Tomorrow... Whee!

[SeaJay]

Boy, am I excited...

It's taken a while and a whole bunch of paperwork, time and effort, but tomorrow I get to officially become a part of the South Carolina Aquarium staff.

It all started when I finally got serious about the sport and got certified last May... Yeah, I know... I shouldn't have been diving unless I'd been properly trained. Yadda-yadda. I lived. Sue me.



Anyway, I got certified, and not long after bought a subscription to both Skin Diver and Scuba Diving magazines. It was right about the time when my brother said to me, "Hey, I went to high school with this girl who now dives at the aquarium, and she says they need more divers," that I read an article in one of those magazines about the South Carolina Aquarium needing divers. In short, I took a trip up there, talked to my brother's friend, and the net result is that I've been accepted and tomorrow I go to my orientation class. I can't wait!

I've already been up there to check out the aquarium a few times. It's the coolest thing I think I've ever seen. It consists of about half-and-half freshwater and salt water tanks, the biggest of which is a 42 fsw tank that houses a full underwater environment, including a five foot and a seven foot tiger shark, a loggerhead turtle, and several 200+ pound sea basses, as well as a generous plethora of other marine life.

Of course there's the fair share of cleaning and all, but they asked me if I'd be interested in doing underwater shows, complete with audience participation in a full face mask, so that I can talk while under water. Of course I said yes! I'm a bit concerned about the sharks, but they've been diving with them for years without incident, and I'm sure that I'll get the proper training for them too.

Man, I can't wait.

Next time someone's up there checking out the aquarium, tap on the glass and say hi to the diver... Maybe hold up a sign or something relative to the Scubaboard. Heck, I might even be able to get you "backstage" so you can check out all of the good stuff...

Oh, and by the way... Someone PLEASE give me an opinion on the basic design of the new website I just built... I'll apologize in advance for posting the address here (bad netiquitte without prior permission) but there's no real content there yet... And yet the basic design shows where I'm linking to this board anyway. It's at http://www.USCBscuba.com , and is the web site for my local University's Dive Club, which I run. Yes, I'm aware that none of the links on the left work yet, and I'm aware that there's too many of them. I haven't designed it yet, but a lot of those links are going to be gathered and categorized into groups; thus, I have many more listed there than will actually be on that one "home" page.

Anyway, wish me luck tomorrow, and give me your opinion of the basic design of the site. Keen eyes will notice that I code by hand for the best results, and keen eyes and ears will also notice that the background and background music have been used on some of my other sites as well...

 

[ckharlan66]

Have fun. It sounds like you will have a blast.

Dive Safe.

Chad

 

[JamieZ]

Hello I checked out your web page and it looks to be a good start.
I'll give you a suggestion, tone down the brightness of your background if you can. It will make it easier on your guests eye's when their reading, it will make print and pictures stand out more too. By the way you are one lucky person it sounds like to be accepted by the aquarium. Will this be a paying job? One other thing your links dont work and there's to many of them.

 

[SeaJay]

Ha!

Great suggestion on the background! I didn't even think of that...

The aquarium relies on it's "professionals," mostly, which are highly educated and specialized, and fairly paid, to do most of the work. Divers are the "grunts," and are typically college age (I'm a bit past that but still in school studying for an MBA) and are volunteers. That would be me. They get free work, I get stuff for my resume and I get to dive year round in their tank and talk to the kids about the sharks.

To be accepted as a volunteer is quite a privilege. There's many more people who want to be volunteers than get to be. But the coolest part is that all paid positions at the aquarium are filled by people who were previously volunteers, with the exception of the business office. In other words, this volunteer position could lead to one of the paid ones. And there are several positions as Master Diver, Animal Care Technician, and Med Tech, etc. that are occassionally needing to be filled. With the right educational level and the right amount of experience, the pay can be plenty healthy.

But they only hire people who were previously volunteers.

So it's not paid yet, but we'll see what happens. For now, I'm thrilled just to get to play in the big tank and show off to the kids.

 

[otter-cat]

I am a volunteer diver at the Oregon Coast Aquarium, and it is loads of fun. Most of the work is cleaning inside the tanks, but it doesn't even feel like work! I love it.

It is different than OW diving, and you have to be very careful with your movements, as you'll probably be working in very small spaces in sensitive environments, but doing this can do wonders in helping you to improve your diving skills.

One word of caution: Watch out for all the people behind the glass. Aquarium visitors seem to be more fascinated by the divers in the tanks than they are with the marine life! They love to snap pictures and make you go blind....On the other hand, it's really a joy to watch how excited the little kids get if you wave to them from inside the tank!

Have fun!

 

[MissAmberDiva]

That sounds pretty awesome. That would definitely be fun work!

 

[Dee]

Now don't you go scaring the audience!

