The Helldivers' Rodeo: A Deadly, X-Treme, Scuba-Diving, Spearfishing, Adventure Amid the Off Shore Oil Platforms in the Murky Waters of the Gulf of Mexico

by Humberto Fontova

  Tom was closing on them. The crazy sucker was almost on them. I guess he sees this type of stuff in all the yuppie dive magazines; people feeding and riding rays and stuff. Hell, he's done it himself with the sting rays on Cayman. I guess he was going for the long ball here. Yep! Looks like he's reaching out. He was over the nearest one now, over its back. The others sped up and Tom made a grab for the ridge between those great horns ... was he nuts? YES! He grabbed hold.

  Then-SWOOOOSH! the manta's wings kicked into fast-forward and it shot off. But without Tom, who was tumbling head over heels-fins over mask, actually-in a great whirl of backwash, spinning like a toy monkey in the manta's exhaust.

  And I was dying. Roaring into my regulator. Doubled over in mirth. Engulfed in a cloud of bubbles. Then I noticed something sinking below him. Tom's spear gun! In the commotion he dropped it. Bye-bye, two hundred simoleons, too late to retrieve, though it'll take a while to sink 650 feet.

  Tom finally swam over, adjusting his mask, pointing it up and blowing to empty it of water. Now he was nodding and hunching his shoulders as I continued roaring. I poked my face inches from his and bellowed, showing my appreciation for the showa show to shame anything on Animal Planet.

  Then I realized I'd used half my damn tank. Enough bullshit. Time to kill stuff. I pointed down and Tom nodded. He was coming along, for the hell of it, I guess.

  Down into that purple void, into that all-embracing vastness. We were at 100 feet before we knew it. 120 seconds later, Tom grabbed my shoulder again. He started pointing down, towards the corner of the rig. Pelayo was down there, about 50 feet below us, wrestling with something that looked like an AJ.

  I nodded at Tom. He nodded back. Looking back, we saw Pelayo with his gun bands up around his shoulder and both hands gripping the fish, on his way up. Nice going. The thing looked huge, maybe sixty, seventy pounds. We swam over toward him. I looked left, outside the rigs, and saw the mantas flapping along again; beautiful, spooky.

  Then Tom jerked my shoulder. I looked at him and he pointed more empathically towards Pelayo. His eyes looked wide, tense. I turned my gaze, but Pelayo looked fine. He was about twenty feet below us to our right. He looked all right, finning up slowly, issuing a little line of bubbles, the fish in control. Then I saw something below him. Couldn't make out the shape. At first I though it might be On-the-Ball. But it blew no bubbles. It looked big, but not massive. Maybe another AJ following his stricken mate, I thought. Then I made it out.

  A shark, and a massive one. He didn't look big at first because of the angle. He was coming straight up. So I'd only seen his head and forequarters at first. Actually that should have been enough. There's no other way to describe it-that Jaws poster. That toothy snout pointing surface-ward. The unsuspecting person above.

  But he didn't stay unsuspecting for long. We were swimming over when Pelayo finally looked down. Then over at us. Then he picked up speed, let go with one hand, and pointed down. He was only about thirty feet away from us and we nodded and waved.

  No hammerhead this time. Or even a sand tiger. His nose was too wide and blunt. He was either a tiger or a bull. As big around as the beam next to him-a main beam, the kind you can't get the rig hook around. But he wasn't in a hurry. Not jerky or anything. Finally he leveled out six feet below Pelayo, and that's when we saw his true size. Had to be twelve feet long. At least twice as long as a man. But again, no aggression. He finned slowly away from us now.

  Pelayo was even with us now, and his eyes said it all. We were pumping for the surface but looking down. I thought for sure Pelayo would let go of the damn amberjack. Give him to the shark, but nooo-he held on.

  I looked over and here came Paul, pointing down with his gun, moving his other hand like a mouth. Our shark signal. We all nodded back. The monster made another big circle, then drifted outside the rig till we lost sight of him. Must have just eaten. And a manta ray must be filling.

  We hit the surface again.

  People like Johnny, Terry, and Gerry say the mid-sixties were the heyday of Louisiana dive rodeos-not of Louisiana diving, nowsimply of competitive spear fishing. Fact is, there's probably more spear fishing now than ever, certainly more certified divers. But the organized clubs and their organized events just don't pack 'em in like they used to. They're no longer chic.

