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The liveliest letters from the DIVER mailbag...
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I visited the Scubashop in Basingstoke, Hants, after seeing its special offer of a new O'Three drysuit with a drysuit speciality course at half price.
Curly the manager took me through the various suits and options, resulting in half a dozen suits strewn across the changing-room floor, but the O'Three was the one for me.
Curly's informative and exceptional service almost made me want to thrust my credit card into his hand but, being a bit of a bargain-hunter, I decided first to search the Internet to see if I could bag a deal.
I searched on eBay and, as if by magic, the exact suit I had tried on came up. It happened to be the same size, came with many extras, and the chap selling it had a fantastic rating with no negative feedback, so I bought it from him there and then.
On receiving it, I found the boots to be a bit small, but decided to return the suit to O'Three for a boot change. Kevin, one of the partners, was helpful and said that if I sent the suit straight down, O'Three would turn it round in time for my pool session the following week.
A couple of days later, he called to tell me that the suit should never have been on the open market. It was a demo suit that had not been paid for.
He said he would send me another suit for my drysuit course and would pursue the matter with the chap from whom I had bought the suit, who, it turned out, had bought it from an operation that had not paid O'Three for the suit. A tangled web indeed!
All of this illustrates the pitfalls of buying specialist equipment online. Not only do you not get the service and knowledge of professional outfits such as the Scubashop and O'Three, but you can also open up a whole tin of worms.
O'Three supplied me with a fantastic suit for my course - and then it gave me that suit with compliments for helping it track down the missing suit (which turned out to be one of three that had never been paid for). I promise to be an O'Three customer for life!
If you're considering an expensive buy like this, ask the right questions and then ask yourself, is this bargain too good to be true?
Nick Watts, Bramley, Hants
What can I say other than thankyou on behalf of many small independent dive centres in our situation (Touch It, Smell It, You're In A Dive Shop, Trewavas, December 2004).
Over the past few years we have felt the knife of the dotcom diver equipment warehouses slowly and painfully twist in our businesses, and seen many centres close within a 20-mile radius of us.
Many of us "smaller" businesses can't compete on prices, so we compete in the only way left, which is service and knowledge.
It's very difficult to get this across to our customers when they see these large warehouses banging out cylinders at £5 less than we can purchase trade, but there is so much they don't see.
We're a two-man band. We sell, teach, repair, service, supply air, nitrox, helium and argon and, when we have people in for quotes and technical information, we spend time, make them tea and make them comfortable. Yet we know that eight times out of 10 they are here only to steal our knowledge, and that the warehouses will be getting the fruits of our labour.
Unusually, our dive-centre club is independent and non-profit-making. The club has other independent committee members and its own bank account; we charge £25 a year to cover shortfalls in charters and pool hire etc; we book 12 charters a year; we organise a couple of holidays a year along with long diving weekends, barbecues, Christmas parties and other socials, all of which are charged to members at cost. Many are free or just rounded up to trickle that little bit extra into the club fund, from which we take nothing.
If we find that we can no longer survive in this climate, our customers will lose far more than convenient air-fills.
Reading Louise Trewavas's article was a breath of fresh air - she's someone who appreciates the community that a local dive centre creates. I'm going to put it up in our shop window.
Lydia, Hastings Diving Centre, St Leonards-on-Sea
So, after having a rant about a local dive shop's attitude to me wanting to dive Bikini Atoll but having no kit of my own (Why All The Elitism?, Off Gassing, November 2004), I think it only fair to have a rave.
I went back to the shop with a long kit list and nothing was too much trouble.
New 5mm wetsuit. "It's got yellow on it. I don't like yellow."
New 5mm wetsuit - with blue on it. "Feels like I've got helium in the tank!"
New 5mm wetsuit - with blue on it, in a larger size...
"How come the sawing knife and sheath doesn't have an instruction manual... I don't get where this belt-clip thingy goes, and the knife doesn't come out that easily, you have to really pull... ****, have you got a plaster?"
And when all the kit was together, I got a very competitive price for the package and a trip to the local pool, so that I could try it all out before I travelled.
So it's nice to be able to write a letter applauding great service and first-rate kit at a keen price. I'll be back. I need a bag to put all this shiny new kit in.
HE Sawyer, Upminster, Essex
"New" advice from the Health & Safety Executive regarding the Diving at Work Regulations 1997 is leading to confusion with unpaid professional diving staff.
Until now, many dive shops in the UK have used instructors and divemasters on a voluntary basis, remunerating them through a free air-fill and/or a drink in the bar.
Problems arise in determining whether an individual is deemed to be "at work" or "not at work" while providing services for a diving project.
Legal advice is that consideration should be given to factors other than payment or direct benefits - for example, the possibility of profit or loss - when considering the status of volunteers who dive as part of an "undertaking".
