5 replies to this topic

[WreckWench]

This forum is for our DAN Interns. They are vital to the success of Divers Alert Network in furthering its goals and benefits to us. The DAN Interns will use this forum to blog what is happening to them, solicit financial support and to help educate on the valuable role that they play in DAN's mission. Please check here often and offer any level of support you can to this tremendous program.

[Dive_Girl]

I understand our two SD member interns are in transit to NC today to meet up for some fun dives! Training starts next week?? Dan (Scubatooth) and Christine (graceful_c), fill us in when you have a moment!

Our dive shop sent Christine a care package that included a sponsorship check to help offset various costs. If people are willing to help out with sponsorship money for interns, I think that is wonderful! Both of these individuals are coming off full time student status and flexible income is very limited.

As I told our staff, it's like a send-a-kid to camp program only our kid is going to Scotland!

Again, congrats you two!

[Scubatooth]

Just a quick update.

Christine and I made it down to Morehead City yesterday evening safe and sound, and got checked in before making a quick run to the store before crashing for the night to be able to get up at 5am for the boat. I will post a trip report in a day or two when I can get all the details together, but so far so good. I will also be starting a new Blog & Photo gallery about the summer in the coming days and will post the links when it goes live.

As for sponsors I have sent out letters to various individual’s and companies in the dive industry seeking sponsors to help offset/defray some of the costs of the internship.

Attached is letter I have sent out for private donors. If anyone needs the corporate sponsorship letter or has any question please PM me, and I will forward it to you.

Well im going to get some rest and i will post later tomorrow.

Tooth

Attached Files

•  Private_Sponsor_Ltr.doc   20.5KB   13 downloads

[Dive_Girl]

great letter Dan! Much better than the "FORK IT OVER" email I sent on behalf of Christine to our staff.....

JUST KIDDING!!!

[gracefulc]

Hello from Scapa Flow!!!

I have now been in the town of Stromness, on the main island of the Orkney Islands of Northern Scotland, for two weeks and have been having an amazing time! After taking some time to get settled in to my surroundings and meeting the skippers of the dive boats, I just passed out my DAN computers to collect my second week of dive profiles for Project Dive Exploration. The first week netted over 150 dive profiles and this week looks promising for gathering even more.

My host here runs the Hyperbaric Chamber in Stromness and since my arrival I have been privledged to observe recompression treatment for 3 cases of DCI. The technicians, nurses, and doctors who work with this chamber are incredibly helpful and have been absolutely doing everything in their power to answer my questions and make sure I understand everything that is going on - its been fantastic!

Last week I was able to go out diving 5 days in a row and dove all 7 of the historical German High Seas Battle Fleet - totalling in all 3 battleships (the Konig, Krownprinz Wilhelm, and the Markgraf), and 4 cruisers of varying design (Koln II, Dresden II, Brummer, and Karlsruhe), as well as a few other wrecks to include - the Tabarka - a blockship that was sunk as part of the Churchill Barriers, and the F-2 - a WWII casualty and the YC21 which sits 100 ft away from it after sinking during salvage attempts on the F-2. The diving conditions are incredibly similar to the PNW diving - in terms of water temperature (Bottom low was 48 F, high was 50), clarity (enough silt floating about to make broad-scale pictures somewhat challenging, but not enough to make the vizibility TOO bad), current/tide effects (none with the exception of the blockships) and bottom composition (SILT!), although the vizibility is quite a bit better as it has held steady at 20 - 30 ft.

The town of Stromness is home to 10 dive boats which can carry up to 12 divers each and are out in the flow 6 days a week, for 2 dives/day, May through October. Depending on the group preferences and the chosen dive sites some boats may go up to the more northern of the Orkney Islands, or other dive sites outside the flow, so they may stay out the whole week, but most come back to port each night. It is worth noting that the vast majority of the boats have living quarters on them (small but adequate is how they have been described by most) so most divers just sleep on the boats, even though they are back in Stromness for the night. This is a great advantage as divers don't have to worry about finding other accomodations as there can be quite a competition for them this time of year!

I'm hoping to venture outside of the city in the coming weeks and visit some of the amazing neolithic and historical sites on the island, as well as visit the other islands making up the Orkney Islands. The one thing I had not anticipated is that there are only a few hours of darkness each night because we are so far north. I woke up at 3am the first night to full blown daylight! Now THAT was a surprise!

Anyone who would like to know more details about Scapa Flow diving or the Orkney Islands in general, please feel free to message me or post on here and I will gladly answer or find out the answer for you!
Cheers!

Edited by gracefulc, 14 June 2007 - 01:43 AM.