Bradley Trip August 2009

[john j]

I dove the Bradley again in mid-August and I haven't had time to write an update, so here I go... 

Team Members:
Tracy X.
Sue S.
Brian S.
Ron J.
John J.
Jitka H. (Shipwreck Explorers Charter)

John S. was having ear troubles and had to skip this trip.

We had some awesome weather this time, only missing 1 out of 6 days of planned dives.  Two of the days, the lake was smooth as glass and the divers bubbles literally made more waves than the lake did.  That is unusual and it was a nice break from the beating we usually take out there.  The last day we turned back because the waves were 4-6 feet and we figured that 5 out of 6 days was good enough.

One of the days we were joined by 4 family members of a lost crewman.  They cast a wreath into the water and said some prayers.  It was quite a moving experience.  Frank Mays, the last living survivor of the Bradley's loss was also with us one day.  It's always interesting to have him there and to hear his stories about the Bradley.  If you ever have the chance to see him speak, I highly recommend it.

The most noteworthy accomplishments this year were that we got video of the break in the hull and of the engine room.  The hull break is breathtaking-there is massive damage.  Thick metal plates just ripped like paper and large piles of clay from the bottom protrude around the break area.  It's spooky.  The video of the break is also giving more clues about the sinking event itself.  For example, the end of the unloading boom is bent and damaged, obviously from considerable force.  It was previously thought to be undamaged  and we speculate that it was caused by a collsion with the stern section of the ship when it broke apart.  We also noticed that all hatches we saw had the covers missing.  We could see hatch covers lying on the bottom all around the ship.  We haven't inspected all of the hatches on the ship yet, but all those that we have seen have been wide open.  All of the hatches on the stern section are open and at least the first couple behind the pilot house are open.

On this trip, I swam down near the bottom in front of the bow and looked back up at the ship, something I have been wanting to do for a long time.  From there I could see up to the pilot house and I was amazed how huge this ship is.  It was pretty intimidating and I felt very frail and small.

Tracy went way into the bow cabins at the hatch deck level and got some interesting video.  There are some things we will have to go back and check out.  He got a good shot of Frank Mays' dresser in his cabin too.

Brian, Ron and Sue had not been on this wreck before and they were all smiles upon surfacing. 

The big news this year is that we finally reached the engine room.  It was thrilling to be in there, especially since it has been unseen for almost 51 years.  Aside from a little silt, it is in remarkable condition and the paint still looks great.  There is a catwalk railing down and the glass is missing from the control room windows, but aside from that, I didn't see much damage.   John S. and I will be presenting on the Bradley bell project at the Gales of November show this year and we plan to show some video of the engine room too.  Enclosed is a still image of the main electrical panels captured from that video.  I do plan to post some engine room video on youtube after the Gales show and I will post a link on MNSCUBA when I do that.

We also did some maintenance on the bow mooring line and installed a new mooring on the stern section, so next year, there should be solid moorings on both bow and stern.  Subfloats are at ~35 feet and all surface lines have been sunk.

I was the only CCR diver on this trip, everyone else was carrying bailout (or open circuit as some folks call it).  We did bottom times ranging from 15-28 minutes.  Max depth I had was about 361 feet.  Visibility was very good and we had some natural light all the way to the Bradley's deck.  In fact I could almost read pressure gauges from natural light once my eyes adjusted.  Quagga mussels are really multiplying now.  It's getting very bad unfortunately.  The name plates on the pilot house are almost totally covered now and they are even growing on the wheel in the pilothouse.  Very sad to see that.

That's all I have for now.

[LKunze]

Great report John.  Looking forward to seeing the videos.