Just before seven in the morning, the bus dropped them off on Deer Island, and Riggs walked over to the Black Dog trailer, along with Hoss, DJ, Tim, and Billy. Riggs grabbed the dry suit he had worn the day before and began getting his gear ready. He noticed some slop on the edge of his facemask, extra material that he needed to trim so the mask would fit better. He borrowed a pair of scissors192 from Hoss, made the cut, and then wiped down the mask with alcohol.
As he began mentally preparing himself for the day ahead, he mulled over an idea that he felt could go a long way toward improving their breathing system. So he walked into Harald’s trailer to float it by him.
The Humvee team had been following Harald’s protocol for measuring the oxygen content in the breathing air that was being blended by the MAP Mix 9000 and then shot out to all five divers through their umbilicals. The diver sitting in the back seat next to the mixer would open the sampling-port valve to release some air, and then hold the Drager Multiwarn analyzer in front of it to measure its oxygen level. DJ had handled that task yesterday, and during the bitch session following the shift, that protocol had come in for lots of complaints. After all, how accurate could it be to stick a probe in front of a whoosh of air that was inevitably mixing with the ambient air inside the Humvee?
Only after Riggs had been lying in his motel bed did a simple solution pop into his head. They needed an in-line analyzer. This relatively inexpensive gauge193 could be plumbed into the system. Rather than having to remove a sample of the breathing supply to measure it, they could plug this monitor right into the airflow, providing a continuous reading of the oxygen content in the breathing supply, like the temperature-control device in a refrigerator. The readings would be much easier for the guys to obtain—and trust. The idea made so much sense to Riggs that he was surprised he hadn’t thought of it earlier. Then again, the equipment, environment, and procedures associated with this Deer Island job were so foreign to the divers that it was taking a while for everything to settle in.
“Hey, Harald,” Riggs said194. “Do we have any in-line analyzers back in Spokane, like you see on a gas rack or a chamber?”
Harald looked up. “Yeah. Why?”
“Could we get one of those hot-shotted out here?” Riggs asked. “I think it would be good to have an in-line reading. It’s a lot more accurate, don’t you think?”
“Well,” Harald began. But then he got distracted by something else and walked away.
Riggs figured he’d press the issue again when he had a chance. But now he had to get ready. He slipped out of his boots and his black Carhartts and put on his dry suit. Because it would be a while before he’d have to worry about getting wet, he kept the suit folded down at the waist, like the ski pro he’d been back in Colorado, walking around the lodge with his suspenders fashionably hanging down.
“Hey, Riggs!” yelled Hoss, who was standing over by the man cage, waiting to be lowered down the shaft. A little earlier Riggs had heard Mars asking Hoss if he’d take his place for the day. Mars had explained that he was feeling worn out from his back-to-back days working at the end of the tunnel. Hoss had agreed to the change, and now he was hollering for Riggs. “You ready?”
“Yup,” Riggs called back, then strode over.
Riggs found Tap standing right outside the man cage, looking at his watch. Then Tap yelled back over to the trailer. “C’mon, DJ!” Tap remained steamed even after DJ made it over to the man cage, lightening up only when DJ flipped over his hard hat to show the Virgin Mary medal dangling on a piece of twine.
At the base of the shaft, the three divers found Billy and Tim already there, flying through the premission checklists195. With his hair pulled back into a short ponytail, and his gray sweatshirt and red sweatpants peeking through his green coveralls, Tim stood clutching a clipboard. He smiled as he checked off each item. A little while later, Harald came down the shaft and placed an additional handheld gas monitor in the gray Humvee. Even though he didn’t have the in-line analyzer Riggs had asked for, Harald told the divers that at least they’d have this extra Multiwarn monitor to devote exclusively to measuring the blended air coming from the mixer. They could use the Humvee’s other handheld196 to measure the content of oxygen and other gases in the ambient air.
