May is
always a hectic month for me . . .
BECAUSE . . . -
I always have Chamber Day at the
beginning of the month, the Scuba Show
is usually in May (although next year
it's in early June) and that takes some
of my time, I frequently schedule an
end-of-the-month trip to give myself a
break, and there's a birthday (mine) to
deal with as well. Embarrassment of
riches when you get down to it, but it
all keeps me rather busy.
THE SCUBA SHOW WAS THIS WEEKEND -
It was nice to see the Long Beach
Convention Center jammed with in-person
divers once again, as well as to see the
scuba industry out in force under one
roof. The 2022 version of the Scuba Show
has now concluded after two days packed
with all kinds of stuff. My personal
experience at the show is somewhat
unique in that Reef Seekers doesn't have
a booth, but I can usually be found
wandering the floor and giving a couple
of seminar talks, the most popular of
which is always the one teaming up with
Coroner Captain John Kades and Chamber
Director Karl Huggins for the annual
"Why Divers Die" panel, where we review
the actual fatalities of the previous
calendar year. It's usually the
#1-attended seminar and this year
appears to have been no exception with
about 120 of you showing up to hear what
we had to say and share. Saturday
certainly seemed noticeably busier than
Sunday, but that's not to imply that
Sunday wasn't well-attended as well. But
for me, the show involves a lot of
networking, some of it post-Chamber Day
with stores and mfgs, some of it
trip-related (we checked in with Buddy
Dive since we're leaving Friday), and
some of it just seeing some of you
roaming the aisles and meeting some new
people as well. So definitely a busy and
packed weekend, nothing earth-shaking or
new that I saw to report, but good to
get back somewhat to a sense of normalcy
again. Scuba Show 2023 is set for June
3-4, again at the Long Beach Convention
Center.
ZOOM SEEKERS WAS LAST TUESDAY - Our
guests were Mark Gibello and Vernon
Brock from XS Scuba and the theme of the
talk was "Diving from a Manufacturer's
Point-of-View." Mark gave a nice
overview of what XS does and how they do
it (they're the largest distributor of
tanks and weights among other things)
and Vernon gave a really nice
presentation specifically on the weight
division of their operation and how
that's all done. If you missed their
talk, we've got it up on our YouTube
page and you can watch it at your
leisure here: ZOOM
SEEKERS - XS SCUBA: DIVING FROM A MFG's
POV.
ZOOM SEEKERS ON JUNE 14 -
Our guest will be Nancy Caruso, who
founded and leads Get Inspired, an
Orange County-based non-profit that
deals with kelp restoration, abalone
replanting, and educating kids about the
importance of the ocean. I hope you'll
be able to join us.
DR. BILL MEMORIAL UPDATE -
I've been e-mailing Bill's son Kevin,
who's in charge of things. Looks like it
is tentatively set for June 12 (which
would have been Bill's 75th birthday) at
the Avalon Underwater Park, likely near
the flagpole, starting around 11AM.
There's talk of it being live-streamed
as well. Secondly and separately, the CA
Fish & Game Commission has accepted our
petition to rename the Casino Point MPA
(the water part, not the land part) the
"Dr. Bill Bushing SMCA at Casino Point"
and it's been put on their June 15/16
agenda. Hopefully we'll get approval at
that time as well. I'll give you more
info about both events as we get closer.
SOCORRO VORTEX RUNS
AGROUND -
The Vortex,
sister ship to the Solmar
V,
basically rammed into Socorro Island
this past week around 2AM while
transiting back from Roca Partida. For
those not familiar with the area,
Socorro Island itself is roughly 9 miles
long and 6 miles wide so its not like
it's hard to spot. My absolute
speculative guess based on no real
information is that whoever was at the
helm fell asleep and that's what caused
the grounding. All on board - passengers
and crew - were able to get off safely
but the vessel is apparently a total
loss. Someone at the Scuba Show told me
the vessel is now in three pieces. So if
you had something booked on Vortex in
the future, you're going to need to call
them and make alternate arrangements.
GOING TO FIJI??? -
They've dropped, as of May 1, their
pre-arrival testing procedures for those
who are fully vaxxed, but you will have
to show proof of vaccination. You can
read more about it here: FIJI
COVID TEST ENTRY REQUIREMENTS.
LOOKING FOR A GOOD READ? -
It's long but interesting. Ron Roth
forwarded a New
Yorker article
about a guy who's trying to dive (in a
submersible) the deepest spot in all of
the world's five ocean. As many of you
know, I did a dive in the Alvin
submersible in 1996, but we "only" went
to 3,700 feet. This guy is going as deep
as 36,000 feet. Here's the link (it may
initially look like it's behind a
paywall but it's not): 36,000
FEET UNDER THE SEA.
That'll
do it for now. We leave for Bonaire
Friday night so this will hopefully come
to you next week courtesy of the Buddy
Dive Wi-Fi and I'll have some images to
share as well. In the meantime, have a
great week and let's go diving soon!!!
- Ken
