Shadow Divers
I went to the Main Library on Saturday afternoon to hopefully meet two of the main characters of a book entitled Shadow Divers",
which is about deep sea divers who discover a then-unknown World War II
German U-boat off the coast of New Jersey. I got to the library a
half-hour early, which allowed me time to see the Florida Atlantic
University student-built submarine on the 2nd floor of the library. The
library itself is massive: 6 floors with a cafeteria/coffeehouse on the
2nd floor, where the library actually begins. The first floor is office
space and some shops. The next 4 floors are books, periodicals,
Internet-equipped computers, microfiche, and more books. The 6th floor
is mostly display space, which is where the book conference was to be
held. They also had an interesting display of Jules Verne's works and
biographical materials on his life in English, French, and Spanish.
At 3 pm, Richie Kohler and John Chatterton came out to a round of applause
from the audience. They discussed their roles in the book and how this
U-boat basically took over their lives for a few years. "Obsession"
hardly begins to describe it; their marriages crumbled and their bank
accounts were emptied. However, they did solve the mystery of the
U-689. Richie Kohler, an excellent deep sea and wreck diver, explained
part of his motivation for solving the mystery. During one dive to the
sub (which lay in the Atlantic Ocean in 230 feet of water, the then
limit for recreational SCUBA divers), he had wedged himself in a narrow
opening, stirring up silt and limiting his visibility, all because he
wanted a trophy. Richie is a trophy hunter and his house is a testament
to shipwrecks of old with dinner plates, bells, flatware, anything that
could be brought up to the surface. Richie is reaching forward in near
total blackness for an object that reflects white in his flashlight:
possibly dinnerware. However, Richie soon discovers that what he grabs
isn't dinnerware at all, but is a human skull.
Richie put the skull down and slowly maneuvered himself out of the
narrow passage. On another dive, John Chatteron brought back a piece of
dinnerware, a plate marked with an eagle and a Swastika. Many dives
(one dive claiming the lives of two skilled wreck divers) and many
trips to the U.S. Navy's maritime museum later, they figure out the
identity of the submarine. Richie admitted that he enjoyed getting some
kind of closure from calling the family members of the men who perished
on the sub during the war. According to John, Ridley Scott and 20th
Century Fox have optioned the rights to the book and are hoping to
begin filming.
They were both very friendly at the book signing
afterwards. I asked Richie what was his most terrifying moment
underwater. He thought for a minute and then mentioned that he'd been
diving the wreck of the U.S.S. San Diego,
which lies in 110 feet of water. He had just set a bag of collectibles
to the surface, but his line snapped and entangled him. His arm was
pinned to his side and with his other arm, he pulled out his dive
knife. Then he dropped the knife. He said that his worst fear was that
all his friends would be laughing at him when he surfaced (with the
bends, no doubt). John chimed in at this point, saying, "We don't want
to die stupid."
Also, at the conference I met a man named Eric, who's a
paralegal for a downtown Fort Lauderdale firm. He was witty and
friendly, and apparently I impressed him somehow because he sat next to
me during the question and answer portion.