The Presidents Corner by Mike Cassetta

Transcription

1 FAIRFIELD COUNTY DIVING ASSOCIATION October 2017 Volume 24 Issue 10 Inside this Issue The Presidents Corner by Mike Cassetta page 1 FCDA Donor I page 2 New FCDA Members page 2 September Meeting DAN Raffle Winners page 3 FCDA Member Ads page 3 Events of Interest page 4 When Is It Safe To Fly? pages 5, 6 FCDA Donor II page 6 What is the Difference Between DSLR and Compact Cameras for Underwater Photography? page 7 Divers Report Key Largo Reefs, Wrecks mostly Intact page 8 Back by Popular Demand! FCDA Tee Shirts and Hoodies! pages Next FCDA Meeting page 11 The Presidents Corner by Mike Cassetta Fall is upon us, the leaves are changing colors and the air is getting a little bit cooler. Fortunately, water temperatures are still comfortable in the Northeast in October/November and can bring some the best diving of the year. Mel, Matt & myself recently went on a dive charter with Capt Noel. Water in The Sound was a balmy 75 with good visibility and plenty of sea life. Additional dives that have proven to be excellent this time of year include Fort Weatherill (RI) & The Old Ponquogue Bridge (NY). A big thanks to Mike Gromotsky for being our featured guest at the September meeting. After a premeeting barbecue, including a fish fry thanks to Jeff Susa, we all enjoyed Mike's presentation on Northeast Wreck Diving. Mike's talk included many interesting artifacts from the U 853 and The Grecian. Dr. David Charash will be our featured presenter on October 27th. His presentation The Aging Diver will focus on the medical aspects of diving in the aging population. So take your Geritol, finish your early bird special and come on down for what will be an important & interesting evening. BTW: admission is free with your AARP card. Our November meeting is a week or earlier than usual because of Thanksgiving and will be on Friday, November 17th. We will have a compilation presentation by several members of FCDA showing off video and photos from recent wildlife encounters off the Northeast Coast including sharks, seals & dolphins. Our annual FCDA Holiday Gathering will be Friday, December 1st. We will do as we have done the past few years, a potluck gathering at the cottage. More details to follow. Happy Halloween Everybody... Mike

2 FCDA Donor Page 2 The business listed on this page has donated dive gear and dive services to help support the Fairfield County Diving Association. New FCDA Members Welcome aboard to the following individual who has recently become a new member of the Fairfield County Diving Association: No new members this month! Feel free to bring a new dive buddy or one you haven t been diving with for a long time! All are welcome!

3 September Meeting DAN Raffle Winners Page 3 After a hearing a great presentation by Mike Gromotsky, the club held its monthly raffle to support our DAN Sponsorship. Winners were: Sharkskin Lycra Socks donated by New England Dive Center - Mike McElroy; XSSxuba Console Cover donated by New England Dive Center - Mike Cassetta; Stroble Light donated by New England Dive Center - Mike McElroy; Scubapro Headband donated by New England Dive Center - Bob Sawczuk; Gear Keeper Clips donated by New England Dive Center - Ken Easley; BC Life donated by New England Dive Center - Bob Sawczuk and a Scubapro Dive Mask donated by Orbit Marine Dive Center -- Bob Sawczuk. Thanks to New England Dive Center and Orbit Marine Dive Center for donating tonight s raffle prizes for our DAN raffle. Remember, you can't win if you don't buy tickets and you can't buy tickets if you don't get up and come out to FCDA events and meetings! FCDA Member Ads Hey - have you got a non retail-diving business that you d like to share with fellow members of FCDA? Get your business card size ad in the FCDA monthly newsletter Surface Interval for only $50.00 for one year. Give your business a boost and help support the production of our monthly newsletters. For more information, write to FCDA, P.O. Box 3005, Fairfield, CT or to fcda@aol.com.

