BlueBeyond Dive Blog

Facebook User Name

Des Paroz — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 09:44:22 +0000

Facebook has just released new functionality that allows a member to claim a username and thus a better URL for their Facebook profile.

I've just claimed desparoz as my username, so you can visit my Facebook profile at www.facebook.com/desparoz.

I recommend that all Facebook users head over to www.facebook.com/username to claim their appropriate user name, and direct profile.

Des Paroz's Profile | Create your badge

New Home for the BlueBeyond Dive Blog

Des Paroz — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 02:08:51 +0000

The BlueBeyond Dive Blog has been moved to a new home on my DivingIDC website.

BlueBeyond.com.au will remain at its current location, and will continue to have articles on diving, dive sites, uw imaging, etc. Only the news portion is moving to the new location.

The former location for the BlueBeyond Dive Blog was on a different platform (WordPress), which I continue to like, but hosted with a host (HostMonster) who true to name, monster the hosting. The BlueBeyond Dive Blog was constantly broken, and rather than trying to spend any more tim fixing it, I moved it to be a blog in my DivingIDC site, which is on the wonderful SquareSpace web/blog management and hosting platform.

Now that the BlueBeyond Dive Blog is restored at its new home, I will resume posting items of interest about diving to it.

For feed subscribers, the feed address remains the same.

Dr Sylvia Earle's TED Prize Presentation

Des Paroz — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 20:40:06 +0000

A few years back I had the opportunity to attend a presentation by Dr Sylvia Earle. A wonderful speaker with a real passion for the ocean, Dr Earle has recently made a presentation at TED Prize where she showed beautiful imagery of the oceans - and shocking stats on the dangers facing it. At the core of her presentation is a wish that we as a society get together to protect Planet Ocean - the heart of life on this planet.

"Business as usual means that in 50 years there may be no coral reefs"

(Thanks to Doug Stetner for the link

)

Diving Safety & The Buddy System

Des Paroz — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 02:48:50 +0000

I received recently the Oct-Dec 2008 edition of Alert Diver, published by DAN Asia Pacific. As usual I found this magazine to have a wealth of articles about diving and diving safety. Receiving Alert Diver is just one of the benefits of being a member of DAN - an organisation that every diver should be part of. One article in particular that I appreciated was 2003 Diving Fatalities: A review of the regional diving-related fatalities recorded by DAN AP for 2003. This article detailed a range of diving and snorkelling related deaths in Australia, NZ, Thailand, the Philipines and Mirconesia. As a breakdown, the following fatalities were recorded:

Australia - 9 scuba & 11 snorkelling
New Zealand - 12 scuba & 2 snokelling
Palau - 1 scuba
Philipines - 3 scuba
Thailand - 2 scuba & 1 snorkelling

There are many interesting things in this article. The apparent disporportionate number of snorkelling deaths in Australia is down to 2 factors

The enormous number of snorkelling tourists visiting the Great Barrier Reef; and,
Unavailability of reported data in many AP locations

The main area of interest for me however lay in looking into the brief outlines of each scuba death in Australia. One thing in particular was strongly apparent to me. In 5 of the 9 scuba deaths in Australia in 2003 the deceased had become separated from the buddy/group prior to dying. Not only did these 5 people die, but they died alone. Now its impossible to say whether they might have survived if they had not become separated, but I would strongly assert that their chances of survival would have been significantly higher had they not been alone. Now please understand, I don't believe that these people were trained solo divers conducting solo dives. I believe that through inattention and probably through the often poor observance of buddy diving procedure they became inadvertently separated. I believe that there is an important lesson herein - buddy diving procedures need to be followed by divers much more stringently than they often are. I stress buddy procedures on all courses I teach, particularly for Open Water Diver (learn-to-dive courses), but also on PADI Instructor Development Courses. For other dive instructors reading this, please consider this data, and think about how you teach buddy procedures. Do you just talk about it and practice it during certain skills (BWRAF, AAS), or do you make it a feature of all dives, even confined water (pool) dives? Do you get people to swim back and forth as a buddy team in the pool, communicating regularly? Do you go around checking peoples gauges, or do you set guidelines for buddies to check with each other, then check-in with you, and then reinforce that behaviour? Do you, as an instructor, do a pre-dive safety check with a buddy and role-model good behaviour, or do you practice the "do as I say, not as I do" method? For all divers, when was the last time you did a pre-dive safety check with a buddy? Do you communicate regularly with your buddy or team throughout a dive, or do you follow the "same ocean, same time" behaviour that seems to typify a lot of diving? I guess that 9 deaths (8 if you ignore the one that a coroner has deemed not to be accidental) is a relatively small number in the context of the number of divers diving throughout Australia every year. But when one of those is a friend, family member, acquaintance or perhaps buddy its terrible. For 5 of them to have died alone is even more tragic. Divers, unless you're trained and certified as a solo diver and are diving according to good solo diving principles, please emphasise the buddy system. Apart from anything else, it will give you someone to talk with about what a great time you had.

