour in the deep inevitably make the mistake of thinking We had time for one more swing at it. coral arcade. Photo the lens is properly clicked into the We suspected there were not one but two Simon Mitchell. camera when it isn’t. Tragically, I made sections of overhang, probably both over This page: > Decompression from that mistake prior to this dive. So, at 65m 100 metres in length. Our goal was to the deeper depths was and staring in awe at this photographic- swim the entire stretch of wall in one hit time well spent on this chance-of-a-lifetime, I realised that even and record the best of it on film. trip. Simon Mitchell though I could see through it, I couldn’t Vidoegrapher Damien Siviero would prepares to photograph control the aperture or focus of my lens! sequentially record the site as it unfolded. a large soft coral In desperation I just cranked the ISO on The photographic challenge of trying to higher up the wall. the camera up until I was recording depict this expansive vista of colour was Photo Damian Siviero something on the sensor, but the result considerable. Choice of ISO, aperture > Brian Mecklem (right) was a grainy out-of-focus photo… the sort and strobe power and positioning would dives his Hollis Explorer you always see of the Loch Ness Monster. be critical. rebreather. Perhaps the first one of these new It was not the James Cook standard of ‘recreational documentation the site was demanding.“ Finally, it all came together. There were rebreather’ units We’d opened a box of sparkling treasure indeed two sections, relatively close sighted on an then been forced to close it after only a together, and the entire site can be taken Australian liveaboard? brief look inside. Despite this, the dive in with one jaw-dropping dive of about > The ship's rebreather deck was rife with excitement on our 40 minutes spent between 60 and 70m. divers. From left Brian return; we were on the verge of Most importantly we’ve been able to Mecklem; Fiona Sharp; something special document the discovery of Osprey’s Deep Shannon Micalef; Sea Arcade with some photos that Simon Mitchell; Damian A whole year went by, our technical vaguely do it justice. We present those Siviero. Captain Trevor Jackson AWOL from issues played on our minds again. On images to you here. this photos. Deep Reef 2013, we were determined to

00 sportdiving magazine april/may 2014 www.sportdiving.com.au