PADI Women’s Dive day 16 July 2016

Posted on June 30, 2016 by Asia Divers

Join divers around the globe for the second annual PADI Women’s Dive Day.

The inaugural 2015 PADI Women’s Dive Day event was a historic day for diving. In just its first year, PADI Women’s Dive Day featured events across 65 countries and all seven continents. Men and women from Alaska to Argentina, France to the Philippines enjoyed a day of diving together to celebrate the contributions of women to the sport. While the focus is on women, all are encouraged to get involved. It’s a great opportunity to get the women, friends, and family members in your life together for a fun day of diving! Alli will be around this weekend to encourage all you ladies to get diving!

Project AWARE – Dive Against Debris at Asia Divers

Posted on June 30, 2016 by Asia Divers

Great fun we had on the special event dive: a Project AWARE – Dive Against Debris !!
14 divers descended at the Sabang Wrecks on a ‘treasure hunt’ for debris items and were accompanied by a large green turtle, beautiful frogfish, juvenile crocodile fish, scorpion fish, a school of batfishes, rabbit fish, and lots of other reef fishes.
A staggering 32.6kg of debris was collected on this dive, while participants learned to identify what to pick up, what to leave on the bottom and what to appreciate even more. We collected a relatively new tire, rescued reefs and turtles from fishing lines, food wrappers, and little plastic fragments that don’t biodegrade… even a black bikini top was recovered. All items were counted and reported to Project AWARE where the data are used as statistical evidence for policy development and implementation.
We finished the dive on a floating bar for some celebratory ‘orange juice’ 🙂 and exchanged stories from the event underwater.

It was a lot of fun to have a great dive and at the same time contribute to the ocean health.
Thanks to all who joined the event… Beth, Steve, Sue, Hanno, Amit, Felicity, Rob, Damien, Khalia, Ross, Allison, Pete, Matt, and especially thanks to Sabine Henkel for organizing this and to Beth Watson for taking amazing pictures during our dive and Rob as our wonderful videographer. Enjoy the pictures…

For those interested, the report can be found here:
http://www.projectaware.org/debris-survey/ads142-sabang-bay-puerto-galera

Sea Base Life

Posted on June 23, 2016 by Asia Divers

This blog is about interesting sea life that has been sent to us by SeaLifeBase. The one is about “Ocean Giants: colossal squid”.

Who here have watched the movie “Clash of the Titans”? Remember the scene when Zeus shouted “Release the Kraken!” to his men? Kraken actually refers to a squid-like sea monster and among the family of squids, there are two known largest species. First is the heaviest – the colossal squid Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni commonly found in the Antartic. To read more, please see: http://sealifebaseproject.blogspot.com/2015/05/ocean-giants-colossal-squid.html
You can become a SeaLifeBase collaborator. WHAT is a “SeaLifeBase collaborator,” and WHO can be one? In a nutshell, SeaLifeBase collaborators are the people who help us by: a) sending or alerting us to references and photos, which we have not yet used; b) assembling data from published sources using a preformatted template; and/or c) verifying or correcting data that we have extracted and incorporated into the information system. Some of them are — but not limited to — biologists, taxonomists, scientists, and other experts. Some are aquarists, photographers, businessmen, and marine-life enthusiasts. Truly, we welcome contributions from anybody who has a passion for marine life.

http://sealifebaseproject.blogspot.com/p/collaboration.html

Tubbataha 2016

Posted on June 23, 2016 by Asia Divers

We’re back from an amazing transition trip from Tubbataha back to Batangas. Asia Divers group of 19 folks including Tommy and Alli we’re on the Discovery Palawan boat from June 10-17 with no internet, no Facebook and no cell phone…ahhhhhhh, it was wonderful! We spent four days in beautiful Tubbataha, then a quick stop at Kawayan and over to Apo Reef. Tubbataha did not disappoint us at all with the spectacular walls, white-tip and grey reef sharks, many turtles, gorgeous seafans, schools of jacks, snappers and millions of colorful fishes. Highlights also included hammerhead, marble rays and marlin…but the big icing on the cake was the time spent on two back-to-back dives with a lovely whale shark! The crew on the boat was top rate and we all seemed to have put on weight with the never-ending wonderful dishes of food. Great to have done this trip with you…Sue Goodman, Frank Craven, Bill MacLennan, Glenn and Shelia Thibodeaux, Beth and Steve Watson, Bob and Brigitte Swanson, Ike Subardiaga, Gernie Meliza, Hamish Low, Eve Nightingale, Dave Collar, Rebecca Lin, Iggy Javellana, and Gunnar Sekander.

Sue Goodman got a great shot of Beth Watson taking a photo of a whale shark.

The very happy group showing the whale shark sign

Divemaster in training at Asia Divers

Posted on June 23, 2016 by Asia Divers

Ross McLeod is moving up that PADI ladder. He has finished Enriched Air, EFR and Rescue and now at the beginning of the Divemaster course. You’ll be seeing lots more of Ross over the next while! The PADI Divemaster course is the first professional level within the PADI System of diver education and allows you to work as a training assistant on PADI courses and programs, supervise certified divers during pleasure diving experiences, and conduct some PADI programs independently. Becoming a PADI Divemaster consists of the following segments: knowledge development, practical application and the Divemaster final exam. We’re got the perfect location for you to learn at with a very experienced instructor team.