ERROR CHAINS

By Mark Young

“For the want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for the want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for the want of a horse the rider was lost, being overtaken and slain by the enemy, all for the want of care about a horseshoe nail.”
–Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanack
 
The cover story for this edition took me back to an article that ran in the second issue of Dive Training — December 1991. It was a Learning Experience column written by a guy who got into trouble diving from a private boat.The reason that article readily comes to mind is because I never forgot it; I’ve always been amazed that it’s so possible for intelligent people to do dumb things. More about that in a minute, but here’s a recap of the event.

So the author’s friend calls and asks if he would like to go lobster diving. The friend owns a boat, they’re in South Florida and the Gulf Stream should make it an easy drift dive; the divers will tow a float, which the boat will follow to pick them up at the end of the dive.

On this day the boat will be driven (and the float will be followed) by the guy’s new girlfriend. She’s never done this before; in fact he’ll teach her to drive on the way to the dive site. It’s just the three on board so she will also be alone on deck as the sole observer. None of this is too smart so far.

Before leaving the dock they question whether to dive. The seas are running 2 to 4 feet, expected later to become 3 to 5. They decide they can beat that, and go. The wind is picking up when they reach the site so their next good idea is that it’s a good idea to get diving and get back soon. In other words, no time for predive briefings or much of a dive plan or, for that matter, to show her how to use the boat’s radio or find her way back to an inlet if necessary. It’s also getting pretty late in the day. They continue on and make the dive.

You can see what’s coming; why couldn’t they?

We tend to think that accidents come from out of the blue, but most don’t. They are usually at the end of a series of events. In fact far too often accidents or incidents are both foreseeable and avoidable. So why do even smart people do such predictably dumb things?

The best answers come from the archives of the National Transportation Safety Board, the operation that investigates airplane accidents. After thousands of well-documented cases, here is what they’ve determined.

The chain of events leading up to an accident is often called the error chain. At the start of the chain is almost always some human factor of personality, of judgment or fault. It’s the mental mechanism that, for example, keeps the pilot flying into iffy weather eager to make his destination when he probably shouldn’t have left to begin with, or should have fixed his gyro, or taken the time to top off his fuel tanks for margin, or had the opportunity to stop at numerous airports along the way. He instead ends up a statistic.

Those same human factors in play, the author of the story hesitantly yields to the boating experience of his friend, who committed to take his buddy diving and is hesitant to back out while the girlfriend, obvious to all to be incompetent for the task, wants to appear cool, capable and willing. There were also at least six event links along the error chain when any one of the three could have said no, and broken it. The horseman is slain, the pilot is lost and the divers adrift on a dark sea, worried as much about how the girl will get back home as about how they will. Lucky for all of them it ends up OK.

Diving from a private boat is fantastic fun. The how-to-do-it article in this edition is a very good primer. What is left to consider when it comes to both your ultimate safety and enjoyment, is awareness of that chain of events. Those not tuned in to their instincts are rarely aware that an accident is forming, so if divers and boaters pay attention and accept the responsibility for safety, most links will be broken before the chains that cause accidents can even begin. And at that time when your gut does kick in, you only have to break one link in the chain of events to never know what was coming.

In the end, it’s always better to be on shore wishing you were in the water than in the water wishing you were on the shore.

FORGING FISH

By Mark Young

Perhaps the greatest art forger of the 20th century was Hungarian-born artist Elmyr de Hory (1906-1976). After studying classical painting at institutes in Germany and France, de Hory realized That his true artistic bent resided in the ability to copy the works of other artists, which he did prolifically. Picasso. Matisse. Renoir. Modigliani. De Hory claimed to have sold more than a thousand forgeries to art galleries and wealthy individuals around the world.

Elmyr was different from most art forgers in that he didn’t copy the paintings of famous artists. Instead, he painted original works in their style, which made the forgeries even harder to detect. Part of what makes the art of forgery remarkable is the different forms that it takes in the countless areas that it pervades. Forgery is basically defined as the process of making, adapting or imitating objects, statistics or documents with the intent to deceive. If there’s money in faking it, someone is making it. And the fact that someone’s buying it often adds another layer of authenticity to the hoax. After all, what does the value of a forged item become when you tell about it?

For example, it is beyond speculation that quite a bit of what you see on display in museums is not the real

deal. Museums have been suckered by forgers to the point that known forgeries remain on display, serious efforts to examine questionable objects are rare and, according to one museum whistleblower, “the system is supported by a mafia-like code of silence within museums and academe that conceals information and impedes exposure of the underlying process of plunder, forgery and smuggling.” Add that to the wonderment of your next museum visit.

Mostly we think of forgery in terms of money and art, but it’s rife in archaeology, literature, music, documents, history, perfumes, designer clothing, stamps, relics, religion, baseball trading cards, and even wine. So should it come as a surprise that forgeries are rampant among fish? One company in Florida, aided by export- exporta - mong export ers in Asia, imported thousands of pounds of catfish into the United States labeled and sold as grouper, just to avoid paying duties that the Department of Commerce had imposed on Vietnamese catfish.