Billy pulled DJ aside. He told him his back was hurting197 and asked if they could switch assignments for the day. Billy knew it would be a lot easier on his back if all he had to do was sit in the Humvee and monitor the breathing system. Although he had cleared the change with Tap the night before, he wasn’t sure if DJ had been notified. When Billy broached the topic now, DJ acted as though it was news to him, calling Billy a pussy.
Billy was in no mood for it, but then he saw a smile forming at the corner of DJ’s mouth. That told him Tap had already passed on the word. DJ, being DJ, was just trying to get some mileage out of it. So Billy played along.
“All right, I’ll go,” DJ told him. “But when I bring those plugs back, you’re loading them in the Hummer.”
Billy laughed.
The amended assignments were settled. Billy and Tim would remain in the Humvee, while Hoss, Riggs, and DJ journeyed to the end to pull plugs. Billy would serve as foreman of the Humvee team, while Hoss did the same for the excursion crew.
With their head start in getting to the base of the shaft, Billy and Tim had already managed to complete the bulk of the morning prep work. Despite all the setbacks the divers had suffered during the first few days in the tunnel, there was now a real rhythm to their work. They were more familiar with the system, and they also had made a few important refinements. The small team of remaining sandhogs198 had done a great job of improving the angle and length of the ramp off the aluminum deck, solving a problem that had given the divers considerable grief during their early attempts to get the Humvees into the tunnel. And the divers themselves had engineered other work-arounds in hopes of avoiding a repeat of the earlier troubles. More than anything, Billy was determined not to see the batteries die again in the Hummers. After discussing it with Harald, he disabled the interior dome lights in the Humvee wagon. While those lights had provided some relief from the dark for the two divers monitoring the breathing system, they decided that the dim light wasn’t worth the added risk.
Billy climbed into the driver’s seat of the lead Hummer, the white pickup, with Hoss riding shotgun, while Tim got behind the wheel of the towed gray wagon, with Riggs in the passenger’s seat and DJ in the back. The divers’ tweaks to the system and their improved muscle memory combined to give them a start to the Wednesday mission that was by far their best. While it had taken them until after 9:30 a.m. on both Monday and Tuesday to get the Humvees down the ramp, they now found themselves cruising into the tunnel at 8199:20 a.m.
Before he settled in the back seat, DJ slipped a CD into the dashboard player. As they began their slow, roughly two-hour ride into the darkness, the Rolling Stones played “Sympathy for the Devil.” DJ quietly began singing along: I round when Jesus Christ / had his moment of doubt and pain.
After an hour of driving, Billy stopped the lead Humvee at ring 7500, just before the venturi, and all the guys climbed out. Before putting his dry suit on fully, Riggs walked far enough from the vehicles to secure himself some measure of privacy. Then he squatted200 near the tunnel wall and took a dump, letting his excrement drop into the ankle-deep water sitting stagnant in the concave bottom of the tunnel. His bowel movement offered a raw preview of the hundreds of millions of gallons of treated sewage that would soon begin coursing through the tunnel every day—that is, provided the divers were able to do their job and yank out all the plugs.
193 (Chapter 10, note 3)
This relatively inexpensive gauge: Dr. Marie E. Knafelc, “Investigation of Deaths Within the Boston Harbor Outflow Tunnel,” Navy Experimental Diving Unit, September 3, 1999, 3.
196 (Chapter 10, note 6)
They could use the Humvee’s other handheld: Trooper Mary T. McCauley, “Interview of Harald Grob,” Massachusetts State Police Suffolk County Detective Unit, January 7, 2000, 8. Of course, the use of this additional handheld addressed none of the fundamental problems with the monitoring system.
197 (Chapter 10, note 7)
He told him his back was hurting: Tap Taylor, interviews by author.
198 (Chapter 10, note 8)
The small team of remaining sandhogs: Dave Riggs to author, June 2009.
199 (Chapter 10, note 9)
cruising into the tunnel at 8:20 a.m.: Harald Grob, topside log, July 21, 1999. Riggs accident notes, 4.