Tag Archive
What Causes Abalone Divers to Die?
By Jack Likins I thought I'd take a stab at trying to explain why divers die abalone diving. I've been abalone diving for over 50 years in both southern California and here on the north Coast. It can be a very dangerous sport if not done with proper training, conditioning and knowledge of the ocean. Let me explain why. From what I have observed most of the deaths come as a result of what the newspapers call a "medical emergency". In other words the deaths occur not directly from drowning, but from some other medical problem (usually a heart problem) that may lead to drowning. Think about it this way... A person who dives once or twice a year comes to the coast with his/her family and friends for a little diving and a lot of fun. If they have dived before they begin to get excited about the prospects of diving and getting abalones for a meal or to take home. If they haven't dived in a while or kept swimming over the winter, they may not be in very good condition and many divers are older (50+). In any case, anyone will have anxiety and apprehension on their first dive of the season (it still happens to me and every diver I know). They look at the ocean, but they don't have enough experience to know if the conditions are within their personal capabilities and they see other people and their friends diving so they think it must be OK. It's difficult to say you don't feel comfortable going into the water when your dive buddies all say they want to go. Who is going to be the one who backs out first? Ten years ago is was not going to be me? Anxiety probably causes most of these so called "medical... More »
Shark Stroking
I get all sorts of input from readers and I welcome it. Sometimes it's to tell me about some great new dive site, to tout a particular dive operator, or simply to grind an ax or two after some youthful divemaster tried to perform an unappreciated rescue on them because they dared to place their mask on their head upon surfacing. But the call I got in late August in 2002 from Dr. Chip Scarlett of Austin, Texas got my attention. "You have to drop what you're doing and check out these white shark photos on this guy's website," he gushed enthusiastically into my speaker phone. "C'mon, Chip," I yawned. "I've seen more white shark images than a sea lion at Dangerous Reef. Don't you think that's a subject that's been covered enough. What's this about: more flying shark footage or are these whites actually flying planes now?" "Just check it out, you'll see what I mean." Chip and I have done some extended diving together in Palau and Yap and he's as accomplished a photographer as most pros. I figured if he was excited about some photo gem he had uncovered, I'd probably be well served to check it out. So I dutifully copied down the cryptic instructions and then summoned one of my youthful twenty-something staff to help me wade through the Internet because at that time I was the last executive on earth to learn how to use the Web properly. I've got staff members who can't spell or walk fully erect but they can zip through the Internet like a Jimmy Dean sausage patty through a wolverine with irritable bowel syndrome. In a matter of seconds I was connected and viewing the images. I was enthralled and had to banish my assistant who rapidly lost interest once he found out the site held... More »
Scientists and Scuba Divers Working Together to Save Cocos Island’s Spectacular Marine Life
By Todd Steiner, Executive Director of Turtle Island Restoration Network Twice each year, for the past seven years, I have made the 20-hour trip by boat to Cocos Island, 350 miles from the Costa Rican mainland. This journey is well-worth the effort - Jacques Cousteau described Cocos Island as the most beautiful island in the world, and I would have to agree. At this remote location, my organization, Turtle Island Restoration Network, and our partners have established an active citizen science project through which divers and scientists work together to study one of the most biologically-rich ocean ecosystems left on the planet. [caption id="attachment_1380" align="alignright" width="400" caption="Cocos sea turtle, photo by George Duffield"][/caption] I'm heading back to Cocos in April, and for the first time, people with no diving background will have the chance to join me - to tag and monitor sea turtles and even take a journey in the DeepSee Submersible to see some of the deepest reefs on earth. The deep reefs are just one of Cocos Island's wonders. A shallow fringing reef encircles the island's bays and then the seafloor drops sharply. The unique confluence of ocean countercurrents, wind currents, and underwater mountains combines to create an ecosystem that supports one of the most amazing displays of marine life on the planet. [caption id="attachment_1379" align="alignleft" width="400" caption="Cocos scalloped hammerhead, photo by George Duffield"][/caption] Hundreds of scalloped hammerhead sharks spend their days being "cleaned" by the butterfly and angelfish that pick parasites from around their gills. Also regularly seen are whitetip reef sharks resting on the sand or hunting in packs in the shallow coral reefs at night. Cocos' abundant marine wildlife has made the region a magnet for scientists and scuba enthusiasts, who often rank the waters as one of the top ten diving spots on the planet. Yet despite its designation as a Costa... More »
Amazing
We all have anecdotes to tell of things that happened during dive trips. The aft deck of dive boats ring loud with divers competing to outdo each other with unusual experiences retold. Approached by a publisher to write a scuba diving edition of their Amazing Stories series, I was vain enough to think I was the man for the job. After a meeting with the book editor of Wiley Nautical, the reality dawned on me. They wanted sixty to seventy stories and I had a deadline of only six months. A moment of failure in my own self-belief ensued. Could I do it? I got the deadline extended to nine months, sat down at my computer and steamed into the job. One month later, it was more or less done. It seems that twenty years traveling and diving full-time had furnished me with enough tales and all I had to do was to send copies of the stories as remembered by me to the actual combatants, for them to check the details and correct any misunderstandings or memory failures I might have had. I am pleased to say that with all but a couple of exceptions every person involved was more than helpful and I am indebted to a lot of people, all featured whether by name or anonymously in the book. Those that were less helpful wanted to claim ownership of the particular event concerned, which of course is not possible. Even those that preferred to remain anonymous, for reasons that become apparent when their stories are told, proved very co-operative. I am commercially minded. I knew that nobody would want to read the autobiography of a nobody so I wrote the stories in third-person and although I was present, witnessed or was actually involved in most of them, I am not... More »
Not Guilty as Charged
A few weeks ago someone sent us a link to an online article on the UK's Guardian website. Here is the tagline above the slideshow of images: A new book, Reef Fishes of the East Indies, is the culmination of a combined 60 years' work to document the biodiversity of the hugely diverse coastal waters of the region. The three-volume publication features the 2,631 known reef fishes of the Indian subcontinent, including 25 species new to science. Here is a selection of images from the book. Below is the first image in the series. Judging by placement only, it is the one the Guardian considered to be the most important shot. [caption id="attachment_1320" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="The book's authors at work photographing a new species in Cendrawasih Bay. Photograph: Jones/Shimlock. Secret Sea Visions/Conservation International. "][/caption] We were very happy to receive that link, knowing that Dr. Gerry Allen's and Dr. Mark Erdmann's work is receiving international attention. We contributed many images to the book, and have worked with both authors for years. The image in question was shot on our 2010 survey to Cenderawasih Bay. All of us believed that it was a good image, which showed the scientists working underwater. We were not prepared for the deluge of negative, accusatory emails that followed. Despite the caption, many folks believed that the image showed Burt and me photographing. Most of those emails said things like, "congratulations for destroying the reef"; "how could you do such a thing?"; "this is a great example of how NOT to take pictures"; "a great example of how not to do science"; "you call yourselves conservationists while blatantly destroying reefs"; "you are two-faced and liars"; etc., etc. We weren't too worried about the first few messages, but when many more arrived and we began to be vilified on Facebook, we could... More »
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