4 Page 4 Events of Interest to FCDA Members Friday, October 27, 2017 October Meeting 8:00 PM David Charash MD The Aging Diver Friday, November 17, November Meeting 8:00 PM (Moved due to Thanksgiving) FCDA Members Present Wildlife Encounters off of New England Sharks, Seals and Dolphins with Matt Rownin, Mike Cassetta, Mel Rich, Michelle Lapin, Lisa Jarosik Friday, December 1, :00 PM Annual FCDA Holiday Party

5 Page 5 When Is It Safe to Fly After Scuba Diving? By Sport Diver Editors P.O. Box 3005, Fairfield, CT Internet mail: fcda@aol.com Presidents 2017 Board Matt Rownin & Mike Cassetta Vice-President Mark Shannon Secretary Treasurer Lisa Jarosik Paul J. Gacek To avoid altitude-induced DCS, how long should you wait to fly after scuba diving 12 hours? 24 hours? The guidelines may surprise you. So What s the Big Deal About Flying After Diving? In a word, the deal is DCS. You already know that your body must have adequate time during an ascent to off-gas excess nitrogen or you can form bubbles in your bloodstream, possibly leading to DCS. Same for an ascent in an airplane to a lesser atmosphere of pressure-excess nitrogen can bubble out if there s too much of it still left. But Aren t Airplane Cabins Pressurized? Yes, they are, but only to the equivalent of approximately 8,000 feet. That s still a pressure decrease from sea level of 25 percent. If your body is already off-gassing at sea level as fast as it can, this sudden decrease in pressure could be enough to trigger symptoms of DCS. So How Long Should I Wait Before Flying? In 2002, Divers Alert Network and the Hyperbaric Medical Society held a workshop to review data on post-dive flights. The recommendations are below: DIVE PROFILE Single No-Deco Dive Multiple Dives in a Day Multiple Days of Diving Decompression Diving MIN. TIME BE- FORE FLIGHT 12+ Hours 18+ Hours 18+ Hours more than 24 Hours Time for the bad news: Having a zero percent risk of DCS is possible only if you don t dive. The good news: Past analyses of accident data do provide some guidelines that divers can use to make a reasonable decision. If you ve only done one dive a day for several days during your vacation, a wait of 18 hours is probably sufficient. However, the more multiple dive days you ve had, and especially if you ve done required decompression diving, the longer past 18 hours you should wait. Most researchers believe that a 24-hour surface interval is sufficient to prevent most incidences of flying-induced DCS. Won t My Dive Computer Tell Me When It s Safe To Fly? Maybe, maybe not. Dive computers can be useful tools when dealing with flying after diving, but most are not. Different computers have two ways of dealing with flight: Arbitrary countdowns of 12 or 24 hours. These are simply clocks reminding you of the 12- or 24-hour rules; they perform no calculations. Calculation to desaturation. These computers actually calculate the time to total desaturation and use that as the time to fly. Very conservative, but more realistic than the arbitrary 12 to 24 hour timekeepers. Most dive computer manufacturers have taken the easy, less effective way out by simply using the arbitrary countdown as the time to fly. It seems amazing with all the calculations that dive computers can do under water, (Continued on page 6)

6 Page 6 When Is It Safe to Fly After Scuba Diving? (continued) FCDA Donor The business listed on this page has donated dive gear and dive services to help support the Fairfield County Diving Association. (Continued from page 5) that all they can do on the surface is count minutes. Whatever data is provided by a dive computer, that data needs to be read, understood and acted on by the user. You should understand that dive computers will not violate or make any adjustments for not following their time-to-fly readings. Can I Dive After I Fly? How soon after flying into a tropical locale can you safely get in the water? Nitrogen is not the issue here. The question concerns the ways that the aircraft environment affects divers. After several hours of breathing dry, recycled air with a low oxygen content, most of us are dehydrated, tired and irritable. Diving under these conditions predisposes a diver to DCS and to making mistakes. It is up to you to decide when you re sufficiently recovered from your trip to dive safely. Divers need to consider fatigue, dehydration and physical fitness, as well as the type of diving planned when making this decision. The urge to get into the water as soon as possible is understandable, but it s better to wait and dive safely than to take unnecessary risks and endanger your health and vacation. What is the Difference Between DSLR and Compact Cameras for Underwater Photography? By Cathy Evans After watching Christoph Weber s video 3 weeks of diving in North Sulawesi at Bunaken and Lembeh and finding out it was shot on a compact camera, we wanted to know more about why he chooses to use compact cameras for underwater photography What are the basic differences between DSLR and compact cameras for underwater photography? In my opinion the following differences between compact systems and DSLR / mirrorless systems are the most important ones: Size & Weight Compact cameras are small, they can fit into the pocket of your trousers, and underwater housings for them are mostly very small too. They also have a fixed lens integrated into the body, which means you will (Continued on page 7)

