Ken Kurtis
Contributor
IPE, Squid, Sunfish, and more
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I guess we know where Taylor Swift will be on February 9 . . .(please scroll down for details)
REPLACING C-CARDS LOST IN THE FIRES - One of my friends lost his house in the Altadena fire. One of the things we discussed was getting duplicate c-cards for him. If you were certified in the early 90s or later, chances are pretty good that NAUI or PADI - depending on who issued your card - will have a record of your cert and can easily issue you a replacement. But my buddy was certified in the mid-80s, and a lot of those records were lost when the agencies computerized everything. On top of that, his original instructor is deceased and the shop where he took the lessons has closed, so none of his original certifiers are around to vouch for him. And while there may not be thousands of people in this situation, he's certainly not the only one. And the last thing you need to deal with on top of all of the other issues you might be facing, would be for someone to tell you that you need to take another class to get your card back. I e-mailed both NAUI and PADI last week to see what we can do in situations like this, especially when you have an active instructor or dive shop that will vouch for the person who needs the card. Both of agencies assured me that they'll work with us to get your card replaced as quickly and painlessly as possible. You can call them to see if there's a record of your card but if not, contact me or any other shop/instructor who can vouch for you, and we'll get things worked out to get you a replacement card.
IPE ISSUE??? GET EVALUATED - There's a problematic condition that can occur when diving known as Immersion Pulmonary Edema (IPE). IPE - also referred to as IPO (Immersion Pulmonary Oedema) - is a build-up of fluid in the lungs which makes it difficult to breathe. This can happen during a dive or while someone is snorkeling or swimming. The cases I'm familiar with have involved heavy exertion but I don't think that's always required. But the bottom line in all of this is that if you experience an IPE incident, you should pause your diving until you can be evaluated by a physician trained in hyperbaric medicine. An Australia-based group recently came out with a position paper about this and you can read about it here: DIVING AFTER AN IPE INCIDENT.
MALDIVES SPOTS HAVE BEEN FILLED - I mentioned last week that we had one and possibly two openings on one of our Maldives trips and within an hour of sending out TWARS, I had someone scoop up the spots. But we are always happy to put you on a waiting list, no charge for that, so if you'd like to be put on stand-by for this or an other trip that's full, just let us know.
BUT PLENTY OF SPOTS FOR ROATAN JUNE 28 - JULY 5 - That being said, we've got rooms available for our return to Roatan trip, leaving L.A. on June 28. Call us at 310/652-4990 for details.
SQUID REPORT - We didn't do the Squid Dive last week but a friend of ours did go out on their own and reported about six feet of visibility, a few eggs clusters, and a few live mating squid. So not totally skunked but not immersed in squid either. We'll keep checking on things and keep you posted. The rain we got today certainly won't help conditions in the short run.
WANNA BECOME A MEMBER OF THE CHAMBER CREW? - The Catalina Hyperbaric Chamber is always looking for new volunteer crew members and if this is something that might interest you, a mainland-based training class is being held February 8-9 at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach. If you're interested, contact chamber@usc.edu to find out more and to get signed up.
LONELY MOLA-MOLA - A Japanese aquarium had a novel problem to solve. They closed for renovation in December. So there were no visitors but the fish were still in their exhibits. They noticed a particular Sunfish (Mola-Mola) suddenly stopped eating and seemed to be depressed. They wondered if it had anything to do with a lack of people that the Sunfish could see. So they made some cardboard cutouts of people, taped them to the outside of the exhibit plexi and . . . voila!!! . . . the fish perked back up. You can read more about it here: CHEERING UP A DEPRESSED FISH.
And that'll do it for now. Have a great week and let's go diving together in 2025!!!
- Ken
