Benthic Canada

Expedition Empress 2005
by Alithea Smith (July 26, 2005)

After spending 24 hours in Montreal touring the town which reminded me much of my "home town" of Halifax (in scorching 40 degrees) we boarded a train to travel the eight hours north to Rimouski, where we arrived at three in the morning, met up with fellow team member Rob Field (professional archaeologist and Mr. Camper) and quickly found a place to rest our heads at Hotel Rimouski (not Motel Rimouski, but that is another story... Oops!)

The next afternoon we met the remaining members of the team at Marina de Rimouski: Rob Rondeau (expedition leader extraordinaire,) Matt Mandziuk (techie and musical talent,) Eric Legua (Empress oldie and translator for "les chien anglais",) and Audrey Legua (wonderful supporter and camp manager.)

We immediately started working as a team that had been together for a lifetime, setting up the tents, building kitchen sinks (no that is not a misprint,) constructing our operations base and all other preparations to create a home away from home for the seven of us. We also were motivated to get ourselves out of the first of many flash thunder and lightning storms - we quickly learned the weather can change on a dime, the very thing L'Empress succumbed to. Now I don't think any of us thought it is was a brilliant idea to stretch metal poles high above our heads in attempts to figure out the puzzle of the tents during this lightning storm but we are a rare breed and I don't think any of us would want to take the easy way out.

We had a task to do and we were going to get it done, and that set a precedent for the team.

Our first night in the tents was great - the fresh air and the queen size air mattress with sheets, comforter and pillows was a true luxury in the camping world. Monday was an exciting day; we were all up early with anticipation of getting to know each other better as well as learning more about the team's goals for the week. We spent time during the day listening to Rob R's goal and dreams, watching Empress footage, building our team spirit with humour and prepping our gear.

The gear was a bit of a challenge as we were equipped with twin steel 104's (for those of you who are wondering the significance of this, they were the heaviest tanks I have ever used. HEAVY!!!) and aluminum 80's for deco bottles, also big and heavy. John and I brought 200 pounds of luggage with us so we took our time putting all of our gear together, ensuring that it was assembled to our satisfaction, as we were preparing ourselves to climb the Everest of the diving world.

John, Jean-Pierre and Alithea

As we were engrossed in our preparations, a beat-up royal blue Cavalier pulled up to our base camp and unbeknownst to John and I, we were about to meet a true inspiration. Slowly but surely, Jean-Pierre Bouillon lifted himself out of his vehicle and accompanied by Pernod, "the most famous dog of Gaspe," he made his way over to the crowd. Once I realized who I was about to meet my heart skipped a beat (I imagine this feeling must be what crazed fans feel just before they meet their favourite pop star, or something like that.) After he said his hellos to the regulars, I nervously made my way over. He recognized my name immediately from our attempts to visit Empress prior to this expedition - this was a sign of his big heart. Jean-Pierre had been in a tragic diving accident 12 years ago while diving Empress and after being sentenced to a wheel chair for the remainder of his life, he not only learned how to walk again but he would also be our boat captain. His passion and understanding of Empress is one of true love and despite all odds he still continues to live his live according to her currents ebbing and flowing.

On Tuesday we were awoken by Eric's excited voice at 6am, "diving in one hour!" I had mixed emotions - pure blissful excitement, fatigue and an underlying nervousness of making this first dive which would be a pinnacle for us. Soon thereafter Jean-Pierre arrived and observed our obvious "newbie" flurry of activity to get ourselves readied for this momentous dive. Keenly aware of his watchful and caring eyes, I kept wondering what he thought about us and wishing I could talk with him. This is when my frustration with my own lack of French language skills started.

That morning we attempted three times before successfully making our way to her final resting place. This is when we were taught the local belief that when she doesn't want visitors, she will let you know... "with Empress you cannot tempt fate..." We listened and eventually she accepted us.

Eric led our first dive and without a doubt we had full confidence in his skills and familiarity with Empress. Although we had waited for her to calm all morning, she still made us struggle against a two to three knot current to get to the wreck. This made me touch the line of calling the dive (in other words, get back on the boat,) but we all wanted it so badly and as soon as I saw her shape appear in the gloom I forgot about the physical challenge (not to mention the 36 degree fahrenheit temperature of the St. Lawrence River) and was in a state of pure mental awareness. We had arrived.

Artist's rendering of bow section

The down line is attached to her port side so once we reached bottom and established our neutral buoyancy, Eric led us over the lower promenade rail where we immediately started taking in the contradicting scenes of destruction and perfect preservation. We crossed in front of the promenade decks as we descended deeper into the dark water and soon reached a completely intact stairway leading us to the shelter deck. I imagined passengers walking on them. We then floated above the debris field on our way to the still attached mast. I spotted the sole of a shoe and wondered about its owner. The mast and crow's nest was larger than I expected and provided a clue of her immense size we would only catch a glimpse of during this expedition. We slowly made our way past the capstans and around her bow where again, we were impacted by her grandeur - her anchor was still in its retaining hold and along with its chain were impressive in size. The dive continued to astonish and make us more emotional.

E M P R E S S O F I R E L A N D spelled across her port bow. We absorbed this moment and made it real by touching each letter, probably not the first to do this as each and everyone was clean of aquatic creatures inhabiting the rest of the ship. The evidence of our predecessors made the experience even more memorable. These thoughts followed our trail to the three plaques commemorating the loss of some of those very same predecessors as well as the 170 Sally Ann members who loss their life aboard Empress in 1914. We shared a solemn moment before making our way to the up line to complete our decompression obligation of approximately 25 minutes.

My emotions were confused; I wanted to come up screaming for joy at such an experience but somehow that didn't seem quite right and opposite from my nature I simply expressed my satisfaction with words and kept my physical expression inside.

Expedition Empress 2005 - Part [ 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 ]