Where a trade, business or profession has as one of its aims providing a diver training or guiding service, it is an "undertaking" within the intent of Section 3 of the Health & Safety at Work 1974.
Is there a difference between schools teaching PADI courses where "no staff means no training courses", and BSAC schools? Will PADI professionals have to abide by the regulations while BSAC colleagues do not, as they operate as clubs and not commercial ventures?
In the UK, many instructors and divemasters provide services on a voluntary basis, holding full-time jobs while "working"" at a dive shop one evening a week. Regulations require them to have professional liability insurance, an HSE-approved medical (£120 a year), be in renewed professional status with their training organisation and, if working with under-18s, pay for a criminal records check and associated courses.
Who finances these additional costs - the individual, the dive shop or the student?
Will all instructors/divemasters have to become truly professional? And will any remuneration need to be declared on a tax return? A free air-fill for £3.60 may be equal to £1.20 an hour for three hours' work - well below the minimum wage!
Andy, UK
I read the Medical Q&A item Allergic To Neoprene (December 2004) and thought you may be interested in how I coped with it. I too did my Open Water course last January after a pool try-dive. As I am 6ft 7in tall the club had no suit to fit me, so I bought one.
I had it on in the shop for up to 10 minutes before deciding to buy it. By the next day, I had had a massive reaction. Every seam of the suit had been drawn out on my body in huge welts and the skin between was bright red. I also felt sick and feverish. I was treated with steroids, creams and so on, and it died down after some weeks, but it was a horrible experience.
I am in the Army, serving in Belgium, and dive mainly in local inland waters. I was sent to a local dermatologist, who did the patch test Dr Sibley-Calder recommended.
Some irritation was caused by the neoprene but that was only a contributory factor - the main problem was the glue used to stick the suit together. It is a type also used in watch straps and shoes.
The reaction had occurred because I had sweated in the warm shop, causing the glue to dissolve slightly. Waiting to enter the water on a hot day can have the same effect, so suiting up and getting into the water needs good co-ordination, especially on boats.
Suit selection can help. Some suits come with special heat-reflecting linings, which are great in the water but can still cause problems before entry. Getting a suit with a fleece-type lining really helps, but the best thing I have found is a cotton lining of some kind,
Wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt and long johns may look a bit naff but it's less expensive than the drysuit option. I have learned to live with it successfully and it hardly bothers me.
Rich Blandford, Belgium
I found Monty Halls' article about Utopia Island very disappointing (Probably The Best Dive Centre In The World, December 2004). Mr Halls has a very old-fashioned view of the world.
Apparently the only woman there is a bit of eye candy who holds out the possibility of an illicit shag (or at least a bit of a sly lech). Every member of staff described in the article was male. It's funny, because I've heard a rumour that these days there are a few women who are dive guides, instructors, divemasters, chalet workers, bar staff, deck hands, boat skippers...
It might not be diving as Mr Halls wishes it to be in his Utopia, but by all accounts it's the way of the world these days!
Alan Barnard, London
Comment: Where did it say that the buddy was a woman - or, indeed, that the subject of the article was a man?
Referring to the article Dead Calm (September 2004), I would question whether yellow is the easiest colour to spot from a surface craft, although I concede that from aircraft this is the case.
I have been a ship's master for almost 40 years, working on ships supporting the North Sea oil and gas industry. My duties include search and rescue of survivors in the event of evacuation from the installations, and we take part in performance trials for the charterers.
This generally involves deploying in the water 20 mannequins, normally bright luminous yellow, and the support vessel being dispatched to search for and rescue the survivors.
We did one such drill on a bright afternoon with the sun low on the horizon, light winds and a groundswell of about 1.5m. The height of eye on the ship I was on was 10m, somewhat higher than the average dive-boat, and a number of look-outs were deployed on the bridge.
The glare on the water's surface was fierce, and with the mannequins' colour it was extremely difficult to sight the casualties, even though many were clumped together. One was never found.
Fishermen often use luminous pink, red or orange buoys to mark static fishing gear. Even with a lot of glare, these colours can be seen from a considerable distance in good visibility.
A road accident that occurred one winter in our area also has a bearing. It was about 8.30am, the road was damp and the rising sun glaring on its surface.
As a fish van approached a pelican crossing, a lollipop lady wearing a "high-viz" luminous yellow coat stepped out to escort some children across the road. The driver collided with her and she subsequently died.
He was charged with causing death by dangerous driving but acquitted at trial when the police confirmed that his speed was below the mandatory 30mph, and the jury accepted that the colour of her coat in those road conditions had made it very difficult for him to see her.
As a result, all crossing attendants in the area now wear two-tone bright yellow and orange coats.
Peter Marshall, Cleethorpes, Lincs
Comment: Diver bases its advice on the use of yellow on research carried out for the Health & Safety Executive by Heriot-Watt University. You can read a summary by visiting www.divernet.com/safety/location0200.htm
After reading your article The Family That Dives Together (November 2004) I thought I would share our experience.
