Dive Wise 2006
Added to website: 05 April 2006
Celebrating an anniversary is something to feel good about for anyone, especially so when you’re still ahead of the competition. So it was with a source of some pride that the BSAC north-east coaching team opened the doors on Dive Wise 2006, their tenth annual one-day celebration of scuba diving. With 260 divers taking part in a day of presentations and prizes, this is still the largest regional dive event and second only to the London Diving Officers Conference.
The day began on an appropriately cold-water note with a wreck-diving expedition to Gulan, known as Norway’s own “Bermuda Triangle”. A typical week-long dive trip in this region will set you back around £1000, but Craig Billingham showed how, with a little effort and planning plus a friend’s RIB it is possible to spend ten days locating pristine wrecks, some still complete with their bell, for less than half that price
Wildlife aficionados were treated to a very different kind of expedition report courtesy of Peter Raines, chairman of Coral Cay Conservation. Twenty years ago Peter created a method to get non-scientist recreational divers involved in surveying the world’s coral reefs, all of which are threatened by global warming. Today, keen divers can join coral reef expeditions to Egypt, Fiji or the Philippines for as little as two-weeks or for any longer period of time they might prefer.
The helicopters of RAF Boulmer are a welcome sight for north east divers and appearances by their crewmen at previous Dive Wise events have always been popular. This year proved no exception as radar and winch operator Mike Holman of 202 Search and Rescue Squadron regaled the audience with hair-raising tales of daring rescues, including some of the 141 lives saved around the UK in 2005. The Sea Kings of 202 SAR have been in service since the 1970’s, but it is still the best tool for the job. Dedicated engineers work constantly to keep them in tip-top shape and it is comforting to know that one aircraft and its four-man crew are on standby 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Although Blue O Two may be an as yet unfamiliar name in livaboard diving, well known wreck-enthusiast and dive book author Peter Collings is not, and the two have teamed up to run regular wreck safaris in the Red Sea. Peter’s thirty years of diving have given him plenty entertain a dive audience; the names of several of his wreck discoveries, such as the Giannis D and Rosalie Moller, are now legends in diving.
His tale of the less well known “Russian Wreck” off Zabargad was particularly intriguing and this vessel has yet to reveal all of her secrets.
Advice and suggestions on kit configuration and customisation was on hand in the form of adventurous technical diver Graeme Bruce. The amount of kit Graeme brought to illustrate his presentation looked sufficient to open a small dive shop; his quad-set was greeted with cries of disbelief from many on the room. However, this was not a “techies only” talk; much of the material was practical safety-based advice suitable for divers of all experience levels.
Hartlepool diver Geoff Leighton wrapped the day up with a presentation on his club’s adopted wreck, the Sunderland-built HMS Port Napier. This 9,600 ton WWII minelayer sank in the Kyle of Lochalsh following an engine fire, thankfully with no casualties, and lies in around 20m. Geoff and his fellow club members discovered on the wreck bottles of Whitbread Pale Ale and found them to be still drinkable. Whitbread were delighted with the find and the club soon found their selves in newspapers and on TV and radio. The Receiver of Wrecks was less delighted and decreed that no further bottles were to be removed from the wreck.
At the close of the day divers went home with a host of raffle prizes, including a Red Sea livaboard holiday from Blue O2, a drysuit from Otter and place on Coral Cay Expedition, as well as dozens of other prizes. Raffle ticket sales totalled over £800 and a further £300 was raised for the RNLI.
