Dive for Earth Day events in SoCal and globally

This month, as we head toward Earth Day on Apr. 22, you’ll get a jolly green earful of great festivals and events where you can celebrate our planet upon terra firma. But since over 70% of the Earth’s surface consists of water, it’d make sense to get a little wet for the occasion, don’t you think?

That’s where Dive for Earth Day comes in. Initiated by environmental nonprofit Project AWARE Foundation in 2000, the campaign has prompted thousands of divers in over 115 countries to volunteer and raise awareness about our fragile aquatic environments. Projects on and surrounding Earth Day largely consist of beach and underwater cleanups as well as educational events.

Last year, in Katowice, Poland, 280 volunteers collected 1,500 bags of trash from shores and sea. On the Isle of Wight in the UK, a “fancy dress beach cleanup” attracted the likes of a James Bond look-a-like and others festively collecting tar, cans, bottles and other rubbish. On Maui, Hawaii, divers collected 500 pounds of garbage and recycled some of it, including fishing lines and weights that were cleaned and got a chance at new life via a local shop, according to the Project AWARE website...[LATimes]

Acentech Awarded U.S. Navy Contract

Acentech Inc., a nationally recognized multi-disciplinary acoustics, audiovisual systems design, and vibration consulting firm, announced that it has been awarded the first part of a multi-year contract by the United States Navy, Office of Naval Research (ONR), to develop underwater communications and hearing protection technologies. Acentech’s RH Lyon Division, one of the most experienced groups of product noise and product sound quality specialists in the United States, was awarded the pro ject through the Government’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program.

The goals of this project are to improve communications between divers and the dive ship or barge, and to pro tect the hearing of military and commercial divers working in noisy environments, such as underwater salvage and hull cleaning. The primary products of the contract will be a communications earphone and a noise canceling headband device for SCUBA divers, as well as noise canceling technology to be incorporated into communica tions devices in dive helmets. The headband device will be an active cancellation system for reducing skull vibration, which is an important pathway to a diver’s eardrum for loud underwater sounds when a helmet is not in use (as in SCUBA).

Naval divers, especially those who work near large ships or on underwater construction or demoli tion projects, are often exposed to extremely loud sounds for prolonged periods of time, putting them at risk of long-term hearing loss. The U.S. government spends $1.5 billion a year to take care of military personnel with hearing damage due to their military service. The U.S. Navy, Office of Naval Research has established a major program to address hearing loss, from finding ways of quieting the working environment to funding medical research to study how to restore the hearing of people who have gone deaf...[BostonSF.com]

Diving in Iraq

A Portland, Ore. aquatic expert is finishing up an adventurous deployment to Iraq this month, after volunteering to put her skills to work in the country's massive reconstruction effort.

"You never know where a job is going to take you," said Susan Fox, a construction representative in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Gulf Region Division. "I started out as a jet engine mechanic in the Air Force and then I worked for a company that made precision aircraft parts. I was injured on the job and was retrained in mechanical engineering technology. So that was just stepping stones all the way. Here I am now in Iraq doing quality assurance, and I had the opportunity to put together a dive operation, to assist the Iraqi people with irrigation and power generation."

Fox will go from memories of July heat in Al Asad, Iraq, to possibly submerging into the cool springtime temperatures of the Columbia River in Oregon. Her full-time occupation is with USACE's Portland District in the Pacific Northwest where she is deputy diving coordinator. Portland District operates several dams and there is plenty of demand for a diver to go into the water for inspections or construction work.

Fox first took the plunge for pure recreation, but it grew into a professional passion as well, and her current job in Portland included an extensive diving course in Key West, Fla. taught by prior-military experts.

"I help manage the dive program, enforce safety regulations, review dive plans and credentials," Fox said.

Because of her experience, USACE tapped her to put together a dive mission at Iraq's Haditha Dam in November 2008...[OregonLive]

Water work

People might say that Ryan Bell picked a really strange time to take a dip in the Des Moines River.

With mounds of snow lining the riverbanks and the water temperature right at the freezing mark, Thursday seemed like a bad day to go swimming. The cold, clear water was perfect, however, for getting a look at what's below the surface.

So Bell, a licensed structural engineer and commercial diver, donned about 100 pounds of gear and dropped into the ice-clogged river to check out the Fort Dodge Hydroelectric Dam.

He spent several hours Wednesday and Thursday underwater near the dam. On Thursday morning, he slid down the dam's spillway in a rope harness to reach part of the structure's downstream side.

Bell's job was to collect information on the condition of the dam that city officials will use when they eventually decide what to do with it. About two hours worth of video was recorded with a camera mounted on his diving helmet. He also took some photos with an underwater camera...[TheMessenger]

Meet Your Neighbor: Diving Deep

“I’m a diver. I do underwater construction.”

As simple as it sounds to say, it can be one of the most amazing, scary and thrilling occupations all rolled into one. For one Stuttgart resident it’s what has fulfilled his expectations in a job. Brent Saranie, who grew up in Stuttgart, has now returned to start a family, but what he does when he is away is what makes one part of his life so interesting — what he does for a living. He has worked on a multitude of things — all underwater — bridges, pipelines, nuclear plants, dams, drinking water intakes, boats, ships, salvage, steel and paper mills.

Saranie started his underwater career eight years ago when he decided to go to school for the occupation. “I used to mortgage houses — went to college — mortgaged houses,” he explained. “I wanted to go find a way to make a living and see a little bit of the planet — see different things. And I wanted to come back one day and be able to tell my kids about it and go ‘that’s what I did.’ I scuba dove. I was spear fishing up in Hot Springs all the time and just picked up the phone book one day and asked how you get hired. They told me I had to go to school.

So Saranie did just that. He went to Houston and started at Ocean Corporation. It took 900 hours. They trained four days a week 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. for seven months...[StuttgartDailyLeader]