After roughly 10 years of diving Bonaire I finally have two (yes TWO )crimes to report
and it was NOT local Bonaire perps, but one or two of you divers that I thought I could trust!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And there is a distinct possibility that one of the thieves might be a tech diver you know.
Both incidents involved theft by fellow divers from the gear room in a resort, and not from trucks parked at dive sites.
We stayed at Buddy Dive from May 10 to 17, 2014. Buddy is one of several resorts we have used in the past, without complaints, other than an occasional mix up where divers have picked up the wrong wetsuit, fins, etc....
No biggy, and always resolved without rancor. $#it happens.
This time we have experienced two deliberate thefts, and both of these thefts were by divers, which means that the thieves may be sitting next to you on your very next dive, or it may be one of you reading this right now. Scum of the earth that you are, if it is you!
One low life wing diver unscrewed the entire inflator hose assembly off of Colleen's new Halcyon travel wing while she had it hanging to dry between dives. I hope you.....nah, I won't say it out loud.
Luckily for Colleen I could pull the inflator off of my own Halcyon so Colleen could continue to dive, as I can pretty much dive anything from a poodle to a BP/W or no buoyancy at all in some set ups. I simply borrowed a Tusa rental BCD from the op whenever she wanted to dive. Buddy Dive was very supportive and outraged by the incident.
The shocker is that a Halcyon is not a very common item on Bonaire, and it is pretty evident that it was a fellow BP/W diver who is the thief, and it could very well be a fellow wing diver that you know, who was on Bonaire last week.
The second theft has already be solved, at least in that the resrt knows who the thief was.
Since whenever Colleen was diving, I was using the rental Tusa BCD that Agusto the dive shop manager at Buddy loaned me, I had rinsed it and left it hanging on the peg in the gear room while I did a shore dive in my own wing. An hour later I was going to dive with Colleen again, so I grabbed the Tusa poodle, and discovered that someone had removed one of the ditch-able weight pockets, and weight from it.
I went to the shop with the loaner BCD, and the girl on the desk exploded, and told me that another diver just ending their week of diving that day had tried to return a rental Tusa with one weight pocket missing. When that diver was told they be charged for the missing item, they said they wanted to look around to see if they could find the pocket, and a few minutes later they returned with pocket (including a 2#) weight in hand.
(apparently they found their lost weight pocket hanging in the gear room..... in the loaner I had just hung up
)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To this date, we have never, ever had thefts from a truck at a Bonaire shore dive site, no matter how remote, and I am speaking for a pretty large number of diver I know who have been regular visitors to the island, many who have been there far more than we have.
This lack of dive site theft was true again this year, BUT this year it has become obvious to many of us that there are some of our fellow divers who ARE thieves (who knows, it may very well be one of you, that has from time to time broken into other diver's trucks over the years, allowing those thefts to be blamed on the local Bonaire population to cover for your criminal activities)
But, I find it very, very hard to call thefts like these two incidents this last week "Bonaire crime", since it is extremely obvious that these thieves diver/tourists and not locals.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So, the next time you are at any resort anywhere in the world, or at your local quarry, lake, on a dive boat, or a live aboard, look around you and think.
If you are not the thief, then one of those two thieves may be sitting right there beside you.
If you are one of those thieves, you are beneath scum. You are a disgrace to the fellowship, support and friendship the rest diver community cherishes and shares. If you are not the thief, now you are left wondering which diver around you it is......
and it was NOT local Bonaire perps, but one or two of you divers that I thought I could trust!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And there is a distinct possibility that one of the thieves might be a tech diver you know.
Both incidents involved theft by fellow divers from the gear room in a resort, and not from trucks parked at dive sites.
We stayed at Buddy Dive from May 10 to 17, 2014. Buddy is one of several resorts we have used in the past, without complaints, other than an occasional mix up where divers have picked up the wrong wetsuit, fins, etc....
No biggy, and always resolved without rancor. $#it happens.
This time we have experienced two deliberate thefts, and both of these thefts were by divers, which means that the thieves may be sitting next to you on your very next dive, or it may be one of you reading this right now. Scum of the earth that you are, if it is you!
One low life wing diver unscrewed the entire inflator hose assembly off of Colleen's new Halcyon travel wing while she had it hanging to dry between dives. I hope you.....nah, I won't say it out loud.
Luckily for Colleen I could pull the inflator off of my own Halcyon so Colleen could continue to dive, as I can pretty much dive anything from a poodle to a BP/W or no buoyancy at all in some set ups. I simply borrowed a Tusa rental BCD from the op whenever she wanted to dive. Buddy Dive was very supportive and outraged by the incident.
The shocker is that a Halcyon is not a very common item on Bonaire, and it is pretty evident that it was a fellow BP/W diver who is the thief, and it could very well be a fellow wing diver that you know, who was on Bonaire last week.
The second theft has already be solved, at least in that the resrt knows who the thief was.
Since whenever Colleen was diving, I was using the rental Tusa BCD that Agusto the dive shop manager at Buddy loaned me, I had rinsed it and left it hanging on the peg in the gear room while I did a shore dive in my own wing. An hour later I was going to dive with Colleen again, so I grabbed the Tusa poodle, and discovered that someone had removed one of the ditch-able weight pockets, and weight from it.
I went to the shop with the loaner BCD, and the girl on the desk exploded, and told me that another diver just ending their week of diving that day had tried to return a rental Tusa with one weight pocket missing. When that diver was told they be charged for the missing item, they said they wanted to look around to see if they could find the pocket, and a few minutes later they returned with pocket (including a 2#) weight in hand.
(apparently they found their lost weight pocket hanging in the gear room..... in the loaner I had just hung up
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To this date, we have never, ever had thefts from a truck at a Bonaire shore dive site, no matter how remote, and I am speaking for a pretty large number of diver I know who have been regular visitors to the island, many who have been there far more than we have.
This lack of dive site theft was true again this year, BUT this year it has become obvious to many of us that there are some of our fellow divers who ARE thieves (who knows, it may very well be one of you, that has from time to time broken into other diver's trucks over the years, allowing those thefts to be blamed on the local Bonaire population to cover for your criminal activities)
But, I find it very, very hard to call thefts like these two incidents this last week "Bonaire crime", since it is extremely obvious that these thieves diver/tourists and not locals.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So, the next time you are at any resort anywhere in the world, or at your local quarry, lake, on a dive boat, or a live aboard, look around you and think.
If you are not the thief, then one of those two thieves may be sitting right there beside you.
If you are one of those thieves, you are beneath scum. You are a disgrace to the fellowship, support and friendship the rest diver community cherishes and shares. If you are not the thief, now you are left wondering which diver around you it is......
Classy!