Prestigious Underwater Photo & Video Competition Series Announced for 2009

Des Paroz — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 00:43:15 +0000

The “Superbowl” of International Underwater Image & Video Competitions Celebrates The Beauty & Plight of The Oceans With Categories For All Levels From Novices To Professionals

New York, NY (Oct. 14, 2009) – Photographers of all levels will help celebrate the beauty and delicacy of the marine environment as the 4^th annual international underwater photography and video competition series hosted by UnderwaterCompetition.com kicks off this week. The competition has become the “Superbowl” of international underwater imagery competitions, with over $75,000 of world-class prizes, major industry involvement, and the opportunity to have your images showcased to the world as some of the best. Esteemed judges include leading professional underwater photographers, cinematographers and magazine editors from around the world.

The unique competition series was founded by professional underwater photographers Jason Heller & Eric Cheng and hosted by popular websites DivePhotoGuide.com and Wetpixel.com. The series is held in association with two leading scuba diving expos on opposite sides of the world, simultaneously - Our World Underwater, now in its 39^th year and one of the largest consumer scuba diving expos in the US, and DEEP Indonesia, the first and only scuba diving and watersports expo in Indonesia.

Due to the overwhelming growth of the competition series, the official competition website has been given an overhaul and relaunched at www.underwatercompetition.com.

Participants will compete in technical, themed and video categories, to win more than $75,000 in prizes including premium dive travel, underwater photo and video equipment, scuba diving gear and more! Dive packages include trips to some of the top photo destinations in the world. A complete list of sponsors and prizes are listed on the website.

New this year is a novice category in the Our World Underwater competition, which opens up the competition to a far greater number of scuba divers who are casual underwater photographers.

Deadline for submissions Jan 15, 2009

Winners for each respective competition will be announced live on stage at either the Our World Underwater film festival in Chicago (February 20-22, 2009), or at DEEP Indonesia in Jakarta (March 27 – 29, 2009), and will be published by our supporting media partners worldwide. Winning videos will be broadcast via podcast as episodes of the iTunes-featured DiveFilm Podcast Video and DiveFilm High Definition Podcast Video.

As with all UnderwaterCompetition.com events, 15% of entry proceeds will be donated to marine conservation efforts.

For more information, please contact: contest@divephotoguide.com.

United Divers Hosts Inaugural International Clean Up Day Event

Des Paroz — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 20:02:46 +0000

United Divers Wollongong, a PADI 5 Star Instructor Development Center, Project AWARE Go ECO Operator and Wollongong's original dive centre recently held our first clean up event in conjunction with Project AWARE and International Clean Up Day 2008. On a rainy Saturday morning, 18 divers and support crew submerged in Wollongong Harbour, after a briefing by Project Coordinator Des Paroz (CD-109032) and Surface Support Coordinator Richard Funston (MSDT-463561). For the next hour or so, the crews brought many bags of rubbish and other assorted marine debris back to the surface. Whilst many of the expected items of rubbish were recovered, we were somewhat surprised to find items like a car radio, a fire extinguisher, the base of an office swivel chair and the port-side navigation light from a medium size boat (probably from something like a trawler). Suzanne Fenwick, director of United Divers and project director for the clean up was pleased with the results, saying "with more than 18 bags of rubbish recovered, we feel like our divers got the chance to feel good whilst having a dive, and to do something to look after our marine environment." Project coordinator, Des Paroz, stated that "as the ocean is our playground – and for some of us our workplace – International Clean Up Day is not only a great opportunity to do something to benefit the environment, but also a chance to raise awareness of the state of the marine world". As a prelude to the clean up day, the prior week a Project AWARE specialty course was run at United Divers to give people a good insight into what's happening in our oceans and waterways. As well as cleaning up a small part of our ocean, United Divers and its customers raised almost $500.00 as a donation to Project AWARE. Many thanks to all who participated. We would also like to thank the Wollongong City Council for their donation of bags for rubbish disposal, and a donation of $100.00 to the overall effort. United Divers will be hosting further events in support of Project AWARE and the marine environment during 2009. These will include a fish survey at Bushrangers Bay as part of Dive for Earth Day in April, and a clean up as part of International Clean Up Day in September.