 

[SeaJay]

I'm just back from the Aquarium.

The day started with a mad rush to the Aquarium, nearly an hour and a half away. Robyn (my sweetheart and my buddy) were late getting out of here to go up there. We left about two hours late, and arrived just five minutes late. Let's just say that I love my radar detector.

But five minutes wasn't too bad. We sat down and immediately want to work. The person doing the orientation had some sort of cold or something, and was not feeling well at all, and made it known that the orientation was going to be short. She also made it a point to give us the appropriate paperwork, briefly orient us, and let us know what to expect next. Then she answered questions for a little while and set us loose in the Aquarium to get familiar with the surroundings from a visitor's standpoint. Robyn and I had already seen the Aquarium a couple of weeks ago, for the same purpose, so we managed to find our way to the top of the "big tank" (filled with sheepshead, mahi-mahi, dolphin, shark, green eels, and loggerhead turtles) to watch them feed the animals. Of course, this was from "behind glass," and we watched in complete envy while three divers geared up for doing the scuba show in the big tank in half an hour. One of them saw the diver down flag on my shirt and made the motion, "you...swim" and I nodded, "yes." Then he smiled and said, "come on around" and I threw him the "okay" sign and he greeted us at the door. This was a very special privilege, as we'd both been told that we would not get to see the topside of the big tank, or the diver's quarters, until later.

The staff was exceptionally friendly and helpful, and they reinforced the sheer enjoyment of the job. They got a real kick out of the fact that Robyn, a former Mrs. South Carolina, was going to be doing Aquarium shows. That looks great for the Aquarium to have a volunteer "celebrity" working for them. Funny. If they only knew what I used to do for a living... Good thing nobody recognizes me any more.

It was obvious that the show was about to start, so we picked a good place on the public side of the glass and watched the show. Man, does this look like fun! One diver wore a full face mask and conversed with the audience, while the other two divers ran support. The show was very cool, and the fish were very excited to eat, including the twin 4 foot nurse sharks, grouper, and lots of yellowtail. (The sand tiger sharks are fed seperately.) At times the divers were literally engulfed in fish, and I could see why they'd warned us to make sure that we were wearing full hoods and chain mail gloves before entering the water. Those fish get very excited, and will bite fingers, ears, and even hair if you don't cover up.

After the show, we said goodbye to the divers, a great bunch of people who seem very happy to see more volunteers. We also got to chat with one of the master divers, the paid person in charge of this part of the Aquarium. He seemed personable and very much interested in helping us to acclamate to the new position.

Heading home, we stopped off at one of our favorite dive shops, Charleston Scuba, to check out hoods. Looks like they might come in handy anyway, as the water cools off for the winter. I also looked (even more) at BC's, regs, and even a backplate, and got the opportunity to chat with an experienced caver who loves his bp/wing, and swears by it... But doesn't dive one in open ocean. More on that another time; he didn't give me much information.

I also got to see another diver who had a pocket recently installed on his wetsuit. The idea looked great, but he did a poor job of gluing it on, leaving much "goo" around the edges. Certainly there's no question that the design is a terrific one, and I definitely want a pocket on my wetsuit. However, the engineering was awful. The idea was great, the execution terrible. His installation looked horrible, and of course, as I'd feared, the wetsuit is now inhibited from stretching underneath of the pocket, since it's not made of a stretchy material. In short, this created lots of stress points which I can see becoming a problem later on, not to mention that the wetsuit is now obviously inhibited from drying properly around the pocket, perhaps leading to mold and mildew. I've got a quick idea of making a neoprene pocket, similar in design to the nylon ones commercially available, but without the inner layer that glues to the wetsuit. This would allow for proper drying, a much cleaner look, more structual strength, and better streamlining when not filled with stuff. It would also be less expensive, just as functional, and much easier to install. Stay tuned on that.

Neither Robyn nor myself found hoods that we liked... They only had hood "skins" and 5 mil or 3 mil fleece lined hoods. No thanks. We'll have to find plain black, inexpensive 3 mil hoods here somewhere. Maybe Diver's Direct...

Of course, in the meantime, the dive shop owner asked us if we were going with them tomorrow morning ("since it was such a great dive today") to the shipwreck "Fred Day" offshore from Charleston. Couldn't beat the dive for the cheap price, and we got roped in. This will be Robyn's first salt water wreck dive. I can't wait to see the look on her face when she sees all the fish and the wreck... The dive shop was extra nice to us, too, after learning that we put together the University of South Carolina's Scuba Club. Seems like they might be interested in doing some discounted group dives for the club. Good thing. We could use it.

Next weekend it's Crystal River, Florida for our AOW certifications. Anyone want to hook up? We'll be testing bp/wings vs. a Black Diamond vs. several kinds of jacket-style BC's. Any and all are welcome...