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Joined on
3/31/2006
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The first time I dove the wreck, Rosinco, was pre-zebra mussels and I didn't know I was on the wreck until I bumped into it. Of course, I was diving air in those days so that may have had something to do with it too.
Rosinco is a 185 foot steel motor yacht that sank in 1928. She lies in 185 feet of water just north of Kenosha.
The trip from Waukegan on Enterprise was made in relative comfort except for the rolling waves that an east wind were sending our way. When we arrived it took a little while to grapple the wreck. After a few tries we got anchored securely into the wreck and got down to the business of diving.
Five divers were going in to explore the Yacht that had lain there on the bottom for the last eighty years. We had trimix for bottom gas in our doubles and EAN50 and O2 in stage bottles for decompresion. Our plan was for a 20 minute bottom time with about 30 minutes of required decompression.
I was the third diver to splash. I waited and let the two ahead of me start their descent and then I followed them down the anchor line. I passed through a thermocline at about 35 feet. I said a silent prayer of thanks for my argon drysuit inflation system as I hit a second one at a depth of 85 feet. Darkness surrounded me. In the dark grey cloud around me within which was only the stark white nylon anchor line angling down into the depths and the bright HID lights of the two divers below me.
As I passed through the depth of 100 feet I began to see a shadow start to emerge out of the gloom below. As I descended farther the shadow started to resolve itself into the image of a ship. By the time I was within 60 or 70 feet of the ship I could clearly see the whole vessel. She stands upright, settled down into the bottom up to her waterline. A truly beautiful vessel, she looks almost as if she is steaming along on the bottom.
I swam along the starboard rail to where our anchor had caught on the forward end of the rail and checked its hold. It was secure and, yet, it would be easy to retrieve when we pulled our boat forward - Perfect. As I started to swim a circuit around Rosinco the last two divers arrived and begaan to move toward the after deck. I checked out the familiar areas of the motor yacht, from the anchor windlass on the fore deck back along the port rail to the cabins. Behind the cabins, the large after deck supports long rows of battery cells that were used to power Rosinco's lighting and other amenities. In the center is a skylight over the engine room, still with some glass in place. As I swam back over the starboard rail forward, I passed the boarding platform which is folded out with the ladder extending down to the ground as if to allow some ghostly crew from the deep to reboard for one last voyage. I backkicked away from the side to get a better look at the whole vessel. Divers were moving over her decks, with powerful, cold beams of light sweeping over surfaces that would never feel the warm light of the sun again.
Too soon, our bottom time was running out and we had to move back to the line and begin the slow ascent back to the surface. With the excitement of the dive, I had forgotten about the cold on the bottom but as I passed through the thermocline at 85 feet I welcomed the sudden warmth. I spent the remainder of my decompression time planning the photos I will take on my next dive on Rosinco.
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