7 Page 7 What is the Difference Between DSLR and Compact Cameras for Underwater Photography? By Cathy Evans (Continued from page 6) have less equipment to carry around with you. Compared to a DSLR system they re also far smaller and easier to handle and setup underwater. Price A DSLR or mirrorless setup will cost you several times as much as a compact setup. Flexibility Underwater With compact systems you can usually easily add or remove wet lenses underwater during a dive, as opposed to DSLR s where you are pretty much stuck with your lens choice you made before the dive. Image Quality This is the area where DSLR and mirrorless systems shine (there is a reason why there are rather expensive!). But, while you never will reach quite the quality and capabilities of a DSLR with a compact, modern compact cameras have caught up quite a bit in recent years on things like image quality, autofocus, low light performance, manual options, and more. Why have you decided to shoot on a compact camera? For me the pros of a compact outweigh the cons, mostly due to the fact that nowadays modern compact cameras perform quite well when it comes to image quality. And at the end of the day the technical capabilities of your camera play only a small part in creating good underwater footage, so on a non-professional level a good compact camera is a very good choice in my opinion. How do you go about choosing a compact camera? I would recommend to look out for the following: Availability of Underwater Housings Plastic housings are cheap and ok for the start. Aluminium housings are far more robust and less prone to problems, so worth the extra cash if you can afford it. M a n u a l M o d e F a s t A u t o f o c u s Ability to Shoot in RAW (for photography) 4k Video (for videography, optional) It s a good idea to do some research on the web regarding the underwater capabilities of a camera you re looking at. On the upper end I can recommend the Sony RX100 series and the Canon G7X series, but for a beginner cheaper models will do fine for a start as well. What about wetlenses how do these affect compact camera photography? Wet lenses are a great optional addition for your compact camera with its fixed lens. You can attach and remove them in the water during the dive, depending on what you want to shoot. So for example, if you want to take a picture of a really small nudibranch, you can just attach a macro wet lens to your housing and get a lot closer to the nudi with your camera still being able to focus, resulting in a larger image of the nudi. The same goes for the other end of the spectrum as well; if during the dive a whale shark swims by, or you want to capture the reef with big schools of fish, just put a wide angle lens on! Wet lenses really are optional, as the lens of your compact camera will have you covered for most normal situations. But if you want to take the next step and capture footage of really small or really big subjects, they are a great (and usually not too expensive) addition to your setup.

