Sea Bees Diving will conduct another International Clean Up Day

This is supported by SSI, TDA & Green Fins Thailand.

The day trip is planned for the 25th of September, leaving from the Sea Bees office in Chalong in the morning, and includes one long clean-up dive at Koh Mai Thon, snacks and fingerfood on the boat, and is of course free of charge. Divers have to bring their own dive equipment (gloves are recommended) or gear can be rented from Sea Bees Diving for the day.

The number of participants is limited to 30 divers, first come first serve. Bookings can be made through our offices in Chalong, Amari Coral Beach Resort-Patong, Sea Bees JW Marriott Resort & Spa by phone or via email to info@sea-bees.com (for internet bookings please add ‘Clean-Up-Day’ in the subject line).

As always it will be great day with a lot of fun! The Sea Bees Team is looking forward seeing you there!

This is where I will be on the 25th.  Where are you going to be?

Dive it out!

25 DSD’s

Looks like tomorrow is going to be filled with lots of accents and descents.  There is a full boat charter and instead of the normal 2 dives for the day per person we will do 30 minute dives.  Should be fun last time like this the families loved it and some even got certified.

The weather looks to be a bit on the nasty side.  I bet at least half don’t dive if there are big waves.

Dive it out!

King Cruiser Wreck

The King Cruiser was operating between Phuket and the Phi Phi Islands in southern Thailand when she hit a submerged collection of rocky pinnacles at Anemone Reef 10 miles off Phi Phi Island on 4 May 1997.

561 passengers rescued and one elderly woman sustained a broken back and several others suffered shock.

I want you to guess which photo is my favorite.

A nice surprise!

Could it be this?

Simple dive map.

King Cruiser was the only wreck to dive but a few boats have been sunk in the last 2 years but more about that in a later post.

Anytime your in Phuket and want to to Dive it out!  Let me know

Reef update Phuket

The SongKrang has been over now for 4 months and the latest research suggest that 50% of the corals have recovered.  This does not include Staghorn Coral as they have not begun to recover as of yet.

This sounds great if you were in Phuket diving and saw the reefs at their worst.  You might be impressed with the difference.  BUT, a friend of mine who was in Phuket last year went diving a few days ago and reported how disappointed he was in the conditions of the reefs.

I will be diving myself in a few days and I will take some new pictures and post them later

Random Pictures

Ok so I figured out how to upload media to my gallery. Now I can go back and add some to my earlier posts. Below are a few of my first images taken with an 5 year old cannon digi.

Diving it out on a safety stop

When your chilling out on a safety stop at 5m for 3 minutes its always fun to make rings.  Its even more fun if you can picture like this.

This was the first attempt.

I like the clear rings.  Pretty good I think.

The camera takes some good pictures when the settings are right.  I am like most casual photographers and take lots of pictures and hope for the best.  Once I get a housing for a Cannon D20 i will be able to really concentrate.  Thanks to Gina at ginasmithphotography.com I am lucky enough to have a partner who is a photographer so I get the hand me downs.  Which will be a huge step up from a little point and shoot. For now my post pictures will be all from my old camera.

Dive it out!

Diving Shark Point

The official Thai name for this site is Hin Musang or ‘Shark Rock’.  Which i guess got translated to Shark Point.  The name refers to the Leopard sharks that inhabit the reef.

It has a rock that sticks out 2-3 meters and indicates Shark Point 1.  Easily one of the most colorful sites when heading east from Chalong Bay. Depending on current and diver experience level either SP 1 or SP2 are the prefered jump spots.

I have only been to SP3 4 times and its fantastic.  The problem is its deep and shortens the dive.  Fine by me but when you have 4 other divers who are paying for an hours dive i try to give them that.  I have had a few groups that were very keen to go and were fine with a shorter dive time.

Other types of sea life to see there include vast schools of tropical fish  there colorful soft corals and sea fans that decorate this huge limestone pinnacle.

Some of my highlights include the “Moray Hotel” anywhere from 5 to 12 white eyed moray sharing ridiculous small holes.  Lion Fish around every corner hiding from the currents.  Ghost pipefish and nurse sharks hiding in small caves. The Nudi branches are plentiful too.

Dive it out!

Swimming with the Red Flags

It makes me really angry that people don’t understand that a red flag on the beach means no swimming!!!

