Good dives off Clearwater Beach, FL on Brian's Ledge and the Airplane Barge October 23,2021

I made two dives with Tanksalot dive charters on their dive boat Orion (instead of CanTANKerous) because there were about 12 divers, too many for CanTankerous. We dived about 15 miles offshore in about 43 ft of water with about 20 ft of visibility. The run out and back were easy with about a 2 ft chop and light breeze. It was great to be diving in my old stomping grounds again. Brian's Ledge is quite long, I didn't get to either end of it from where we were anchored. Lots of grunts, some small hogfish, small grouper, a few triggerfish, etc. I saw one very large, probably Goliath Grouper, but didn't get close enough to see clearly or photograph. Below are pictures from this dive, a few more can be seen at: https://photos.app.goo.gl/6pESi5ZorrcUhqvP8

Black Sea Bass

Lizard Fish

Key West Grunts

Black or, more correctly, Gag Grouper and, second photo, Triggerfish

Barred Butterfly fish

Juvenile Red Grouper Our second dive was the Airplane Barge, so named because airplane body was strapped to it when it was sunk. After the passage of a hurricane, there is no sign of the plane's fuselage but it's wings are on the bottom off opposite sides of the barge. There were some beautiful, nice sized snook on the wreck, at one point I counted a dozen. There was one Goliath Grouper but he was shy and I didn't get a picture of him. There were also Hogfish, Atlantic Spadefish, and Blue Angelfish. Below are some pictures from the dive, to see more please go to: https://photos.app.goo.gl/82PBC832mR9TXMTf7

Snook at the Airplane Barge

Barracuda

Snook with huge school of bait

Sheepshead (top) and Atlantic Spadefish

Blue Anglefish

Hogfish