Anyone Ever Dive the Tenino Rock Quarry Pool?

[Nwbrewer]

I don't know if you've given it consideration already, but it might be worth checking what's in the water. Sometimes places like that have been used to dispose of some pretty nasty stuff.

I would hope that if the city is using it as a swimming area that they have already done that, but I suppose with some municipalities it may not happen.

[whatevah]

I don't know if you've given it consideration already, but it might be worth checking what's in the water. Sometimes places like that have been used to dispose of some pretty nasty stuff.

I would hope that if the city is using it as a swimming area that they have already done that, but I suppose with some municipalities it may not happen.

Doh - completely missed that part. If it's become a sanctioned swimming area they might've done a fecal coliform check but I wouldn't be as confident about heavy metals etc. I've heard of quarries becoming popular dumping grounds for batteries. A few months ago I was called out to help with a recovery and spent some time groping around in silt, only to find out a few days later that the location was formerly an industrial site which will soon be getting some expensive ecological restoration because of the harmful levels of pollutants found in the substrate under the docks. It's the kind of thing you wish you'd known beforehand :(

[BASSMAN]

Great report!
I am not interested in doing this dive. We have way too many other dive sites around the Puget Sound.
I would be interested in a shore support type of thing.

[renoun]

Found some cool photos.

[LCF]

the only way I could tell that I'd accidentally transitioned from swimming in water to slithering head first into the silt was that the faint glow of my dive light directly in front of my face went away.

Had this experience in a cave in Florida. It is definitely not for the faint of heart.

[Nwbrewer]

Found some cool photos.

Cool find!

[Waynne Fowler]

Good find renoun. here's a couple others





For all the failure of the outcome (not making it to the actual wreckage on the bottom) it was a successful dive in that we now know a bit more about the site.

I am not sure how things would work with me inviting folks along because I was invited myself and did not 'arrange' this dive. We'll have to check that out.

I wondered about the comm thing whateva, and how it might affect a rather newly minted diver who jumps right into the PSD realm and straps on a comm. My lack of experience with comm's may be an asset in that I've learned that when you're in those conditions, to kind of enjoy the solitude. For divers used to comm's I wonder if when things may not go well and they realize they must count solely themselves, how that might affect them when they're used to having a person on the surface to talk to. Even in a good team in this kind of situation. There are moments (some of them loooonnnngggg) where you are, for all intents and purpose, 'alone'.

The total disorientation that accompanies a silt out certainly can be disconcerting, flying by gauge's is not complicated but it sure can be stressful when you're in 1 inch viz with people in proximity. Sorta like a square dance with blind people, ya better all be on the same beat or toe's get stepped on pretty quick and frequently.
Thankfully Lynne, I've never had that experience in a cave ... wheeeewww..... though I've done recoveries at marina's where you had to drop 4-5 feet into that yukki gelatinous goo (the consistency of thinned out chocolate pudding) to retrieve rings, watches, motors and such. When we initially got swept up in the silt cloud my first thought was... 'holy crap, I don't think a silt out in a cave with no light could be any darker'... you could feel the silt on your lips and face it was so thick.

Bassman... would really dig the shore support, thanks for the offer! . We'll have to see what arrangements are possible.

BTW Whateva: we did not take any water samples, never even thought of it. .. it is Tenino after all , so yeah... probably should check that out. The good news is I sure didn't taste any heavy metals and the water had no discernible odor. Not that that is definitive but.......

[ljjames]

i know a few who have had the same experience (murk to silt transition) in lake washington

[CaptnJack]

Looks nice topside. Sounds like a dive I'll skip though. Other than the experience of being in a siltout I'm not what else there's to see or do? (I have been in siltouts before so that's off my bucket list lol)

[Dashrynn]

I have no problem digging into the goop, did it a couple times in some lakes. Only issue I would have is poking something Sharp.

[airsix]

You're all funny. Puget Sound is on your doorstep and you want to dive in a compost pit. I'm constantly trying to get AWAY from dives like this!

[Nwbrewer]

Cherry picker

Looks nice topside. Sounds like a dive I'll skip though. Other than the experience of being in a siltout I'm not what else there's to see or do? (I have been in siltouts before so that's off my bucket list lol)

This coming from the guy who hiked his stuff into the woods to dive in a flooded, silty mine with 75 year old soaked timbers keeping the mountain off of him?

One of the posts mentioned the possibility that the quarry owners left a bunch of machinery there when it flooded. How is that different than going to look at the stuff in the mine? You go to see what there is to see!

[Waynne Fowler]

just loolking for something a bit different. Black water and silt may not be the best to see things in but it doesn't have to be an 'oh shit' experience. I'm interested in finding out just what's down there. I imagine one has an opportunity to find some very cool stonemason's tools (of course they're probably burried under 5-10' of silt). Hell I'd cough em' up to the local museum as for me the prize is the process of the find not the artifact itself. Plus seeing and touching a crane from the 30's would be way cool especially one that no one's seen in the better part of a century.
But I do absolutly get what ya mean airsix.
being in a silt out 'WAS' on your bucket list there Richard.

[CaptnJack]

Cherry picker

Looks nice topside. Sounds like a dive I'll skip though. Other than the experience of being in a siltout I'm not what else there's to see or do? (I have been in siltouts before so that's off my bucket list lol)

This coming from the guy who hiked his stuff into the woods to dive in a flooded, silty mine with 75 year old soaked timbers keeping the mountain off of him?

One of the posts mentioned the possibility that the quarry owners left a bunch of machinery there when it flooded. How is that different than going to look at the stuff in the mine? You go to see what there is to see!

Yeah but do you see me going back???

[CaptnJack]

being in a silt out 'WAS' on your bucket list there Richard.

Exactly!! Past tense lol.

Actually I don't know if even with perfect technique you'll avoid nuking the vis in there. Bubbles and water movement may be too much. But it would be cool to find tools or machinery, esp if you could somehow get pics.

[Pez7378]

(I have been in siltouts before so that's off my bucket list lol)

Diving with Joe?