By Oahu Dive Team Coordinator Glenn Roberts
The dedicated ODA-Hawaii team in Oahu made their monthly trek to sea on Sunday, June 13th.
It’s the first time in memory that our faithful Oahu Outreach Coordinator Ken Staples wasn’t able to make the outing. He was missed, but I think he’ll be proud of us!
We had 12 volunteers on the boat which is operated by our partners Island Divers Hawaii (IDH). IDH’s crew included Tim Hollandsworth as captain and instructor Anna Sorrentino was our safety diver. IDH’s Marlena Neal was our deckhand and she was just awesome. Our volunteer divers doing the cleanup work: Alan Mark Alegre, Chad Schmidt, Chris Denton, Dan Okamura, David Marcelli, Henry Bennett, Mark England, Walker Embry, and Zachary Trevathan. Veteran ODA diver Ed Sisino and I joined the divers and handled the debris lift bags. We’re glad to have some underwater photos for you to enjoy – thanks to Anna and Dan!
When we reached our original destination called Fish Camp near Hanauma Bay, we found the seas to be very rough on the east end of the wall near the Bay. We do look forward to getting back out to this site, because we haven't been able to do our cleanup there in many months due to conditions.
So, not to be deterred, we switched gears to Plan B and motored to a site we’ve committed to keeping clean: Spitting Caves at China Walls. The area where we do our cleaning is a bit more sheltered, so the conditions were acceptable for us to dive.
Please be sure to look at our photo gallery. Our water is so clear, it looks like some of us are floating “in the air”! We did weigh down our debris buckets with a lot of toxic lead weights, some fishing line, and a few other odds and ends.
Everyone thoroughly enjoyed the time together doing what we love – giving back to the oceans. If you are in Oahu and would like to join an outing, please reserve your space by visiting the IDH website. If you don't see a date for the upcoming month, please check back as we do go out each month!
