Red River Update: July 28-29

The Challenge of Working Underwater

Saturday and Sunday, July 28-29, 2001. Dredging and mapping continued on Saturday and Sunday, uncovering and recording parts of the hull that have been hidden in the riverbed. Red River Project team members are now seeing - or feeling, in the poor visibility - features that no one has seen in over 160 years. This, combined with ongoing shifts in the river bottom, has been disorienting for some of the field school students. The crew is getting tired, too - they’ve been working every day for a week in conditions that would challenge any diver.

Field school students continue adapting to extremely challenging diving conditions. Cyd Schantz, a Long Beach City College (http://www.lbcc.cc.ca.us/), student, discovered on Saturday the difficulty of working in such a strong current. Diving with LBCC Instructor Laurel Breece, Schantz was assigned to dredge between two datum points near the stern of the boat. "We were pretty stable at one point," Schantz said later, "and [Dr. Breece] had me feel a post she uncovered. That’s when I let go of the wreck. I thought we’d be fine and I’d be able to grab it again. I couldn’t find the wreck but had a death grip on her BC [buoyancy compensator, a vest-like piece of diving equipment]. She asked if I was OK. I answered not, so OK she motioned to go up. I was wondering if I’d find the wreck or have to pop up to the surface. I was on her left and was supposed to be holding on with my left hand, and felt that I was gripping sand. She motioned ‘what the _____?’ and I motioned the same back. I was determined to find the wreck and eventually did. When I broke the surface all I could do was laugh. I was glad I could remain calm through all of that. I was bummed that we didn’t get more done [on that dive]. I swear I will not let go of the wreck ever again. I am more comfortable with every dive - yet still wary."

Cecilia Brothers, a second-year undergraduate student at Long Beach City College, had a similar experience the following day. She spent her dive Sunday working with Daniel Seib, a graduate student from Indiana University Bloomington (http://www.iub.edu). Brothers provided support while Seib worked the dredge. "I positioned myself at between the knee and deck beam at [datum point] SS5 and Daniel moved down the trench line about three feet below me. . . . I was taking measurements when the dredging line yanked my arm and I went flying down toward the transom. My fin was wedged behind the deck beam and so I was able to pull myself up by the wale [the timber running along the hull of the boat at the top]. There I started reeling in the dredge, slowly because of how heavy it was. . . . I was hoping to tie it off before returning to the surface via the mooring line. When we returned we got to sit on the sift box for a long while."

At the project’s base camp at Fort Towson, the students have been transferring the measured drawings made on the site to scale drawings on the overall site plan. Most of the students have done very well with this, despite the difficulty of getting accurate measurements on the site. The students are each assigned to draw individual units, and when placed side-by-side the drawings line up very well - a good sign that the information being collected is accurate.

The crew is looking forward to Monday. "Tomorrow is our day off," one crew member recorded in her notebook. "We’re going out to dinner and sleep in in the morning, with no duty shifts and no work detail."

This update is sponsored by the PAST Foundation and the Oklahoma Historical Society. It may be freely redistributed without modification for non-commercial purposes.

Cecilia Brothers stands on "Mount Dune," a sandbar that formed alongside the wreck.	Lucius Martin works on field drawings after returning to camp.	Field School participant Bob Piper, an experienced reenactor, brought his own tent. . .	. . . which proved to be a popular spot for discussing weighty matter before dinner.