Ken Kurtis
Contributor
I was going to tag this "February 23-30" to see if anyone would notice . . . . . .
WONDERFUL DAY AT THE 39th ANNUAL AVALON CLEANUP - Despite my alarm going off at 3:20AM so I'd make it down to the 6AM boat, and despite the overcast-but-occasionally-sunny skies, and despite the occasional rain shower . . . it seems like everyone had a good time at the Avalon Underwater Cleanup on Saturday. We had a record 600+ divers participating and they were rewarded with pretty good visibility (at least until it all got stirred up as they hunted for treasure). There was plenty of good stuff brought up from the three cleanup locations: Green Pier, Step Beach, and Casino Point (the backside, not the UW Park itself). Glenn Kerr of Signature Scuba received the Jon Hardy Award, given to someone who's actively promoting diving at Catalina. And Mike Doran received the Golden Flipper Award, our equivalent of a Lifetime Achievement Award, for continued service to the Cleanup and the Catalina Marine Society as well as the Catalina Conservation Divers.
WANNA SEE SOME PIX? - Here's a link to the Cleanup pix I was able to snap yesterday (Teresa Lee took most of the awards ceremony pix for me): CLEANUP 2020.
FABULOUS VISIBILITY - Not just in Avalon but all over the island for the last week or so. And when I say "fabulous," I'm talking in the 60-100' foot range and clear, blue water. It's a bit unusual for this time of the year so take advantage of it while it lasts.
ALSO UNUSUAL SIGHTINGS - I don't know if it's because of the viz, but Rusty Berry of SSA posted a video on FaceBook of one of their Catalina dives over the weekend where they ran into what appears to be a Green Turtle. Again, unusual for this time of the year. (We occasionally see turtles, but it's more of a late-summer warmer-water thing.) You can see the video on his FB page. The turtle seems very calm and is just meandering along while everyone gawks.
UNDERWATER DURING AN EARTHQUAKE - Years ago during a dive along the backside of San Clemente Island, I was underwater when I heard a loud rumble and then felt a shock wave hit me a few seconds later. A couple of other divers experienced the same thing on that dive. Some investigation led us to discover that it was actually an earthquake and the fault was about three miles from us. Recently, there was an earthquake in the Cayman Islands and a number of divers reported hearing it and feeling it underwater. Now it turns out that Woods Hole had their Jason ROV doing some exploring at a deepwater vent in the area at the time the earthquake struck and they've got video of it. They were looking at a dense colony of shrimp and you can tell when the earthquake hits because all the shrimp jump and there's debris in the water. You can see the video here: JASON & THE EARTHQUAKE.
FEEL-GOOD STORY OF THE WEEK - As many of you know, I volunteer at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach. They were out yesterday on a collecting trip (I wasn't with them) diving oil rig Eureka last week when they found the GoPro at 60 feet. It had a yellow floaty handle on it and was lodged under one of the beams. So they brought it back. It was a Hero5 with a red filter attached to the handle and it didn't look like it had been down very long. Eventually they had time to pull the card and look at the footage. Luckily, the owner had taken a picture of a plane ticket with her name on it and they were able to track her down. Turns out she's from Arizona and lost it on a dive nine days earlier. They're now arranging to get it back to her. It's also a good lesson as to why you should stick your name and phone number on these valuable things we could lose so if you DO lose it and someone finds it, they can contact you. Someone over the weekend had a great idea specifically for digital cameras which is to place on your memory card a text file that you can call "OWNER INFORMATION" or something like that. Put your name, address, and phone number in that file on the card and if your camera gets lost, hopefully whoever finds it checks the card and all of your contact info will be right there.
And that'll do it for now. Have a great week, and let's go diving soon!!!
- Ken
WONDERFUL DAY AT THE 39th ANNUAL AVALON CLEANUP - Despite my alarm going off at 3:20AM so I'd make it down to the 6AM boat, and despite the overcast-but-occasionally-sunny skies, and despite the occasional rain shower . . . it seems like everyone had a good time at the Avalon Underwater Cleanup on Saturday. We had a record 600+ divers participating and they were rewarded with pretty good visibility (at least until it all got stirred up as they hunted for treasure). There was plenty of good stuff brought up from the three cleanup locations: Green Pier, Step Beach, and Casino Point (the backside, not the UW Park itself). Glenn Kerr of Signature Scuba received the Jon Hardy Award, given to someone who's actively promoting diving at Catalina. And Mike Doran received the Golden Flipper Award, our equivalent of a Lifetime Achievement Award, for continued service to the Cleanup and the Catalina Marine Society as well as the Catalina Conservation Divers.
WANNA SEE SOME PIX? - Here's a link to the Cleanup pix I was able to snap yesterday (Teresa Lee took most of the awards ceremony pix for me): CLEANUP 2020.
FABULOUS VISIBILITY - Not just in Avalon but all over the island for the last week or so. And when I say "fabulous," I'm talking in the 60-100' foot range and clear, blue water. It's a bit unusual for this time of the year so take advantage of it while it lasts.
ALSO UNUSUAL SIGHTINGS - I don't know if it's because of the viz, but Rusty Berry of SSA posted a video on FaceBook of one of their Catalina dives over the weekend where they ran into what appears to be a Green Turtle. Again, unusual for this time of the year. (We occasionally see turtles, but it's more of a late-summer warmer-water thing.) You can see the video on his FB page. The turtle seems very calm and is just meandering along while everyone gawks.
UNDERWATER DURING AN EARTHQUAKE - Years ago during a dive along the backside of San Clemente Island, I was underwater when I heard a loud rumble and then felt a shock wave hit me a few seconds later. A couple of other divers experienced the same thing on that dive. Some investigation led us to discover that it was actually an earthquake and the fault was about three miles from us. Recently, there was an earthquake in the Cayman Islands and a number of divers reported hearing it and feeling it underwater. Now it turns out that Woods Hole had their Jason ROV doing some exploring at a deepwater vent in the area at the time the earthquake struck and they've got video of it. They were looking at a dense colony of shrimp and you can tell when the earthquake hits because all the shrimp jump and there's debris in the water. You can see the video here: JASON & THE EARTHQUAKE.
FEEL-GOOD STORY OF THE WEEK - As many of you know, I volunteer at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach. They were out yesterday on a collecting trip (I wasn't with them) diving oil rig Eureka last week when they found the GoPro at 60 feet. It had a yellow floaty handle on it and was lodged under one of the beams. So they brought it back. It was a Hero5 with a red filter attached to the handle and it didn't look like it had been down very long. Eventually they had time to pull the card and look at the footage. Luckily, the owner had taken a picture of a plane ticket with her name on it and they were able to track her down. Turns out she's from Arizona and lost it on a dive nine days earlier. They're now arranging to get it back to her. It's also a good lesson as to why you should stick your name and phone number on these valuable things we could lose so if you DO lose it and someone finds it, they can contact you. Someone over the weekend had a great idea specifically for digital cameras which is to place on your memory card a text file that you can call "OWNER INFORMATION" or something like that. Put your name, address, and phone number in that file on the card and if your camera gets lost, hopefully whoever finds it checks the card and all of your contact info will be right there.
And that'll do it for now. Have a great week, and let's go diving soon!!!
- Ken