SS Bombo and Five Islands - 9-10 August 2008

Des Paroz — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 05:45:43 +0000

Over this weekend just past I had the chance to do four dives as part of a Deep and Enriched Air Diver Course, and a concurrent Deep and Enriched Air Specialty Instructor Course that I am currenrly teaching. On Saturday we dived the wreck of the SS Bombo, which lies in 30m. I've done well over 100 dives on this wreck, and this would be the best dive I've had on the Bombo in a long time. Viz was good at 10-15m, fishlife was absolutely prolific, and it was a very pleasant dive indeed. After our surface interval we headed out to the northern side of Pig Island, and dived a spot I call Guano Reef. Great sponge gardens, good viz and moderate fish life. A nice dive. On Sunday morning, we headed out to The Pinnacle, which lies east of Pig Island. A terrific dive on the southern wall of the site, with a max depth of 30m reached. A massive bullray glided past and checked us out, and there was a load of fish. The final dive of the weekend was at The Ampitheatre, on the southern side of Pig Island. Going down to the sand at about 24m, another massive bullray checked us out. Then as we cruised around the wall, we were met by the largest school of sea pike and bullseye that I've seen in a longtime. Again viz was in the 10-15m range. Sea conditions were quite flat with a cold westerly wind, which particularly buffeted us on the Saturday. The water is very "brisk" with a magical 14C reached on each dive!

PADI eRDPML Now Available in Australia

Des Paroz — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 01:43:07 +0000

I have been advised today that the first batches of the new PADI eRDPML are now available in Australia. I've yet to play with one myself, but I've been told that the device is very sleek and is a great dive planning tool for recreational, no decompression air dives. I'll be implementing the usage of the eRDPML in all PADI Instructor Courses immediately. This will ensure that my candidates are given the opportunity to get comfortable with this new technology, as well as be able to offer something unique to their students. I should have a unit to play with early next week. I'll try and post a bit of a review then.

The Surface Interval Show Episode 021: Awesome is the new absolutely

Des Paroz — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 01:01:30 +0000

Surface Interval Episode 021 (mp3 - 10MB - 30 min) LISTEN HERE TO SURFACE INTERVAL

Welcome to the awesomely exciting relaunch of The Surface Interval Show podcast. Des and Bear kick catch up on whats been happening with them, and some stuff in the diving world, including:

Des has been busy becoming a PADI Course Director, and is now teaching PADI Instructor Courses at United Divers in Wollongong
Des discussed the PADI Course Director Training Course he attended in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia
Bear hasn’t been too wet lately, but has been working on getting a lot fitter. He’s going to have to get his dry suit taken in before he wears it again, as he’s dropped more than 15kg! (way to go Bear)
Oceanic Australia has taken a big initiative to talk with its customers, having setup a relationship with DiveOz (close friends of the show), and hosting three bulletin boards there. Russell Kitt, MD of Oceanic Australia, personally gets into the conversation
Mike Ball Dive Expeditions is getting rebreather friendly
The ex-HMAS Canberra has now been handed over to the Victorian group who are preparing it for its sinking as a dive site. Check out the splendid website at www.hmascanberra.com.au
Friend of the show, Dave Harasti, has co-authored with Mark Blaine an amazing book called The Marine Life of Bootless Bay. Its a wonderfully illustrated work on the life found around Port Moresby in PNG. Purchase the book through Dave’s website.

We would love your feedback. Please join our Facebook Group. For regular updates, follow The Surface Interval on Twitter. If you like Surface Interval, tell a friend. Also, we’d appreciate it if you’d consider popping over to PodcastAlley.com and giving us a vote, or giving us a review on iTunes or PodcastAlley.com. BlueBeyond Dive News and Blog | BlueBeyond.com.au | The Surface Interval Show podcast Surface Interval Episode 021 (mp3 - 10MB - 30 min) LISTEN HERE TO SURFACE INTERVAL

Multi Level eRDP to be Released Imminently

Des Paroz — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 01:44:07 +0000

According to the PADI Northwest Newswire blog, the multilevel version of the PADI eRDP is set to be released imminently in the US. This long anticipated device will replace both the eRDP and the RDP Wheel as dive planning devices that can be used in a variety of PADI courses. Essentially an Open Water Diver will learn dive planning using either the traditional RDP table version, or the new eRDPML. The RDP Wheel, introduced in the mid-80s, is a fantastic device that allows a great deal of precision in diving planning, and allows for multilevel dives to be planned. Unfortunately it is relatively costly as it is a calibrated instrument. It also takes a little getting used to, and can be harder for some to learn than a straight forward table design. The eRDP and now the eRDPML take advantage of the reduction in costs of production of electronics, and give a tool that is a fantastic aid in dive planning. Although some believe that people should learn on a submersible dive computer from the start, I believe that there is a lot to be said for learning how to plan a dive ahead of a dive. This way, people get to know what good profiles look like, and then will be more ready to deal with the situation that occurs when a computer fails. I have not heard anything from PADI Asia Pacific to this point about the release of the eRDPML, although I expect it won't be too much after the US release. I for one am looking forward to candidates in my PADI Instructor Development Courses being able to use this device instead of the Wheel and the standard eRDP. For more information, visit the PADI Northwest Newswire blog