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SCUBA News 92~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Happy New Year! I hope you enjoy the newsletter, but should you wish to cancel your subscription you may do so at http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/news.html Contents: __________________________________________________________ What's New at SCUBA Travel? We've opened a new room in our photo gallery dedicated to photographs taken in the Maldives. We've plenty of photos to put in here so will be updating it each week. Competition to win Dive Guide and Log Book Following on from last month's competition, Travelling Diver have kindly given us two copies of their latest dive guide - "Marsa Alam Egyptian Red Sea" - each worth £12.50. To win your copy name three of the 16 dives sites included in the Marsa Alam pack (visit http://www.travellingdiver.com/ to find out.) To enter e-mail your answer, name and address to news@scubatravel.co.uk. Closing data is 31 January 2008 __________________________________________________________ Review and Competition: Dive Guide and Logbook of Marsa Alam 
Marsa Alam - Egyptian Red Sea For £12.50 you get a guide-come-logbook for the Red Sea area around Marsa Alam, Egypt. The format is loose sheets designed to fit into a diving logbook binder. The format of this second logbook is the same as the one reviewed in November's SCUBA News. The pack covers 16 sites in the Marsa Alam area, 11 shore dives and 5 off shore reefs which you would need to dive from a boat. The guide is extensive and covers all the sites you are likely to do on a week's holiday to the area and more. It includes Elphinstone reef which in my view is one of the best sites in the Red Sea and one I am particularly familiar with. The coverage of this site confims my belief that these guides are accurate and do detail most of what you will need to know for the dive. The pack contains the dive guides and also 2 spare logbook sheets (4 dives). All the sheets are standard 3-hole diving logbook size and contain a section for collecting dive data, a guide to the site including a 3D colour drawing, a description of the site and marine life. Finally there is a section for you to add your own notes on the dive. The data section is very detailed and covers: the usual dive data on duration time, air consumption, weight as well as gas mix, tank type, visibility, water temp, sea conditions. In my view more than enough information. As I said in the previous review, I like the idea of a combined dive log and guide. Review by Andrew Reay-Robinson About the author Win a copy of Marsa Alam - Egyptian Red Sea If you are not lucky enough to win a copy you can purchase one from http://www.travellingdiver.com/ or Amazon. __________________________________________________________ Diving the Straits Underwater Preserve, Michigan, USA by Jerry Vonderharr It is illegal to remove or disturb artifacts in the Great Lakes of Michigan, which means that small items like cups, tools, silverware and ornaments often remain where they were discovered by the first divers many years before. Diving the Straits Underwater Preserve is not for the "faint of heart" especially if you are wearing a wetsuit (as I was). The temperature drops to 41 degrees F below the thermocline, but the views of well preserved shipwrecks is worth the shivering. My favourite is the Eber Ward, century old wreck in 120 feet of water. This ship was sunk in 1909 after encountering packs of ice on its first journey of the season, leaving holes in the bow large enough to swim through. There are entrances at the stern as well, and once inside you can swim from one end to the other entirely inside on not one but two decks. The upper one is the more interesting, with rows of hand carts towards the bow, and well-preserved loading gear hanging under every cargo hatch. Two large, hinged anchors are still inside the bow, and another rest just below on the lake bottom. One of the strangest items to find was a capstan inside the wreck. The not-to-be-missed items on this wreck include the prop, bathtub, and ultra-rare mushroom anchor which is still in place in the hawse pipe on the port side. Of the 700 or so dives that I've done around the world since 1975, this is my favourite. __________________________________________________________ Diving News From Around the World If you would like to read the diving news as it happens, without waiting for this newsletter, then grab the SCUBA News feed from http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/scuba.xml It's free and automatically updates you with the latest SCUBA news via your web site, e-mail or any news feed reader. 
