Three rebreathers in Tank Cave

 Cave diving, Mt Gambier, rEvo  No Responses »
Jul 072015
 
Three rebreathers in Tank Cave

After a productive Saturday morning on the Mt Gambier main street buying tiles for my kitchen floor, and a pleasant Saturday afternoon dive in Kilsby’s, Sunday brought a relaxed two hour swim through Tank Cave. The site was open for Sunday only and the four of us were the only ones there. This made getting in the water a lot easier – no rushing to clip on bailout with someone standing awkwardly hunched in dive gear (or the reverse). With three models in the water at the same time this was the first opportunity to test out all of my strobes on a single dive in a while. A couple of my inon Z240s have been playing up with electronic [read more…]

Backlit bubbles in Tank Cave

 Cave diving, Mt Gambier, rEvo  No Responses »
Feb 042015
 
Backlit bubbles in Tank Cave

After our very pleasant jaunt through DD31, Moo and I headed over to Tank Cave for the rest of the Australia Day weekend. It was good to see a whole bunch of freshly minted Advanced Cave divers working through their first group dives with enthusiasm. Tim and I left the gold lines to them and headed down the back of the cave. I was on the rEvo but Tim was back on open circuit and carrying a couple of large stages in addition to his sidemounts. The rEvo makes a big difference to photography in Tank, as once I’m in the right spot I can take more than a couple of different angles without worrying about my bubbles disturbing silt [read more…]

Rebreathers in Tank Cave

 Cave diving  No Responses »
Jan 132014
 
Rebreathers in Tank Cave

About the cave Tank Cave is one of my favourite places to be. Miles of tunnel, clear water, great photo opportunities, stairs to the water…and shallow tunnels, narrow spots and lots of small depth changes. Those last three points mean Tank is not generally regarded as a great cave for rebreathers. The counterlung acts as a third source of buoyancy in addition to the wing and the drysuit. As well as managing the oxygen levels in the rebreather, the diver also has to manage the gas volume. So every up and every down means either adding or venting in at least two locations. On an open circuit dive I manage microbuoyancy with my breath. Need to go up slightly? Breath [read more…]

Rocky foregrounds in Tank Cave

 Cave diving, Mt Gambier  No Responses »
Jul 012013
 
Rocky foregrounds in Tank Cave

About the cave Looking back, this is the 14th photo article I’ve posted about my trips through Tank Cave. With easy access, miles of shallow tunnels and clear water it’s easy to see why we keep going back. On the other hand, long tunnels tend to lead to long swimming dives and it becomes a challenge to find a new angle while on the move. Things that have occupied me in the past include reflections in surface bubbles, action shots of divers reeling out, the perfect tunnel shot and more. About the dive I have to admit I wasn’t feeling the inspiration on this particular weekend. The more I dive in Tank, the more I notice the diver damage throughout [read more…]

Triggerfish in Tank Cave

 Cave diving, Mt Gambier  No Responses »
May 272013
 
Triggerfish in Tank Cave

About the cave Tank Cave, Mt Gambier has kilometres of crystal clear, shallow tunnels perfect for testing things out. You can see the different areas in these two photos from the same dive – small twisting light-walled tunnels vs large dark chambers. All in the same still and clear water, so great fun for photography. About the dive Over the course of the weekend we dived down the gold lines and through J and K section, followed by a long swim to GS tunnel yesterday. All of the dives involved a trip out or a trip home under Lake Ayre, one of my favourite places to take photos. Taking photos under this huge reflective surface is tricky. The chamber is [read more…]

Rocks, reflected

 Cave diving, Mt Gambier  No Responses »
Mar 252013
 
Rocks, reflected

About the cave The photo above was taken under “Lake Ayre”, which is on the gold line in Tank Cave. Given its convenient location I usually swim under it at least once on a weekend in Tank, on the way home from the further reaches of the cave. It’s a completely enclosed air space composed of bubbles exhaled by passing divers. When first approached from back in the tunnel, you can look up and see the still, mirrored surface. Once divers swim underneath and exhale the ripples begin, spreading outwards to the walls on either side. About the shot As I was putting together my talk for OZTeK last weekend I spent a lot of time trawling back through my [read more…]

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