  Many still spear fish. Many still enjoy it. But reveling in the slaughter has become un-chic, like trophy hunting in general. Fact: there's more big-game hunting today, even in Africa, than in Hemingway's day. You'd never know it from the mass media. Amazingly, this "shusssssh, let's keep it within the family" attitude has infiltrated even-I'm ashamed to admit it-Louisiana.

  The Grand Isle Tarpon rodeo itself-the oldest and biggest in the nation-recently yanked its spear fishing division, "for conservation reasons," according to the Rodeo's president at the time, who happened to be Louisiana's governor's son-a Republican governor no less, big-time hunter himself, NRA supporter, the whole bit. This governor also gave us Louisiana's concealed weapons law. We can pack one down here. This governor (Mike Foster) enjoys enormous support in hunting and fishing circles.

  No small feat to become politically incorrect with this bunch. But we managed it.

  Every year the Academy of Underwater Arts and Sciences awards something called a NOGI award, a little statuette known as "the Oscar of Diving," in three categories: Sports and Education, Arts and Sciences, Distinguished Service. General do- goodism stuff. Hans Hass and Jacques Cousteau have both won-Hass right here in New Orleans last year. This award has an interesting pedigree, one that might horrify its recent winners. It stands for "New Orleans Grand Isle Invitational."

  Remember how Johnny Bonck, Roland Riviere, and their bud dies got spear fishing accepted by the Grand Isle Tarpon Rodeo? Well, the NOGI was awarded to the winner. Johnny Bonck first saw the carved wooden statuette in Belize in the 1950s. He brought one over and it became the award for the Most and Biggest Fish Killed at the Grand Isle Rodeo-for piling them up, no mercy, no limit, no nothing-at the time.

  it, gotta wonder, Hom-boy-da," Johnny laughs. "How many people nowaday know that? All these photographers and stuff, they're up there all proud, smiling and everything-wonder if they know we used to get that NOGI for shooting jewfish, barracuda, sharks-and whoever piled up the most, won it. I just gotta wonder. Hell, they might drop it like a snake."

  Indeed, Cousteau and Hass didn't win it as spear fishermen. They won well after becoming sanctimonious pests.

  The crowd at Westxvego City Park drives the point home: we're a hundred people at best; the club divers, their wives, girlfriends, kids.

  "Can you believe this?" Pelayo snorted as we crunched into the gravel parking lot. He was nodding pensively, sadly. I was sad too. Same for Tom and On-the-Ball. No escaping that "post-partying depression." You see it at the airport a lot, those glum faces on returning vacationers. I can spot them every time. It's a cinch to tell who's coming and who's going. Three days of heavy boozing, of oblivion towards jobs and bills. Now it all gangs up. Home and its routine tonight. Work tomorrow.

  "Geezuz," I said. "Remember when we were little kids? These rodeos packed them in, man."

  "Yeah," Pelayo snapped. "I remember, all right. They used to hold these things at West End Park, at the Lakefront. Traffic jams for blocks around. Huge fish hanging up. Unreal."

  "Really?" Tom poked his head up from the back seat. "Looks pretty crowded to me."

  "Nothing like the old days." Pelayo answered while jamming the shift into park. "You wouldn't believe it, Tom. Now I'm talking about the mid-1960s. Parents always took us on "Sunday drives" back then. If it was the Sunday of the rodeo weigh-in, you always wound up at West End Park. Even if nobody in our family was a diver. It was a happening event, that's all."

  "Not much happening here," Paul said glumly while getting out. "But-ah!" his face lit up. "I see the keg over there."

  "We're right behind." I chimed in.

  Actually, we show up at these weigh-ins for the mere
hell of it. Our fish never place. We show up, see what's on the board, look at each other, arch the eyebrows, whistle, gasp. Nowadays, the big fish are way down, 200 feet plus. Not quite worth it for us. Why embarrass ourselves by even entering our kill? No way. Like I said before, we're in the bush leagues compared to these guys.

  Or the fish are way out, forty to fifty miles offshore. Again, not worth it-certainly not in our twenty-two-foot boat. Some of these Sea Tigers, Helldivers, Aqua Aces, Pneumatic Nailers, and Bayou Bandits have been out on chartered trawlers or crew boats close to a week, "bounce-diving" as they call it. They plunge in swim down to 220 feet, look around. . . "Hmm ... nope. Just little stuff down here. Nothing over 100 pounds." Back up. They might hit fifteen different rigs this way. It's trophy hunting. Take the biggest or nothing.

