There are a couple of local articles that are worth mentioning from over the weekend.

The first one is about a project by the Ocean Defenders Alliance to remove a huge 9,000 pound fishing net that had wrapped around the sunken fishing trawler Infidel, off of Catalina Island.

The wreck rests on the ocean bottom at 150 feet and the net, which is 40 feet high and several hundred feet long, has become a death trap for creatures such as dolphins, sea lions, sharks, seals and fish.

I have dove with some of the divers involved in this group.

This is a dangerous project due to the depth and hazards.

Towards the end of the article, it states, “The limit for normal scuba diving is 120 feet beneath the surface… the divers relied on tanks filled with a special nitrous oxide mixture that enabled them to spend more time at the bottom.”

In case you aren’t aware, nitrous oxide is an anesthetic – it’s laughing gas!

So, spending “more time at the bottom” on a “nitrous oxide mixture” is an eternity!

Maybe the reporter mistook “Nitrox” for “nitrous oxide?”

However, Nitrox only allows you to stay under longer, not deeper;  so, I am speculating that they may have used heliox or trimix.

The complete article can be found here: Divers Cut Away At Net That Has Been Killing Marine Life

Secondly – and I’m even surprised that it was offered to begin with – Carl Robbins and other SCUBA divers helped removed shark fin soup from the Barona Resort Chinese New Year celebration menu.

Shark fin soup is a controversial Asian “delicacy” that relies on the fins of sharks.

Some sharks are captured, hauled onto the deck and have their top fin sliced off before being released in a mutilated state back into the sea; this practice is being blamed for a decrease in shark populations around the world.

After an email campaign, the Barona Resort quickly, and apologetically, took shark fin soup off of the menu; I don’t think it’s a loss to any of the guests as I hear shark fin soups tastes like shit anyways.

The complete article can be found here: Scuba Diver Helps Get Shark Fin Soup Off Menu

Logged SCUBA Dive #328

Terranea Resort, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA

Dove with Not So New Chris and Chris From Michigan

In With: 3200 psi
Out With: 600 psi
Max depth: 45 feet
Waves: Minor swells, but pretty darn flat
Visibility: 10 feet+
Temperature: 55 degrees
Total Bottom Time: About 60 minutes

Still a little hung over from attending the Monster Truck event at Anaheim Stadium last night,  I headed to Old Marineland for my traditional Sunday morning dive.

Arriving fashionably late,  I geared up and joined Not So New Chris and Chris From Michigan on a dive to 120 reef.

A lot of the regulars were out of town, on boats, or chained to their wives.

Some how, some way, the nice, flat and fairly sandy portions of the cove are now rock piles.

The coast changes every time there’s a storm, but there hasn’t been one for weeks.

Chris and Chris off of Terranea Resort.

Vis was crystal clear in the cove, but dropped to 10 feet at 120 reef.

A Sunstar crawls along the sand, looking for a home.

We followed not so new Chris on his photo hunt.

A Lingcod?

Yeah, I think so.

A starfish assaults a group of sea urchins.

A Green anemone next to a sea urchin.

Every time I dive here, I always run across a reef formation that I’ve never seen before.

We ran across the small arch.

Heading back in, we lost New So New Chris, but he surfaced shortly after we did.

Even though the beach is a lot rockier than previously, we all made uneventful exits.

After all the walking I did yesterday, I fell behind in the walk up.

The debriefing crew was light today.