Scientists said the animal, which they named Kiwa hirsuta, was so distinct from other species that they created a new family and genus for it."

Recompression Chambers Reject DAN America Insurance: The SSS Recompression chamber network, operator of hyperbaric chambers in a dozen popular dive destinations, has announced that some facilities will no longer accept the Divers Alert Network (DAN) America insurance for payments at some chambers: Nassau, Bahamas; Cabo San Lucas, Merida and Cancun, Mexico. SSS has other chambers, which they say may also stop accepting DAN insurance payments: Cozumel and Playa Del Carmen, Mexico; Ambergris Cay, Belize; the Galapagos Islands, and five in Thailand. In a prepared statement, SSS declared it could "no longer tolerate unpaid services, and since the only insurer in the world who has refused to settle our bills is DAN America, some SSS chambers have no other choice but to ask DAN America patients to pay for services when rendered and file the claims themselves with DAN America." SSS owner Mauricio Moreno told Undercurrent that their chambers are still "duty bound to render services despite a patients' ability to pay." SSS has filed a lawsuit against DAN over the matter.

Undercurrent

You all no doubt remember my foolish dive attempt last week. Well, after the dive, I started feeling very nauseous and vomited a couple of times over the side of the boat. Soon thereafter, I started feeling pain and numbness/tingling in my extremity joints. I had initially attributed this to hyperventilation and hypocapnia. However when the symptoms persisted over the next 24 hours, I began to suspect some sort of sub-clinical variant of decompression illness.

(  )

The first (and only) dive was to the Bianca C, a 600-ft 1940's cruise liner that I have written about before. Since I've done the dive about 5 times previously. Needless to say, I wasn't thrilled about doing it again… However, this time the Divemaster offered something different — he proposed going down to the stern of the ship and swimming under the props, which I had never done before. The only problem is that the props are in 170 feet of water. I knew the proposed dive would be pushing the limits of sport diving (limit is theoretically 130 feet), it was something I have wanted to do for a while, and since the Divemaster had done it numerous times and survived, I figured how dangerous could it be?

The dive started out calmly enough… Since I couldn't get my gear fixed, I ended up using a rental 1st/2nd stage. Gear was working fine, got to the dive site and did a negative entry followed by active swimming to get to the bottom as quickly as possible. The first thing I noticed was how cold it was compared to previously. The next thing I noticed was that we would need to swim a little bit into the current to get to the stern of the wreck. That's where I started running into trouble. What trouble, you ask? Well, since I am posting this, you must have figured out I didn't die doing it… But I was psychologically close… The first contributing factor was probably that my A/C has been totally out for the past 2 days, and I was unable to sleep more than 3 hours a night, so I was exhausted. Couple that with the swimming against the current and I think I just plain over-exerted myself. Then I started loosing rational thought and my breathing rate went through the roof. Yup, I was totally narc'ed on the nitrogen. I thought I could bring it under control, but at 152 feet, I just panicked and decided I needed to end the dive. For the first 30 feet or so, I violated my ascent rate indicator, but as I got less narc'ed I ended up slowing down to the point where the last 100 feet were nice and slow, complete with 2 safety stops (at 30 and 15 feet).

I seemed to be alright, with the exception of some nausea (and vomiting over the side of the boat), and some left-sided parasthesia (numbness/tingling). These are classic signs and symptoms of hypocapnia. Ok, ok, so I was hyperventilating, I just wanted to make it sound better. In 11 years of diving with almost 200 dives logged, this has never happened to me before. Hopefully it never happens again.

Alright, time to try and go eat something without throwing up…

After picking up gear from the local dive shop (and borrowing a gear bag — that reminds me I need to return it), our group of three divers headed to the airport for the short (25 minute) flight to Tobago. Unlike in Grenada, we breezed through Customs and Immigration, and took a taxi to our hotel - the Hilton. Our reservation was theoretically for two people, since the website wouldn't let you put three adults in a room. Not a problem, I thought, an extra cot is usually $10-15/night. Boy was I wrong. The staff member at the front desk wanted to charge an extra 50% for the third person. I wasn't having that, so I ended up speaking with the manager. Seeing as it was low season, I successfully negotiated her down to an extra $6/person/night. Not bad.

