Have
you ever been sat down the pub with your mates and started wondering
what happened to Bob or Ben or Dave? You know, that bloke who used to
be part of the group but no one sees much of him now. Did he ever
make it in the world of IT or did he go back to being a Landscape
Gardener in Hull? Did he ever get to trek across the Andes or Andorra
or wherever it was he was going to trek across? God he went on and on
about that didn't he? And of course did the antibiotics ever clear up
that embarrassing little itch he had? You know, the thing that made
Debbie leave him.... Or was she called Diane?
Anyway
today we are going to do a blog version of wondering about whatever
happened to Bob and have a look back on some or our posts from the
last year or so and ask, did anything ever come of that?
Bethany Farrell
We
start on a very serious and very disturbing note. Back in 2015 we
wrote a piece about diving safety called Who's Really Looking After
You. You can read the original piece here.
In that post we discussed three separate incidents where people had
died whilst diving. All of the incidents were depressingly sad and
should never have happened but one of them stands out for one very
good reason. Bethany Farrell had never dived before, ever! She was
travelling in Australia and was undertaking an “Introductory Dive”
with Wings Diving Adventures. This was supposed to be a chance for
her and others like her to experience what SCUBA diving was all about
in a safe and controlled way. Bethany didn't get to experience the
wonders of SCUBA diving though. Somehow she became separated from the
instructor and despite the fact that there were many other divers in
the area and observers on boats, Bethany vanished. She was later
found on the sea bed and died from drowning. At the time a number of
people took to the TripAdvisor website to criticise the way Wings
Diving Adventures staff acted during and after the incident. Now,
over a year later a UK coroners inquest into that tragedy has
recorded a narrative verdict that highlights significant failings in
the way the company conducted itself and legal proceedings by the
Australian authorities are ongoing.
Interestingly the instructor at
the centre of the incident, Fiona McTavish, has been expelled by PADI
however the company itself hasn't. Which begs the question was Fiona
McTavish thrown to the wolves as PADI has done before (check this
link out if you doubt us) or can we expect that PADI will soon be
expelling the company as well? The last few years have not been good
for the reputation of the recreational diving industry with deaths,
accidents, divers being left in the ocean, sea life being harassed
etc and things don't look like they are going to get better anytime
soon. PADI for example, has launched its own freediving courses,
where people who know nothing about freediving are taught to hold
their breath for many, many minutes by people who didn't know
anything about freediving themselves a few months ago. Then there is
PADI's “Zero to Hero” program, which, apparently, is an
accelerated training program which turns complete novices into diving
instructors in a matter of months. Oh dear, you really can hear the
papers being shuffled in coroners courts everywhere can't you? Is it
just us, but does no one in the diving certification business learn
lessons at all?
Now as we said there are still legal proceedings
against Wings Diving Adventures (who are still claiming to keep you safe and smiling on their website) underway in Australia so this sad
saga still hasn't been concluded and it is worth noting that a
coroners court cannot attribute blame to any individual and cannot
imply a criminal or civil liability. The Coroner must use the
evidence heard to decide who the deceased person was, where they
died, when they died, and what the cause of their death was. By
expelling Fiona Mctavish from their organisation however, PADI does
seem to have made it clear where they think blame lies, but in the
end when the legal channels have finally been exhausted, we don't
think PADI or the company itself will come out of this looking very
good either. In general, Bethany Farrell's death should be
more than a wake up call. It should be a bloody great Klaxon sounding
in the offices of every diving certification company headquarters
everywhere. Every PADI member, every diving centre and company staff
member should remember her name. Bethany Farrell was on an
“introductory dive” for gods sake. Her death should never have
happened and we hope and pray that for once the “lessons learned”
will be heeded because this must never happen again.
Riz Smith and those short things
On
a lighter note, does anyone remember Riz Smith? Oh come on, Riz Smith
(cool name, cool dude), he's the guy who was going to save the oceans
by making boardshorts out of plastic. Well, we are pleased to
announce that despite our serious doubts (read them here and here)
Riz really does seem to have cracked it. At least we think he has,
it's difficult to tell. We know Riz is making baordshorts out of
plastic but we can't tell if it's the nice clean sort of plastic you
get from the bottled water trade or that nasty, dirty plastic you get
from the bottled water trade when those bottles have been plucked
from the ocean. Confused? Yeah, so are we. Anyway here's what Ali
Murrell, who is one of the co-founders of Riz Smith's boardshorty
enterprise says:
Our
current fabric has been carefully sourced to give us exactly what we
need; great feel; quick drying and, importantly, made from 100%
recycled polyester, rPET as it is known. rPET is essentially a
re-composition of the same plastic (PET) that you find in most clear
drinking bottles. Every day, tonnes of bottles are recycled and
shipped to Taiwan where our factory then creates the rPET yarn and
finally our fabric specification. Whilst it is great that you can
recycle bottles into fabric there are still very high percentages of
bottles that never make it into recycling programmes, either finding
their way to landfill or entering the litter stream, into waterways
and ultimately the seas, oceans and beaches. Our aim is to divert and
collect these bottles to create our fabric in a fully traceable and
circular process and ideally do this closer to home.
Err...
Okay Ali, but are you making shorts out of plastic plucked from the
sea?
We
have always supported the Marine Conservation Society and known for a
while that plastic bottles are finding their way to the sea and
landing on our beaches in ever increasing numbers, but it dawned on
me when I realised that the actual cause of the problem was literally
sitting on our doorsteps. Seeing all the plastic litter in and around
my neighbourhood in London, knowing where this is likely to end up,
made me think that there must be something positive that can be done
to reduce and ultimately prevent this situation from getting any
worse.
Yes
that's great Ali, but are you making shorts out of plastic plucked
from the sea?
Initially
I thought that it would be the condition of the bottles. It turns out
though that this is the least of our issues! Unfortunately the
sea and the tides are fickle things and it is very hard to predict
where or when a given beach will be heavily littered or not. We know
that the bottles are out there based on the great work of
organisations such as the Marine Conservation Society and their
litter surveys, but being in the right place at the right time is a
real challenge. We have relied on the amazing scores of volunteer
groups around the country to help get the project off the ground and
they have been so supportive; this does leave us with the challenge
of co-ordinating all their efforts into one seamless process.
Ultimately we want to design a system that can work on a commercial
scale!
Oh
for gods sake Ali, please just tell us if you're actually making
boardshorts out of plastic plucked from the ocean or is this just a
gimmick?
To
be fair we have jumbled up Ali's answers and taken them out of
context for a bit of fun. However, if anyone can read Ali's Q and A
on his websites journal and figure out if Ali, Riz and the other cool
surfer dudes are actually making boardshorts out of ocean plastic,
can you let us know because we haven't a clue if he is or not....
Sharkwater the sequel
Finally,
did anyone read our piece on Sharkwater Extinction?
Sharkwater
Extinction is a new project by filmmaker Rob Stewart and is described
as “a quest to find 80
million missing sharks, revealing a multi billion-dollar scandal that
implicates us all in the greatest wildlife massacre ever known.”
Rob
Stewart was funding the project through Kickstarter and we are
pleased to say he not only reached his target of $150,000 but
surpassed it. You can still support the film by donating via Rob's
Kickstarter page. We went for the $175 “thank you” in the credits
and we look forward to seeing our clubs name in the film credits
next year.
Now
then, does anyone remember Bob? Bald bloke, buck teeth! Oh come on,
you must remember Bob? He had that embarrassing thing on his
wossiname......