That example is just one small act on the grand stage of seafood fraud that includes a multitude of illegal activities, undertaken by countless characters in countless places along the international supply chain. The fraud typically involves mislabeling (forging) seafood through the substitution of one species of fish — usually of inferior quality — for another, mostly for economic gain. The feature story that begins on Page 30 provides an interesting look into fish fraud; it’s a disturbing and informative article.

You can imagine that Elmyr de Hory’s career makes for good reading, and indeed he is the subject of a few books. The best was written by then-respected author Clifford Irving after extensive interviews with the subject. (“Fake! The Story of Elmyr de Hory, the Greatest Art Forger of Our Time” was published in 1969.)

So does the name Clifford Irving ring a bell? Just two years after publishing “Fake,” Irving pulled his own

“de Hory” using forged letters that he said were from Howard Hughes, to trick McGraw-Hill into buying a fake autobiography of the reclusive billionaire. However, while the subject of his previous book worked to

make his forgeries hard to detect, Irving had the brass to perpetrate his fraud and write the autobiography

with much fanfare, and dumber yet while Hughes was still alive. Irving went to prison for the scam, as did the owner of the Florida fish company, mere footnotes to the ever-growing market in fakes and forgeries where not everything is what it appears; perhaps not even that salmon fillet on the plate before you.

Enjoy this edition of Dive Training as you dine on

— whatever that is.

OCEAN'S DAUGHTER

Written by Mark Young

Midnight on the water

I saw the oceans daughter

Walkn'on a wave she came

Staring as she called my name

And I can't get it out of my head

No, I can't get it out of my head

Now my old world is gone for dead

'Cos I can't get it out of my head

-Electric Light Orchestra

Benchley called his brother to tell what had happened to him and to ask a favor. The story is that Bench’s friends were going to the Caribbean and asked if he wanted to come along. He had to get certified, though, because they were going there to dive. Bench kind of always wanted to do that so he took lessons and a month later was with his buddies in the sun having a great time. He did his checkout dives at the resort and told George how he spent the rest of the week doing the most incredible stuff.

The question for George was more like a plea.“I’m going back. You have to get certified and come. I promise you’ll love it because you’re like me. You can’t say no. Leesy too.”

It’s George’s wife Lisa telling me this on the phone. She and George had talked about diving. They like outdoors stuff but the conversations about taking up diving usually stopped with her and a halfhearted, “Yes we should.” The conversation wasn’t going to end there this time. Bench had dragged Lisa and George off on other adventures and they were always fun, especially when he brought along his eternal fiancée (of seven years) who they all loved and rounded out the foursome. She had agreed to be certified too. There was no saying no.

Lisa went on. “I don’t know why I always managed to put it off, whether it was the money or maybe I was a little chicken about doing it — it was easier to shine it on. But we did it. We found a dive store that we didn’t know was here and our class had two other couples and two other guys. There were eight of us and by the second class we were comfortable with each other, and by the end we were at the bars and having a great time together. We became good friends. Diving was our common bond. But that’s not why I’m calling.”

She was calling to say they went off on their adventure with Bench, and that her life hasn’t been the same. She fell in love with the sea. She hasn’t been able get that phrase out of her head from the song by the Electric Light Orchestra. “They were singing about me, the ocean’s daughter. And how odd the title of the song, “Can’t Get It Out of My Head,” because that’s how I’ve been; profoundly changed. I asked her if George became the same way and she said no, that would be impossible. He loves it too but she’s gone nuts.

Most people come into diving pretty unaware. Blank slates, if you will. They know little about the equipment they will be using, are certainly unfamiliar with the skills and knowledge, and I contend that most new divers have never heard of the island of Bonaire. From the minute they first walk in, diving becomes a total learning experience.

The education goes past the bookwork and skills, to way beyond what they think this will be. New divers are soon to find out more than they know about the world’s history, geography and its people. They will learn some oceanography and lots about marine life and diving’s environments. But when they swim alongside of something alive and the size of a bus, or a wall that descends thousands of feet beyond unlimited visibility, they learn quite a lot about themselves. Prior personal experience and their very familiar world expand past something that they have imagined, to discover that it’s more. For many the observance and appreciation of nature on the scale where divers are privileged to be will become deeply personal. What is really coming in the way of learning, for the new diver, is often unexpected. Sometimes quite unexpected.

She called not just to tell me all that, but to ask if we could write something powerful that would entice other Lisas who are on the fence to give this a try. I believe she just did.

AS HISTORY SERVES

Written by Mark Young

On the morning of February 17, 1944, in a surprise attack by the United States, aircraft bombed Japanese warships and merchant vessels in Truk Lagoon, a strategic plot of wartime geography in the Central Pacific. The attack continued the next day and when it was over 52 ships and their crews were on the bottom. The destruction would have been far greater had the Japanese not seen U.S. reconnaissance planes overhead days earlier, anticipated the attack, and moved much of the fleet.