  First guy we ran into on the way to the keg is "Doctor Bruce." Yes sir, Dr. Bruce Thompson, Ph.D. in Marine Biology of LSU's Coastal Wetlands Center. He was hacking and slicing away at a big red snapper. He was covered in slime, spattered with blood, shrouded in flies. He looked ecstatic.

  "Whatcha say Dr. Bruce?" I said, waving. He looked up, smiled, nodded, adjusted his glasses with a slime-covered hand, and resumed his butchery. No, he's not cleaning fish in the conventional sense. He's dissecting them. Doctor Bruce likes fresh red snapper as much as anyone, but he's not carving out the white, gorgeous fillets on this one. He won't throw them, lemon and butter drenched, on a grill to sizzle and drizzle over flaming coals. He's more interested in the snapper's ear. Some "earbone" down there somewhere tells Dr. Bruce the fish's age. Next he'll grope for its gonads.

  These butcheries and perversions, filtered through Bruce's brain, result in valuable age and spawning information that might be used by the National Marine Fisheries service to set size and harvest quotas. If nothing else they might set size limits for the dive clubs themselves. It happened years ago with jewfish. He determined that these fish didn't spawn until the age at which they weighed around fifty pounds. The Louisiana Council of Dive Clubs promptly disqualified any jewfish under fifty pounds from any competition. Years later, state and federal regulations kicked in. In many ways, on matters of conservation these dive clubs were ahead of the curve by years. Ask Dr. Bruce himself. "No doubt about it," he nods. "These guys have always been helpful."

  A sign near the big board commemorated the life of a fallen chum, Warren "Whip" Mermilliod. But with more than just cheap sentiment. The Helldivers' Rodeo has contributed over $5,000 to the Warren J. Mermilliod Memorial Scholarship Fund to date, the only scholarship at LSU offered in the Marine Biology Masters program. Whip himself held an M.S. in Marine Biology from LSU.

  Maybe Pelayo and I were contributing right now. "Too much foam, man." Pelayo snorted. "Blow it off."

  "Hey whatcha want for seventy-five cents?" Terry Migaud snaps. He was serving at the ever-popular beer booth for now. But he was on the makeshift wooden stage earlier. "Yeah, this keg's gettin' low," he complained while pumping away, draining the last drop.

  "See you gotcha a nice barracuda," Paul said, pointing at the board. "Fifty-five pounder, hunh?"

  "Stoned him," Terry replied. "Nothin' to it. Hit the trigger and he keeled over. "

  Amazingly, Terry's amberjack didn't get first place-after all that. Nor did Gerry Bourgeois's. Joe Michel of the Get-'Em Dive Club edged them out with a 111-pound monster.

  Terry's dive mate during the shark escapade, Louis Rossignal, won the Snapper Division with a forty-pounder. And yes, Stan "The Man" Smith took "King Spear Fisherman" with that shark, 490 pounds of it. The steaks will feed another throng at another Helldiver picnic.

  We milled around for a while. Tom, still somewhat new to the area, showed the keenest interest in the fish, the divers, and the general ambiance. As usual, the second beer on my empty stomach started clearing things up ... or maybe just masking the confusion with a mild buzz.

  Over by those tables, Gerry Bourgeois and Val Rudolfich, the grand old men of Louisiana rig diving, Sea Tigers, literally and figuratively. "Present at the creation," you might say. It doesn't seem possible. They started in the late 1950s (a little after Johnny and Roland) and are still at it. Still plunging deep, sticking monsters and wrestling them up, still making the Board every year, and still chugging beer, but slowly, decorously. They compare to the gang at the other end of the park like a Jagger, McCartney, or Townshend to the stars of today's music awards shows. They watch the current crop of cut-ups from a distance. They nod and smile, shake their heads every now and then.

  "Been there," they smirk. "But geezuz! Did we look and act like that? Well, we won't begrudge you your fun, kiddies. We sure had ours." They don't say it. They don't have to. That wry smile and relaxed look says it. The younger crowd is reveling, indulging, letting off steam. Always happens this way. It suddenly hits you. "Hey, we made it! First off, we're alive! And second, check out these fish! And check out these babes!"

  But the only babes we ogle here are wives, girlfriends, and sisters-and dare I say it ... daughters. But they do bring friends. And when they hear the band crank up and hear the cars piling in, this neighborhood always disgorges a few of its residents for a little fun. But for the most part, over the past ten years these weigh-ins have become inside affairs. The big crowds of gawkers went out with the 1970s-like our disco. Maybe that's why we're here? We can't shake it. Compare this to Johnny and Roland's Rodeos, in a day with a tiny fraction of today's divers. They had international diving stars crowding into Grand Isle, features in every Louisiana newspaper, trophies, TV cameras. Things have changed.

