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WINTER 2012
LOCAL DIVING
The mine is about one hour south of St. Louis and open all year, with
winter being the prime season. The basic cost is $65 per dive, which
includes tank, air and weights, with a two dive minimum. Personal tanks
are not allowed. Nitrox 32 is available for an extra $10. Super 80 alumi-
num tanks are provided, and 92 cubic foot tanks are an extra $8 per dive
when they’re available.
Dive lights are not allowed, but two guides — one leading and one trail-
ing — carry multiple lights, and every diver wears a tank light. A kayak also
follows on the surface for divers who run low on air and need to end their
dives early. Guides conduct air checks at regular intervals.
In addition to the existing 28 trails, three are currently being devel-
oped for technical diving.
CONDITIONS:
No matter what Mother Nature is brewing outside, it’s
always 62°F inside the mine, with a constant 58°F water temperature
from top to bottom. Diving should be done in a heavy wetsuit or a
drysuit. Visibility is around 100 feet, and most dives are conducted in
depths of 40-60 feet. Despite being lit by more than 500,000 watts, the
mine is dark. Think of a dive at Bonne Terre as a dive that continually
changes from dusk to night-diving conditions and back again. The walk
from the mine’s entrance to the dive dock and back can be strenuous,
especially when you are loaded down with dive gear. There is a good
reason it’s called the Old Mule Trail. Carry your gear in a backpack, and
wear sturdy shoes, definitely not sandals.
GETTING THERE:
From St. Louis take I-55 south for 33 miles. Merge
onto US-67 south for 23 miles. Take the MO-K/MO-47 ramp toward
Bonne Terre, and turn right onto MO-47/Benham Street. Turn left on N.
Allen Street. The mine is located at 39 N. Allen Street.
ON THE SURFACE:
Lodging packages are available with the mine’s
1909 Depot Bed and Breakfast off-site or the Park and Allen Divers
Lodge located on the mine property. There are several places to eat
in Bonne Terre, but you really should try Mario’s Italian Grill. Mario’s,
located just a short walk up the hill from the mine, features all things
Italian. Hungry divers need to try the 16-inch all-meat calzone. It’s
Bonne Terre’s second great adventure.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Bonne Terre Mine Tours/West End Diving,
1-888-843-3483, www.2dive.com/btm.htm
HOW TO DIVE IT
stables are. As we swim through these buildings, our high-
intensity discharge (HID) lights cut through the smoke and
the blackness to illuminate tools and machinery left behind as
well as the trough where the mules were fed. It’s hauntingly
cool and definitely the highlight dive of the weekend.
Our third dive finds me swimming down another ore dump. I
stop to photograph two divers coming at me through the
Middle
Ladder-Room Tunnel
, past an ore cart and toward the tipple I’m
hovering above. It’s an odd sight, divers where miners should be.
On our final dive, through the
Secret Passage
on Trail 21, it
hits home just how lucky I am to be doing a Bear trail. We drop
80 feet straight down from the dive dock and turn toward the
wall, slipping through a small opening that seems to appear from
nowhere. As I swim through the tunnel, following a set of ore-
cart rails, pausing at a small, out-of-place tar boat, I realize I just
logged a wreck dive under 100 feet of rock. Cool.
We continue in the pitch black along the narrow passage
a total of 550 feet to
Clinton Shaft
, a section of tight shafts
connecting multiple levels of the mine by a series of ancient
wooden ladders. Ascending the ladders requires excellent
buoyancy control and is another exhilarating experience. After
leveling off, we turn down the
Transformer Tunnel
and view
the artifact it’s named for.
The last divers out of the water, we remove our gear and —
except for the constant drip, drip, drip of condensation raining
down from the rock above — it’s eerily quiet. I reflect on the
wonders beneath the city streets of Bonne Terre. Diving here is
anything but typical. It’s part history lesson, part adventure and
spooky in a cool way. Much like the feeling I get when hiking
the Redwood Forest in California, I am rendered speechless by
my weekend-long liquid history of lead mining.
AD
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