So Somerset

I love diving, but the truth is I haven’t dived for years, and for even longer the time before that. To say I was a bit rusty is putting it mildly.

There was no way I was going to pass up the chance to take part in a charity Santa dive, involving two of my favourite things- dressing up and swimming!

I also had complete faith in the six-month British Sub Aqua Club (BSAC) training I’d received at university and just hoped it would come flooding back to me.

Luckily it did.

Sitala underwent a three hour HSE medical

The fact I’d taken and passed the most rigorous medical in my life, just two days ago, meant that physically I knew I could cope as well. 

As for the technical side of things I knew I would be taken care of.

BSAC has a buddy system that means you dive in pairs.

Your partner makes sure you stay safe by checking your air and providing a back-up if your equipment fails. 

My buddy was the dive centre manager Tim Clements- a highly qualified diver with more than 15 years of underwater filming experience.

With him as my buddy I knew one way or another I’d be able to deliver the editorial package I’d breezily promised my producer and editor, whilst sitting in our cosy, centrally heated office in Taunton.    

Tim has been diving for over 15 years

Yet knowing this didn’t stop me feeling nervous about pulling it off and as I got closer to the quarry, I thought I could hear the butterflies in my stomach flapping in time to my pulse.

Tim met me in the car park and introduced me to the other divers, which included various Santas, a snowman, a fairy and a Pagan Viking from Devon who was celebrating the winter solstice by immersing himself in water that just happened to be 12-15m deep in the quay.

After laughing at my outfit- I was wearing a red Christmassy dress with spaghetti straps, six inch heels and a Santa hat, he whisked me off to the shop to get kitted out with a thermal, fleece-lined under suit and dry suit.

He then took me on a shallow practice dive on a 6m platform to refresh my skills and we joined the other divers for their second dive of the day at 15m exploring a section of the quarry with deliberately sunken objects such as a car and an airplane. 

Apart from the tips of my fingers and big toes, I didn’t feel particularly cold in the three degree centigrade water.

The santas raised money for the RNLI

We went down as a group in our buddy pairs and the lower we swam, the darker and quieter it became.  

Some people had torches and it felt surreal looking up and seeing a pack of Santas swimming overhead soundlessly emitting a stream of bubbles.

The highlight was seeing them vanish one by one as they swam down a chimney.

From my position above them, I couldn’t see them re-emerge near the fuselage of a sunken plane.

We spent around 25 minutes underwater and the event raised money for the Royal National Lifeboat Institute.

Check out the link to see a film of our dive.