Over the past several weeks, we’ve spent a lot of time with our friends Frank @ Melanie Wasson aboard their ship, the M/V Spree.  Frank and Mel were in town with the rest of their crew for three weekends of diving here in Pensacola.  The first of the trips featured stops on both the USS Oriskany, and the USS Ozark.  Both are former military vessels that now lie on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, thanks to artificial reefing efforts.  The second two weekends were spent on the Oriskany only.  We really enjoyed the opportunity to sail with the Spree and her crew again.  She’s a top notch diving platform and it was very nice to have access to such a vessel in our own back yard for a change.  The weather for the trips was mostly cooperative with fair conditions for the first and third trips, but some rougher waters for the second trip.  Such is wreck diving I guess. 

The USS Oriskany is the only known US aircraft carrier that can be visited by divers.  She was sunk as an artificial reef in May of 2006.  Since then the marine life has begun to move it making her an even more attractive dive site.  The Oriskany is massive in size offers many opportunities for penetration and exploration.  Heather and I served as crew for these trips, so most of our diving consisted of setting and recovering the mooring for the Spree, but we did have a chance to get in plenty of diving for pleasure as well.  Due to her massive size, there is lots to explore on the Oriskany and there are still plenty of places that I haven’t seen yet. 

In addition to the USS Oriskany we also got a chance to visit a lesser known, but equally great dive site, the USS Ozark.  The Ozark is a ship that began her service during the Second World War and was the first vessel to have the moniker “Mighty-O”.  She served as a transport ship and a mine layer, among other duties.  She was ultimately retired and sunk during weapons development testing.  Despite that, the Ozark now sits on the ocean floor amazingly intact.  And she’s rarely visited by divers due to both her position 28 miles off shore and her depth in 330 feet of water.  This wasn’t our first trip to the Ozark, but it has been quite a while since the last one, so we enjoyed the chance for another visit.  Due to our duties as crew, we didn’t have a chance to shoot any photos on that dive.  But we’re already making plans for a return visit next year, so we’ll try to get some then.