I'm off the barge!

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Well, where do I start. . .

If you have read my last blog I mentioned that I was on a vessel literally stuck in port waiting to go and do the job. I think I also mentioned that the job will be finished relatively soon. How wrong I was! This really was the sequence of events that shaped my last 6 weeks offshore:

The vessel some how managed to drag itself out of port and arrive at on dive location about 1 week late. No real surprise there. Once we were over location it was then that so many things went so terribly wrong. It first started with the weather, when it wouldn´t settle down and when it did the equipment started to fail, first with the diving bell (the device the divers get lowered into the water with), then 23 hours later after it was going swimmingly the rope the connected to one of the anchors snapped leaving us with a problem. So about 3 days later both were fixed and underway again when the divers power tools they use underwater failed, both the primary and backup tool. So it was to the 2nd backup of a 15lbs hammer!

Eventually it got to a point where everyone was so impatient that it was decided to flag the end part of the job as it was costing far too much per day for it to warrent us being out there. So we were taken back to Ra´s Laffan Port in Qatar where we were kicked off at 3am because our passports were´nt in order so everyone was put up in a hotel for 2 days. This is where all the tension of the last 6 weeks was released, to be precise released on each other!

After starting drinking at 12pm, it was really a question of who would remain standing at 3pm. When this time came around, and everyone was still coherant, it was decided to move onto the next hotel/bar. When we arrived and I was walking through the metal detector (first sign), some guy went running past with security right behind. Turned out he had got a pool cue and broke it over someones head. The next incident was when a football fan and an ex French Foreign Legion butted heads with about 4 divers rushing to hold to ex commando back, which was a wise idea! And the final incident came when 2 fire extinguishers were opened up in someones room leaving a blanket of what looked like ash from a volcano. What a interesting 6 weeks I had and I blame/thank all the British divers that made it so.

Well, back in Dubai, this blog would have been longer but the computer crapped out so i quickly re-did this one. Off to Spain in a few days so watch out for my next posting . . .

Ciao!!

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