It happens every year someone drowns and sometimes even a whole family. Recently Phuket hired lifeguards to work at the various beaches around the island. Fantastic news for everyone. Well so it seemed until I open up the local paper and the life guards are angry!!!! My first thought was not enough money. Nope was totally wrong. It seems they feel the hotels are not doing enough to inform there guests about the dangers of swimming of the beach on the west coast of Phuket. Of course only during the “Green Season” This was reported after a number of drownings occurred.

I heard about the drownings and thought to my self. Idiots! Don’t they know what a red flag means. Its so frustrating to read about the same story line every year during “green season” tourist drowns after swimming off the beach. After reading the article I feel the hotels in the area are responsible for educating RED FLAG NO SWIMMING!!!!! Not to mention that there are signs posted everywhere.

Here is link to one story which is dated June 18th, 2010

British woman, 21, is latest Phuket drowning death

And this one happened yesterday
Phuket Day of Beach Tragedies: One Tourist Drowns, Another is Missing, Feared Dead

If you come to Thailand and a lifeguard says don’t swim please don’t swim. Some of the most beautiful pools can be found here Don’t be afraid to visit a pool that is not on your resort.  Play  nice, buy lunch or have a drink. and soak up a new pool!!

Dive it out!

Hot, So Hot, I Saw an Orange and Black Nemo burst into flames!

Its with great sadness to share this info with you.

This past high season has been one of the warmest in awhile. I was repeatedly diving in water that was 30-31C in the Similan Islands. Once the season was over i relocated to the Chalong main office and went diving down south. I knew that warm waters have an adverse effect on coral but what i was about the see still haunts me when i close my eyes.

100% of all staghorn coral bleached completely white! Mushroom coral as well. Pretty much all the hard corals has some degree of bleaching but the mushroom and staghorn coral was hit the worst. I was diving the “Staghorn Reef” shocked senseless and thought to my self where are all the fish. Well there were fish, but not the numbers I have seen over the last 4 years.

I was double shocked this problem had not been discussed with the Phuket dive community. I will be going diving in a few days and i will upload some pictures to show you. i wonder what the coral will be like as it has been a month since my last dive.

The Phuket Marine Biological Center (PMBC) says that about 50-60% of coral reefs have died and 100% of the coral is bleached. The temperatures are going down as monsoon rains are here now but to little to late.

This has happened in the past but not anywhere close to 2010. 1991 and 1995 were also years in which the sea temperature rose high enough to bleach some coral. The reefs were able to recover from that. time will only tell~!

Dive it out!

Manta’s with Stephan

I have to go back a few years for this one but it is an easy one to remember.

I was on the “Over Night” trip to Phi Phi Aboard the Sea Bee’s Aragon. She sleeps 12 guests in bunk style accommodation but any more then one night is a bit much i think. A full boat means the staff are sleeping under the stars! good thing no rain for us that night. There was wind however and when we awoke in the morning the captain informs us that we lost the mooring line in middle of the night.

Last dive of the season Similan Islands

So first dive of the morning! We all kit up and have a wonderful dive. We had Manta’s swimming around us every where a leopard shark made it known that it wanted a video made of him. Lots of little stuff like sea horses, nudi branches, frog fish as well. Everyone came up was buzzing about the Manta’s. One guest said it was the only reason they went on the trip. Glad I could help them Dive it out!

The dive is done but not for Stephan and myself. It was our task to repair the line from last night. S. grabs the line and off we go. As soon as we jumped there was 3 mantas swimming below us keeping an eye on what we were doing. While we are repairing the line the smallest of the 3 decided it wanted a closer look at us. the manta was about 1m away form us and just hovering there looking at us then swam off but never out of our sight. We finished re attaching the line and it was time to head up. Something had another idea.

That same little Manta (3m) decided it was time to play with me. Zooming in and zooming away. At this time the 2 larger manta were just circling below keeping a eye on what was happing with Jr. ( i can only guess) The highlight for me was when he was swimming right at me and at the last moment opened its (mouth) and did a back flip so close to me if I thought it would knock my reg out. After that it did another “hey look at me pose” then went to join the others and then they swam off.

It does not get much better then that it thought at the time. then i was working close enough to the Similan Islands that i could go to Koh Bon! More on that with video and some pics to!!

Next post will include some IE high times and low times. You know what I mean Dom.
Dive it out!

I joined Scuba Board

Here is my first post.

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/introductions-greets/341703-just-joined.html

It seems likely that it was a bit to long winded. as no one has replied.

What do you think

dive it out
Tim