  They call this a "young man's sport." In general, it's undeniably true. Just look around this park. After the mid-thirties the passion for this lunacy seems to cool. Look at our own crew. Only a third of us on Breton Island actually dove. Ten years ago we all did. But the same crowd shows up every year. In fact, we got a few more out here this year than last. And that's what counts, I think.

  Maybe Gene had the right idea all along. Show up. Keep the ties strong. He was fine this morning. Nobody brought up the ugliness. He cooked breakfast, had it ready for everybody when we crawled out of the tents ... and boy was that ever nice, considering how we felt.

  "It is our fellows who make life endurable to us," says Mencken. "And give it a purpose and meaning." All the fellows were there, like on our seventeenth birthdays, and our twentyfirst birthdays, and our bachelor parties, and our weddings ... and our (yikes) kids' birthdays and christenings! We all partook of the revelry, the good fellowship. And the rest of the gang didn't miss the spearing. They enjoyed loafing around the campsite, a little fishing ... the boozing.

  I expect we're all headed that way. Let's face it-ten, fifteen years ago those manta rays on the last dive would have been dead meat-or maybe we'd have been dead meat if they tangled with us. Point is, we'd have shot them.

  What would Tata say about that? "Malditos!" I'm sure. We'd get our butts switched for sure. But boy, she'd love these amberjack and cobia, and especially the red snapper. "Pargo," for Cubans.

  As Tom brings me another draft and a chunk of grilled snapper drenched in lemon butter and seared around the edges, I think, "If Tata could see this ... if only she could taste it." But, ouch! she'd probably wait until it cooled.

  I shot a little snapper off Cojimar once, couldn't have been over eight inches long, slightly bigger than the ronquitos. But she went crazy. "Ay! Rubio! ["Blondie" in Spanish, my nickname] Mira! Un pargito! Que bueno! Que lindo!" We spoke with Tata on the phone recently. She had mailed us a stack of uncovered photos from our childhood, and a recent one of her. Amazing, my hair was golden at the time, almost the same color as the ronquitos Pelayo and I are holding in the shots.

  Some things stick in your mind. The taste of Tata's fried fish is one of them for me. Yes, I was only seven, but I remember it, I don't care what anybody says, I remember it. I've never been able to duplicate it. My parents say it's because Tata always fried fish in manteca (lard). But I've tried that-not the same.

/>   There's probably 1,200 pounds of fresh fish in the bins around me. Wonder what she'd do if Pelayo and I showed up in a pickup full of cobia, amberjack, and red snapper?

  The edge, it always returns to the edge. The Cojimar coast was an edge. Our Mississippi Canyon rigs hug an edge. It is, as Hunter S. Thompson called the edge, "the place where you stretch your luck so far that fear becomes exhilaration."

  Tata told Mom that her son Evelito hopped on a raft with three friends a few years ago. They did it right off Cojimar, "right where Rubio and Pelavito used to swim and dive," she said. They told her they'd call when they reached Key West.

  Tata still waits for that call. That was the last time anyone saw them. Evelito wasn't seeking any "edge" on this trip. I doubt his fear every "turned to exhileration." That "icy clutch" gripped his guts all right-and never let go. it strangled his gut 'til the endhowever it came. When those waves started cresting around him, as the raft started unravelling, when those tigers and whitetips started circling ... who knows? Evelito would have much preferred to hop a plane like Pelayo and I and our families.

  Yes, those who seek Thompson's "edge" are the pampered. Evelito had it land in his lap.

  Tata still looks nothing like Mami in Gone With the Wind. She looks more like Tina Turner now.

  We live across the "World's Longest Bridge" from New Orleans, the twenty four-mile causeway over Lake Pontchartrain-the lake where the Helldivers' Rodeo started thirty years ago. For some reason I love hitting that toll booth with my gas gauge needle on "E."

  "Wonder if I can make it across?" asks something within me. I get a strange little buzz, especially when I'm dressed in a suit, commuting to a deskbound job. I learned around the campfire last night that several of us do the same thing. "And boy!" Chris added. "Gina hates it! Shirley, my wife, hates that "running on empty" bit, too. She's always leaning over to look at the gauge a mile before we hit the booth. "Let's fill up, NOW!" she says.