Women Divers Deck the Halls Six new members were inducted into the prestigious Women Divers Hall of Fame on March 29 at the Beneath the Sea Awards Banquet. Barbara Allen: Pioneer, Instructor, Ocean Advocate. Kristine Barsky: Marine Biologist, Environmentalist, Author, Videographer. Emma L. Hickerson: Marine Researcher, Science Interpreter, Photographer. …

Text by Lynnette Ang Photography by Aaron Wong  South Korea’s aging sea women still dive for the ocean’s bounty  On this chillymid-July morning we arrive in Udo, bristling with anticipation. The tiny speck is just two miles (3.5km) off the eastern side of Jeju Island, South Korea, due south of the …

By Jill Heinerth Maintenance mitigates daily wear and tear; insurance covers the unexpected   When you pursue the art of underwater image making you will eventually experience a loss from flooding. After crying over my first flooded camera, I bathed the afflicted gear in rubbing alcohol and sent it …

Text by Lilla Clare It started like most dive days, with clear skies, calm seas and vigorous activity hauling equipment onto the dive boat. It was a typical two-dive day charter catering to a transient group unfamiliar with the local dive site topography. What followed was a common enough …

Divers encounter jelly with a bubbly personality Text and Photo by Trisha Stovel During a recent search for six gill sharks with Rendezvous Dive Adventures, I encountered one of my favourite critters: a fried egg jelly. In the end, we didn’t see any of the elusive sharks during our …

Dive industry pro Bret Gilliam offers the historical perspective The first research work in decompression physiology was not directed at scuba divers. Records from 1841 show that construction workers working at elevated pressures in either caissons (water-tight boxes inside which workers did construction underwater) or construction tunnels beneath rivers …

ByJean-Michel Cousteau Amid laughter and squeals of delight, twenty families splash into the chilly waters off Catalina Island, California. It certainly doesn’t look like serious education, but it is. These are students with their parents from all over the country, many of them diving into 68°F (20°C) ocean water …

The Niagara Divers’ Association will present its 19th annual Shipwrecks Symposium Saturday, April 6, 2013 and DIVER Magazine will be there! A popular event for Ontario and New York State area divers, the event is staged in Welland, Ontario. This one-day symposium on shipwrecks features multimedia presentations and internationally …

Photo: Kids Sea Camp   Text by Garth Eichel 1. Provide regular reminders Kids are hesitant to ask questions in front of their peers, especially if they’re already certified and feel like they’re supposed to know it all. In dive briefings, go over basic skills like hand signals, gear …

Photo by David Benz / Kids Sea Camp   The following are a range of dive programs available for children of all ages and abilities. Skin Diver/Junior Skin Diver (NAUI) — this certification class is for kids eight years old and older, teaching the process of snorkelling and breath-hold …

Text by Jeremy Heywood Correction: When this story appeared in DIVER Volume 37 Number 4, Dr. Mica Endsley was inadvertently referred to as he, not she. We apologize for this error. Experts agree: situation awareness is critically important to diver safety. But because it’s regarded as an advanced skill …

Project Pink Tank is on a mission to get to the bottom of it. Text by Lisa Sonne More than 400 scuba enthusiasts, including open water, advanced, technical, and instructor level divers, are participating in “Project Pink Tank,” a multi-phase investigation into the relationships between scuba diving and the …

Lake Minnewanka has a rich history. There are recorded archaeological sites showing pre-contact occupations that cover an entire 10,000 year period. Artifacts have been found from the early, middle and late pre-contact periods. The Minnewanka site is one of a series of such early sites in the lower Bow …

The latest deployment of NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) has begun with the international crew of aquanauts entering the habitat, Aquarius, yesterday for a twelve day mission. Aquarius, the world’s only undersea laboratory, is located in about 63 feet (20 metres) of water, three and a half miles …

DIVER magazine scours the internet so you don’t have to. Simply browse our selection of todays top stories and click for further reading… Researchers from the University of British Columbia have been using Google Earth to investigate fish enclosures of the Mediterranean. Read Article. Source: New Scientist Could mobile …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau The biological clock of the Pacific Northwest is set to the rhythm of the ebb and flow of five different species of Pacific salmon: Chinook, Chum, Coho, Sockeye and Pink. Preparing to spawn, adult salmon travel upstream from the open ocean along coastal rivers and streams. …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau Beginnings are always a time for renewal and optimism and the debut of 2010 is a good time to consider what we are faced with that concerns the ocean and the environment. The meetings on climate change in Copenhagen must now result in global policy change, …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau I have traveled most of my life and have seen changes in the sea that no one, not even my brilliant father, could have predicted.  Jacques Cousteau, however, did point the direction on many things—the danger of nuclear waste, overfishing, habitat destruction, even the high cost …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau Imagine you have just returned from a life-changing dive trip to an absolutely magnificent island chain surrounded by the most beautiful reefs you have ever seen. Immersion in this candy store of luscious treats has given you a deep connection to the miraculous wonder of life …