The next morning we were picked up bright and early by the dive shop. Unfortunately, I managed to leave my dive computer in the room, so we had to go back, and got a little later start than planned. (I have an hose-attached-air-integrated computer, so without the computer, I can use my hoses/regulators.) After signing all the "I won't sue you if I die" paperwork, we got our gear set-up for the boat. We had chosen this dive company because it had a nice large boat with ladders, swim-platform and proper gear benches, so we were a little surprised to find out that the boat was in repairs. What we did instead is take a pick-up truck to a beach near the dive sites, and then use a small fishing boat to get out to the sites. A small fishing boat with no shade, no room, and no ladder. So as you can imagine, I ended up being a bit burnt and my stomach still hurts from having to pull myself up and over the side of the boat to get in. However, however the quality of the dive sites and the friendliness of the staff definitely made up for it. We ended up doing 7 dives with them, the details of which can be found in the dive log.

We did lots of nice sites — the visibility as well as the health of the coral reef and abundance of fish life was much better than it was in Grenada, and I think made the entire weekend worth it. (Well, that and the food, but more on that later.) Probably the coolest dive was Coral Gardens - not only did we see the biggest brain coral in the world (ok, so it wasn't all that, more like the biggest ball of string), but we also got to see a huge manta ray, which is something I haven't seen in a while, and the others have never seen. I will update this if/when I get pictures of the manta, as well as all the other nice pics my friend took. The other sites were also very nice, with lots of nice coral and fish (didn't I say that already.)

To recap, the diving was great. And I didn't even die of the bends, since I only had 18 hours after my last dive before flying instead of the recommended 24. The food was also great. (It better have been for the thousands of dollars we spent. Ok, so it was in Trinidad and Tobago Dollars, but it was still not cheap.) I haven't eaten so well in a long time — steak, lobster, shrimp, nice wine, and great desserts. It was almost worth going to get away from the same old 6 restaurants in Grenada.

In summary, I had a great time, but unfortunately, I won't be able to do that again for a while due to the strain on my budget.

Update: Totally forgot to mention: For some reason my first stage (scuba regulator) now has a huge leak in one of the seams. Luckily for me, I don't use that much air diving, and we weren't going that deep, so I was able to complete all my dives with enough air left even with the free flow. Gotta get that looked at before I go again, though.

Sorry for the delay, but I need a vacation from my vacation — but unfortunately I have to get up early tomorrow for classes…

Back to studying, in my 90 degree room (half the building is out again because the chiller shut down for no apparent reason.)

Update: The chiller is back on so my room is more comfortable, and the dive trip is booked complete with plane, hotel, and 7 dives potentially in 2 days, with the 3rd reserved for off-gassing that nitrogen. More to come, but need to go to bed now, so I can get up early to study tomorrow.

Update 2: Chiller back off again. Hopefully Maint. fixes it before tonight so I can sleep without sweating to death before my exam…

The first dive was to the HEMA I, which is a shipwreck that I first dove in March, only two weeks after it sunk. At that time, the ship was still fully intact, rocking on the ocean floor, and kicking up sand. The passage of Hurricane Emily caused the ship to break apart, hence it is a "new" dive site. It now has a bunch of swim throughs and interesting holes to peer in. Not much in the way of interesting fish life, with the exception of a few barracuda, and a reef shark that reportedly swam behind my buddy and I unbeknown to us. (We were looking in the cargo hold.) I was definitely cool to see the before and after, and as an added bonus we did manage to salvage a bottle of Absolut Limon.

The second dive site was Lighthouse Reef, which the one to which I had never been before. It was a nice site - not as much colorful coral as on the other side of the island, but plenty of fish life. We saw moray eels, lobsters, a turtle, and a nurse shark that started charging towards the Divemaster, after we cornered it against some reef wall. Luckily he had his hands in, and the shark veered off before collision. The rest of the dive was less exciting, yet still filled with colorful reef fish.

I also did three dives a couple of weeks ago (when I didn't have time to log them or to post) to King Mitch, Grand Canyon (a site I had also never done before), and ???. So how do you know you do too much diving? You can't even remember where you've been. Anyways, King Mitch was the same as previously. Grand Canyon was cool, complete with another new wreck (45ft sailboat) courtesy of Hurricane Ivan. And I really can't remember the third dive, but I think it was nice.

Well, it's time to get back to the books…