It's a dive centre's nightmare - a diver who has dived with the centre for more than eight years suddenly decides to bring the family. His partner has not dived for 10 years and needs some serious convincing to go under water again.
The 13-year-old is a Junior Open Water Diver, trained in the UK and desperate to be able to see past her fin-tips. The 11-year-old wants to get his qualification and is dyslexic. And the spare adult who usually accompanies the first diver on holiday is really chuffed at the prospect of being roped into babysitting under water.
Experiences: coming round a corner to be met by the 11-year-old and instructor swimming with a turtle. Him getting his certificate at 12m and posters all over the dive club announcing to the world that he is now a Junior OWD.
Finding out that diving with your partner is fine, especially when you're buddied with someone at 18m and they're at 25m-plus with theirs.
Being told that one child will not be coming on the boat dives if Mum doesn't pull herself together and take that ****** mask off in the skills review - amazing what you'll do for the children!
Doing my first cave and wreck - even better, a wreck at 12m, so the children could come too, and on a dive their father had never done (that kept him quiet).
The face of the 13-year-old on coming out of the water after seeing an eagle ray, feather-tailed sting ray, conger eel, boxfish...
I recommend shelling out for a divemaster for the kids, because you can concentrate on sorting yourself out, and because teenage children do not suddenly decide to listen to their parents just because they're under water.
Also, if you're a nervous adult, you can latch onto the divemaster while pretending to be keeping an eye on the children, and you all get to go boat-diving.
This amazing place was the Oonas dive centre in Sharm el Sheikh. It achieved what we thought was impossible - and made it look easy.
Cate Langley
The arch at Elphinstone, which my buddy and I dived last October, presents a mystery. Perhaps my opinion was coloured by what I had heard before, but the whole structure looked man-made - not just the sarcophagus.
The arch itself looked to be a perfectly symmetrical semi-circular structure. Its underside was uniform throughout, with no jagged boulders hanging down.
Perfectly centred under the arch were what appeared to be two sarcophagi. One was slightly worn but the other appeared to be a perfectly formed block of stone, which really did look like a sarcophagus. It's hard to believe that this all occurred naturally.
I was only under the arch for a couple of minutes and had to memorise everything, but surely there has been some detailed examination of the arch and blocks?
I appreciate that ancient Egyptians had no diving equipment and weren't around 12,000 years ago when the area was above water. But wouldn't it be a mystery if detailed measurements were to point towards a man-made structure with two sarcophagi where they should not be?
David Ireland, Exeter
I read Gavin Parson's article about cuttlefish (Cephalopods Looking For Luuuurve, November 2004) with interest. I had the pleasure of watching two cuttlefish changing colours to get the attention of a female while diving in Sulawesi.
I saw the female going from a sandy area, over yellow coral and then over green stones, and it always took on exactly the same colour as what was below in less than a second. Can anyone explain to me exactly how it does this?
Jana A Czipin, Dahab
It was good to see the news item reporting the court victory of divers at Protea Banks over Denise Milton, owner of Sensational Charters (Shark Protesters Vindicated in South Africa, October). Trevor Krull pioneered diving with sharks on Protea Banks. His enthusiasm is infectious and his knowledge second to none, and I strongly advise any shark-lovers to make the trip to Shelly Beach in KwaZulu Natal to dive with Trevor and his crew.
He has worked tirelessly to protect sharks on Protea, and is starting to gain small but significant victories. It is now forbidden to land sharks at Shelly Beach, and the recent court ruling is a blow to the local shark-fishing community (see www.africanodyssea.co.za/JAWG .htm for disturbing pictures and footage).
Trevor recently set up the Joint Awareness Group for Shark Conservation (JAWG) and it is going public under the name Sharklife. Initial efforts will concentrate on shark protection in KwaZulu Natal, but the aim is to become a major player in African shark conservation. I urge you all to visit www.sharklife.co.za and support the cause.
Anyone who has dived with the sharks on Protea knows what an amazing experience it is, and I hope divers can enjoy that experience for years to come.
Samuel Kemp, London
I would like to apologise to those skippers I seem to have annoyed with my letter Skippers Wise Up! (October 2004). It was never my intention to annoy you, but to bring the importance of having oxygen available into the light - and in this respect it has worked, because the subject has been discussed in the past three issues.
Yes, I should have known that the HSE is not responsible for oxygen on boats, sorry for that.
I know that most charter boats carry O2, but some in lesser-known areas don't, and that could be relevant to a pair of divers who decide that they want to go diving on the spur of the moment with a charter boat that has space.
They should check that the boat has O2 and/or they should take their own set.
John Rapley, Kingston & Elmbridge BSAC
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