8 Page 8 Divers Report Key Largo Reefs, Wrecks Mostly Intact BY KEVIN WADLOW A diver with Rainbow Reef Dive Center inspects an anchor uncovered when Hurricane Irma shifted sands near the Benwood shipwreck off Key Largo. Shayna Cohen Rainbow Reef Dive Center Divers making survey inspections of Key Largo s coral reefs and shipwrecks soon after Hurricane Irma came back smiling. The reefs look spectacular, compared to what we thought they would look like, said Billy Wise, general manager for Rainbow Reef Dive Center in Key Largo. We re super optimistic about the reefs, Wise said. We had seven boats out Saturday. Everybody I talked to at the dock was positive and said everything looks great. About two dozen divers from Rainbow Reef checked corals at Molasses Reef, Grecian Rocks, the Christ of the Abyss statue and French Reef. Some of the reefs have gotten deeper because sand moved, Wise said. It s a little like diving a new site. I was expecting to see more dead sea fans, but it seems like most of them came through OK. Near the World War II wreck of the freighter Benwood, the storm uncovered an anchor that had been buried in sand for decades. That was an incredible find, Wise said. It s as cool looking as anything. On the shipwreck reef Duane, a retired U.S. Coast Guard cutter, a top section of a smokestack was removed by the hurricane. It kind of make it more interesting, Wise said. Other shipwrecks, including the big Spiegel Grove wreck that was rolled upright by a weaker storm, appear to be in tact. All in all, we re ready and happy to be letting visitors come back in, Wise said. We want to let people know that not everything is negative. We have a great staff of 70 and we want to keep them here and working, he said. People are going to be curious about what s happening on the reef, and that will help rebuild the Keys economy. Rainbow Reef and other Upper Keys shops helped remove some debris from canals and the ocean bottom. We found a refrigerator floating by about a mile offshore, Wise said. Reports from dive shops in the Middle and Lower Keys, more hard-hit by Irma, were pending. Cece Roycraft of Dive Key West said many dive operators have been focused on repairs before focusing on booking trips. It will be a week or so before we take customers out, Roycraft said. Our boat is fine, but the store had some damage. Hurricane Wilma was far worse for us, though. Staff with the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary is assessing the impact of Hurricane Irma to our underwater environment, Superintendent Sarah Fangman said in a statement. The Category 4 storm caused serious damage on land and, undoubtedly, created changes in the waters surrounding the Florida Keys... We urge caution for those going on and in the water. Many waterways are littered with sunken boats and other debris.

9 Back by Popular Demand! FCDA Tee Shirts and Hoodies! Page 9 Get your FCDA Tee Shirts and Hoodies with a high quality embroidered FCDA logo on the front and an embroidered dive flag on the back. Available in sizes from Small to 3XL. Gildan Heavy Cotton T-Shirt The Endurance Poly Hoodie 100% polyester performance fleece - Quarter zip pullover for easy on and off - Mesh lined hood and front pockets - Rib knit hem and cuffs / Draw string in hood- Grey/Black or Grey/Red Adult Sizes SM - 3XL $35.00 Graphite grey shown - Cotton/Polyester blend - Adult Sizes SM - 3XL $25.00 Also available with long sleeves (not shown) $30.00 Both available in choice of ten colors Hoodie also available in Grey with Red Insets. High quality embroidered FCDA logo on the front and an embroidered dive flag logo on the back. Available Colors for Tee Shirts and Long Sleeve Shirts

10 Page 10 FCDA Shirt/Hoodie Order Form Please note that all items are custom made and must be prepaid. Items will be ordered as soon as we have the minimum quantity for an order and will generally be available at the next scheduled meeting. Name FCDA Tee Shirt with Logo and Dive Flag No. Size $25.00 = $ No. Size $25.00 = $ FCDA Long Sleeve Shirt with Logo and Dive Flag No. Size $30.00 = $ No. Size $30.00 = $ FCDA Hoodie with Logo and Dive Flag No. Size Black $35.00 = $ or No. Size Red $35.00 = $ No. Size Black $35.00 = $ or No. Size Red $35.00 = $ Make your check payable to FCDA and mail to: TOTAL $ FCDA, P.O. Box 3005, Fairfield, CT 06824

11 Page 11 Next FCDA Meeting Friday - October 27, :00 PM US Coast Guard Auxiliary Cottage - South Benson Marina, Fairfield, CT "The Aging Diver" a presentation by David Charash, MD Dr. Charash will discuss an approach to understanding how we define the aging diver. A review of the many issues that define medical fitness to dive as we age will also be addressed. Common medical conditions will be discussed as well as the issue of medications in diving.