Thistlegorm re-opens to divers Following an intense operation, conservation work to preserve the wreck of the Thistlegorm has been successful and finished on schedule. Diving boats and operators can now make use of a new mooring system. The Thistlegorm is in the Red Sea and has been voted one of the best dives in the world. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission have recalled Oceanic and AERIS SCUBA Regulator First Stages. Divers should immediately stop using these items and take them to any authorised Oceanic or AERIS dealer for a free replacement part Diving Ecotourism benefits nature and reduces poverty Ecotourism, sometimes criticised as the voyeuristic indulgence of rich first-worlders, really does benefit the environment and the people who live in protected areas. A review of four marine conservation initiatives shows that they have helped reduce poverty and created tourism-based jobs. The report, Nature's Investment Bank, is based on interviews with more than 1000 people in four recently protected marine zones in Fiji, Indonesia, the Philippines and the Solomon Islands. In every case, the conservation schemes had boosted fish catches and helped create new jobs. Red Sea mega-dam would be irresponsible A plan to build a gigantic dam across the mouth of the Red Sea that could generate huge amounts of clean, renewable energy has been condemned by experts who say it would wreak untold ecological ruin. The scheme would literally part the Red Sea with a massive wall more than 150 metres high, one kilometre thick and 100 km long, stretching between Yemen in the north and either Eritrea or Djibouti in the south. UAE Underwater Explorer: 65 Spectacular Dives An updated guide to diving the United Arab Emirates - Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Ras al-Khaimah, Sharjah and Umm al-Quwain - has been published by Explorer Group. This week encouraging news has emerged for one of the world's largest marine herbivores, the green turtle (Chelonia mydas). A new study shows that long-term protection of the sea turtles' nesting beaches is successful in achieving increases in the green turtle populations. Whale's diet revealed in its doo-doo Want to find out what whales eat? There's no need to cut them open, just wait until they relieve themselves. One of the reasons given by the Japanese government for its "scientific" whaling programme is to learn more about the animals' diet. Now scientists have developed a way of investigating diet by identifying mitochondrial DNA from the remains of the prey in a whale's faeces. Overfishing is creating a jellyfish plague Global warming is starting to sting - literally. Millions of baby mauve stinger jellyfish, in a swarm 26 square kilometres in area and 10 metres deep, drifted into a salmon farm in the Irish Sea, killing all 100,000 fish. More swarms have been spotted along British coastlines as far north as Shetland. The mauve stinger, a Mediterranean species, has been increasingly turning up in UK waters in recent years, but this year's numbers are unprecedented. What's more, this isn't supposed to be the season for babies. Warmer seawater is boosting mauve stinger numbers in the Med by increasing winter survival. Voyeurs put male fish off their ideal mate Mating fish don't like an audience, it seems. When another male spies on them they change their mind about which female they prefer. The findings may alter the way we think about mate choice driving evolution, researchers say. A remote-controlled 'fish', whose form is modelled on the movement of the manta ray, has been developed by a German pneumatic drive specialist. The 'Aqua ray' provides a manoeuvrable, remote sensing platform with potential applications in the inspection of undersea pipelines and cables. __________________________________________________________ * Copyright SCUBA Travel - http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/ * Reprinting welcomed with this footer included. We are happy for you to copy and distribute this newsletter, and even use parts of it on your own web site, providing the above copyright notice is included and a link back to our web site is in place. Previous editions of SCUBA News are archived at http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/news.html SUBSCRIBING AND UNSUBSCRIBING Visit http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/news.html and add or remove your e-mail address. CONTACTING THE EDITOR Please send your letters or press releases to: The Editor SCUBA News The Cliff Upper Mayfield DE6 2HR UK ADVERTISING Should you wish to advertise in SCUBA News, please fill in the form at http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/newsad.html PUBLISHER SCUBA Travel, The Cliff, Upper Mayfield, DE6 2HR, UK Subscribe To SCUBA NewsOur newsletter, SCUBA News (ISSN 1476-8011), is absolutely free. It is a monthly publication, delivered by e-mail. To receive your copy fill in your details below. We will never pass your e-mail address to any third parties, or send you unsolicited e-mail. You will receive an e-mail confirming your subscription. If you don't receive this you have probably entered your e-mail address incorrectly - revisit this page and re-subscribe. Send us your Press Releases
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