Undercurrent Online Update
for Subscribers

For Subscriber David Denson Whiteside (with username 'dwhitesi' exp: 2024-08-20', at dwhite95815@hotmail.com )
November 27, 2012

Dive News (Website News)

Thanks to Doc Vikingo, we got word of changes DiveAssure recently made. There are now three levels of annual coverage: Gold, Platinum and Premier. There's short-term medical coverage for periods less than a full year. There are three levels of travel insurance, with or without an annual diving accident plan. A Duke Dive Medicine Package is included in all plans and offers: emergency and non-emergency hotlines; a Duke physician consultation for dive-related inquiries; physician-to-physician consultation, with review of member-provided medical information; evacuation, supervision and medical oversight of diving accident treatment. Looks very similar to what Divers Alert Network offers in coverage. Get details at www.diveassure.com/new/usa/index.html

Old Undercurrent direct-mail insert

Maui natives and visitors showed up at a county council meeting to oppose the development of Olowalu Town at one of the island's few healthy reefs. Olowalu, four miles south of Lahaina, is home to more than 350 manta rays, has one of the few black-tip shark nurseries in the state, and is the largest of only two remaining Maui reefs with more than 50 percent live coral cover. Developers want to build 1,500 new homes for 4,000 new residents on the Olowalu watershed directly uphill from the reef. In response, Olowalu Town LLC project developer Bill Frampton said his team is taking all steps to protect the reef. The county council now plans to hold public hearings on the development. If you want to petition against Olowalu Town, you can sign this ForceChange petition

The proposal would establish a 1,500-foot section of Kaohe Bay in Hawaii's South Kona as a fish replenishment area, meaning there would be no scuba spearfishing, and no taking of nine shark and ray species and two invertebrates. An aquarium collectors' permit also would be required. The goal is to increase protection for 40 rare fish species - particularly popular with aquarium collectors -- and it would make West Hawaii the only area in the state to ban scuba spearfishing. Residents can provide input during a public hearing on December 5. Anyone else can submit written testimony by December 19 to the Division of Aquatic Resources .

Starting this month. Airbus 320s from New York and Boston now land at Grand Cayman. New York round-trip flights operate on Monday, Thursday and Saturday, and the Boston round-trip flights are on Saturdays.

Not many divers visit this island chain (it's not cheap or easy to get there), but two legislative actions taken this month make it worth keeping an eye on for future dive trips. First, it banned shark fishing in order to stop the population's dramatic decline - it's illegal to catch or possess sharks within three miles off shore, covering most of the territory's coral reefs. Second, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration finalized a huge expansion of the Fagatele Bay National Marine Sanctuary, from 0.25 square miles to 13,523 square miles. That takes the sanctuary from one lone protected coral reef to a marine area larger than the state of Maryland. NOAA also renamed the protected region, now calling it the National Marine Sanctuary of American Samoa.

Per Undercurrent contributor Doc Vikingo, we found out that Brad Nelson, from the old Bob Soto's Diving outfit, has just opened Cayman University Divers . It aims to differentiate itself by "using underwater communication technology for teaching scuba classes and offering optional narrated scuba tours to divers." Strap on a gadget called Dive Link Explorer to your hose, slip the speaker under your mask strap, and you can hear your dive guide talk about the marine life you're seeing. That could either be a great way to learn more about critters on a dive, or an annoying way to spend 45-plus minutes.

Congressman Allen West, a Tea Party candidate from Florida, took heat for this stunt last year, and it's one gaffe that led to his loss to his 29-year-old Democratic challenger. Regardless, he is an avid diver and celebrated Learn to Dive Month with disabled veterans and members of Diveheart.

I went to the Diving Equipment and Marketing Association's annual convention in Las Vegas earlier this month, and all the buzz has been about a device by Casio that lets divers easily talk to each other underwater. Logosease is a four-ounce transmitter attached to the mask's strap on the side of a diver's head. Using bone conduction (vibrations carried through the wearer's skull), a microphone is able to pick up what the diver is saying. Conversation can be garbled, what with having a regulator in your mouth, but the transceiver's "digital speech conversion technology" is supposed to make difficult consonant sounds - like n, b and p - easy to understand. Speech travels by ultrasounds waves and is played back as speech in the transmitter's speaker. Logosease supposedly lets divers communicate within visual range (although it depends on what the water conditions are, obviously) and is watertight to 180 feet. The prototype was on display at the DEMA convention, but no word yet on availability or price.

Diving in Baja California, Sipadan and Malaysia . . . Truk by land . . . A hideaway in Vancouver, B.C. . . . can dive shops turn you away if you don't buy gear from them? . . . our readers' advice about diving again after a major medical procedure . . . can scuba diving really burn 400 calories per hour? . . the link between women, age and DCS . . . and much more.

Ben Davison, editor/publisher

Contact Ben

Website News

The 2013 Travelin' Diver's Chapbook will be available to all current subscribers in early December - we'll send you a notice. It will contain all the reader reports filed by all our Undercurrent subscribers during the past 12 months. Last call: if you submit a reader report by 12/28, we will include it in the 2013 Chapbook; we can't promise for later ones, though they will be available for mini-Chapbooks.

Did you know that you can make your own mini-Chapbook at any time, and only with the reports of interest to you? It will include the very latest reports just submitted. It's very simple and quick to do: just go here . You choose the country/destination of interest, what range of years you're interested in, land and/or liveaboards, and you can even limit it to certain dive operators as well as areas of the country. And voila', your report is created for you - read it online or download to your computer. For example, if you choose the last three years of liveaboard reports about Indonesia diving, you'll get 80 reports assembled together for you.. Or if you only are interested in those involving Raja Ampat, you'll get 37 reports. Give it a shot - we think you'll find it very useful for your trip planning!

Dave Eagleray, webmaster

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