LCM-8 (Landing Craft)

[Admin]

County Decription: 74' landing craft (LCM-8)
Deployed: 29 nov 00
Depth: 94'
Relief: 22'

The LCM-8 was on its side (since deployment?), but was set upright by hurricane Ivan.

[Capt Rick]

Dove the LCM on 6-15-07. (This is the LCM that's 600 feet to the NW of the Janet.)
It is sitting upright in 95 feet with mainly a sandy bottom around it.
The wheel house is detached and rests appx 60 feet to the southwest of the main structure.
Divers beware, there's miles of monofilament line on this structure, making for a good chance for entanglement. Best to stay on the outside edges of LCM as most of the mono is entantanged all in the top framing and down in the belly of the craft. As I sat straddled atop the outside edge for a few minutes I observed a healthy population of small AJ's, and short Red Snapper with a few keepers mixed in.
No grouper to be seen, but did see a nice Flounder that came cruising by just off the bottom and made a nice target for my 5' free shaft when it decided to settle just under my perch !
Vis was appx 15 to 20 feet.
Capt Rick

[spear]

You are right about the mono-filament! I have dove this spot 2 times this year and had to cut myself loose at least 3 times each dive, and we came up with mono wrapped all around our tanks, legs, ankles and everywhere else it could hang up.

[Bayesj]

15 Jul 07,
Dove the LCM today. Poor vis, 20' at best with particulate matter causing the bad vis - Janet vis was at least 10' better. Lots of baitfish, one lone but large flounder, and one real nice grouper. Was really surprised to note that the LCM has clearly STARTED to break up. Monofilament existed but was not the problem it was earlier in the year.

[Candy]

LCM -8 Inshore Landing Craft visited: September 27, 2007

This landing craft is sitting upright in sand. The overall condition seems to be good and it appears to be a great nursery for a nice variety of recreationally targeted fish.

Some of the beams are covered in monofilament proving that this site is often visited by fishermen. There are a few places that could present entanglement hazards to divers.

This site has numerous holes for the fish to retreat and hide from larger predators. There is a large steel plate that appears to have fallen to the side of the LCM providing a hiding area for larger fish.

The visibility on this particular day was about 20’ with an abundance of small purple jellyfish that made surveying very painful. The bottom temperature was 80 degrees.

Below is a list of fish that were observed

F = Few 2 – 10 / M = Many 11 – 100 / A = Abundant – over 100

F – Cocoa Damselfish
F – Blue Tang
F – Spot Fin Butterfly fish
F - Blue Angelfish
F – Juvenile Gag Grouper
M - Juvenile Red Snapper
M – Juvenile Mangrove Snapper
F – Juvenile Amberjack
F - Barracudda
A - Jellyfish

[ReelFinatical]

We also went to the Landing Craft on January 27, 2008. There, we anchored several times in different spots & also drifted over it a few times. Again, fish were showing on the screen down there and we had a few hits but no takers.

[Candy]

Dive Report LCM-8 Date: June 22, 2008
Report by: Candy Hansard
Dive Partner: Stone Hansard

Weather Info: 75 F early (warming to 90F). Pretty & sunny all day. Winds light and variable very early, then 10 kts and out of the SW as the summertime on-shore breeze picked up.

Sea Condition: Rocky Bayou & the Bay were flat. The Gulf started out at a foot or less inshore and built to 1’ to 2’ as the day progressed. NICE!

Depth: 100’

Visibility: The vis was layered. The top of the water column had fine particulate matter followed by clearer water then, on the bottom; the visibility dropped to a murky 25- 30’ with huge particulate matter suspended in the water. Unfortunately, this created less than ideal photographing conditions except for close up shots.

My main objective on this dive was to perform a fish count for monitoring purposes for our Public Artificial Reef Monitoring Project. I did not take my gun. Almost all the recreationally target fish were juveniles.

This Reef had what appeared to be a healthy amount of sea life and most notable was the presence of a small goliath grouper.

Fish Count

(S) Goliath Grouper approx: 150lbs & 5’ Healthy appearance. This GG seemed to be patrolling its territory and seemed to have all the fish on the wreck nervous and skittish.. This GG did follow me around when I left it to explore other fish on the wreck. I never heard this GG warn me with a bark perhaps because it was small and I was not overly aggressive in my attempts to photograph it. Maybe it just didn’t feel threatened by divers because this wreck is frequented by local dive shop charters and the fish has possibly learned that divers are not a threat. It also may not have barked a warning because we were not hunting on this dive.

(M) Queen Angel Fish
(A) Tomtate
(M) Black Snapper
(F) Vermillion Snapper
(F) Red Snapper
(F) Trigger Fish
(F) Black Drum
(F) Spot Fin Butterfly Fish
(M) Spade Fish
(M) Amberjack
(F) Gag Grouper
(F) Beaugregory
(M) Sea Urchins
(M) Star Fish
(F) Sea Cucumbers
(F) Arrow Crabs

Special Note:
Many Thanks go to Bill Horn who has been instrumental to training me on Reef Fish identification and counting procedures. Bill, you do make a difference! Thanks for all the hours you have volunteered to help our fishery by providing training. You don’t know how much we appreciate that!