Ablaze with what appears the reflection of a dazzling fireworks display, the eyes of a Red Irish Lord (Hemilepidotus hemilepidotus) add to the brilliant colouration of this striking species of sculpin. Its typically vivid coat can vary from hues of orange through red to magenta and into striking pinks …

Two hundred billion gallons of foaming seawater swirl through Sechelt Rapids on each turn of the tide in this constricted, islet-strewn passage on Canada’s Pacific coast. In the aerial view to the northwest, looking from Sechelt Inlet toward Jervis Inlet, a 13.5 knot ebb roars through the shallow gap. …

In the late 1970s I worked on a dive boat called the Oceaner.  Owners Gary Mallendar and Larry Mangotich, manufacture exposure suits under the Oceaner name and distribute dive gear such as the TUSA line, across Canada. Their vessel has been retired for their private use.  On several occasions …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau It will take years, maybe even decades, before we know the full impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, but we will begin to get a sense of just how far-reaching its effects are as the first round of wintering migratory birds makes their way through …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau It’s often called ‘The Law of Unintended Consequences’. The simple explanation for this law is when we do something we believe is good or helpful but there is a counter, unexpected reaction that is not always so good. That is exactly the case with human sunscreens …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau It is widely accepted scientific knowledge that climate change has drastically accelerated rates of ice melt all over the planet, contributing to sea level rise.  This is only part of the story, however. Like the visible part of an iceberg, it represents only a small part of …

By Jean-Michel Cousteau

 The ocean’s supreme hunter cleaves through the sea in dauntless pursuit of his prey. At the top of the food chain, he fears no other species. Using cunning and relentless force, he tracks his quarry, which can only feebly resist. He has one mission and one …

A mid winter opportunity to dive Browning Pass in B.C.’s Queen Charlotte Strait delivered up cold February winds and rain… but when they abated and the sun came out we were treated to some of the best visibility I’d ever enjoyed in these remarkably fertile waters at the top of …

  Perfectly ‘synched’, these Pacific White-Sided Dolphins (Lagenorhynchus oblquidens) gracefully paced our boat as we motored across Blackfish Sound near Port McNeil on Vancouver Island’s rugged north coast. These playful and social marine mammals are a favorite in British Columbia’s Emerald Sea, and encounters such as this are among …

Genny Simard, interpreter at the Fundy Discovery Aquarium in St. Andrews, New Brunswick, holds Big Dee-Dee, a 22-pound (10kg) lobster (Homarus americanus) caught three years ago in the adjacent waters of the Bay of Fundy. A part of the Huntsman Marine Science Centre, the public aquarium is Canada’s newest …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky A seizure is a sudden surge in electrical activity of the brain that alters how an individual feels or acts for a short period of time.  In a classic ‘grand mal’ seizure a person looses consciousness, all of their muscles contract for up …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky In this column we will look at the breath-hold diver who suddenly looses consciousness in relatively shallow water.  These individuals often die from drowning.  This phenomenon has been called ‘shallow water blackout’ but the term should be avoided – it’s confusing.  Initially shallow …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky Frequently, I receive reader questions. The following (edited) enquiries raise several issues of interest. Does Nitrox Have a Taste? Should Nitrox taste any different from regular air? I’ve noticed a difference. Air is odourless and tasteless in contrast to Nitrox, which I found …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky In the last two columns I reviewed inert gas narcosis.  High Pressure Neurological (Nervous) Syndrome (HPNS) is a similar problem that is experienced on deeper dives.  It is a difficulty that recreational divers will never experience but advanced technical divers are increasingly performing …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky In any discussion on dehydration, the topic of electrolytes must come up.  So what are electrolytes?  In Stedman’s medical dictionary an electrolyte is defined as “any compound that, in solution, conducts electricity and is decomposed by it; an ionizable substance in solution”.  Ions …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky All of us enjoy diving or we would not be doing it. Often we feel better when we are diving. A subset of divers seem to really enjoy diving deep on air. Is diving addictive? Narcosis is a fascinating topic and supports the …

Diving Medicine By Dr. David Sawatzky Every year approximately 100 people die in North America while diving, and another 100 die while diving in the rest of the world.  Diving is a relatively high ‘risk’ activity.  By that I mean there are many ways in which you can be …