In 1945 the American government relocated the residents of the Bikini Atoll to another place in the Marshall Islands, to create an isolated spot and test the damage that could be inflicted by nuclear weapons. Among the tests, they wanted to see the effects on war vessels, and anchored a mock fleet in the blast area. Among the vessels sent to the bottom were the 880-foot (267-m) aircraft carrier USS Saratoga and, in a blast of irony, the Japanese battleship Nagota, from which Admiral Yamamoto directed the attack on Pearl Harbor.

November 23, 1984. A powerful storm ripped the Mercedes I from its temporary anchor in the Atlantic and landed the 194-foot (59-m) freighter up against a sea wall, literally next door to the Kennedy family’s Palm Beach, Florida, compound. The ship’s owners slithered off, and it took months for the state of Florida to have it pulled off the beach. Because of the unusual stranding, the moneyed neighborhood and the drama around the removal, the ship became a media celebrity. Just a few months later it began service as an artificial reef off the coast of Fort Lauderdale.

Shipwrecks, like people, have stories to tell. They rest where they are because of war, weather, malfunction, accident or by plan. A major allure of shipwrecks, certainly for divers who visit, are their histories. Certainly they all have interesting how-I-wound-up-on-the-bottom stories, but they have others. Many of the military ships that we are privileged to dive served in war. Others patrolled during peacetime to protect their country and the peace of others. Some ended up tracking space launches, or became spies, or were used as movie sets.

There are also very deep personal histories ascribed to each ship. Within each sailor who served, a military ship occupies a place usually reserved for a childhood home. For many it forged the rest of their life. For far too many, the ships became their grave.

And shipwrecks are surrounded by history. The push for America to stay ahead as a war power sent the Bikini fleet down. A total of 242 naval ships, 156 aircraft, 25,000 radiation-recording devices and some 5,400 goats, rats and pigs were subjected to the initial atmospheric nuclear blasts, which eventually numbered 23 over a 12-year period. Topping the chart was the monster of its time, a hydrogen bomb that vaporized three of the islands and spread radioactive debris over 50,000 square miles (130,000 sq km). In many ways the area is still reeling. The Bikini ships and the Ghost Fleet of Truk Lagoon essentially represent a placemark along man’s advancement from being savage to someday becoming civilized.

And finally, each wreck has an aftermath. Beyond any damage of war, or wear, or the sinking itself, ships are profoundly changed by the sea. They become cloaked in living biomass. Paradoxically colorful life camouflages the muzzles of guns as old ships become new environments. That part of a shipwreck’s history — the story to come — is the subject of the article in this edition as Alex Brylske talks about the ecological issues surrounding ships in their role as artificial reefs.

Quite a few ships have recently gone to reef by plan. In July 2000, the HMCS Yukon, a destroyer that served in the Royal Canadian Navy, was sunk by the San Diego Oceans Foundation after nearly 2,000 volunteers spent more than a year gutting and cleaning it for its role as a California artificial reef and dive site. Consider that, and you basically have the story of the USS Spiegel Grove, USS Oriskany and General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, all put down by divers and interests in the state of Florida, and the MV Captain Keith Tibbetts, and most recently the USS Kittiwake in the Cayman Islands. The success of those efforts has fueled the desire to send more mothballed military and other idled ships to the bottom as recreational, financial and ecological attractors. It is something that our diving community will continue to support, for divers to continue to enjoy, as history continues to serve.

LIONS AND TIGERS AND BEARS

Written by Mark Young

It’s scary down there. Professionals in this industry face that every day when trying to entice people to try diving. The people who raise their hands high enough to actually inquire about diving do so at their own peril. We don’t have a shot at the others, who know enough to never ask. Just ask divers how hard it is to convince their friends and relatives to give it a go.

We in the industry know too well about the “Jaws effect.” It’s a metaphor now, referring to what happened to the diving business in the mid-’70s, when the movie made people aware that to become certified was to become chum. Didn’t we hide that fact from the public for a long time? Then the movie came out. Then we had to wait out the downturn in business for the post-Jaws movie generation to come around. Well, then came Blockbuster. No matter. Since then, this sport has become dominated by daredevils. Why else the popularity of shark dives?

Speaking of sharks, we may not have to fear them much more. Along with many of the ocean’s biggest predators, sharks are going away — basically, they are overfished. No wonder; it took from the beginning of time until the start of the 19th century for the first billion people to populate earth, now here we are at 6.9 billion. Fish just can’t keep up.

That’s not a problem for sustainable fish populations, where reproduction exceeds catch limits. But it is a problem when, for example, shark fin soup becomes the culinary rage in very populated places. That dish alone takes out an estimated 73 million sharks each year.

Did I actually say that it’s a problem? So getting rid of the scary stuff, why is that a bad thing? Of course everyone has opinions, and another view is that it’s the predators, not us, that should be in fear. Fish don’t fear so that’s ridiculous. Still, some divers, along with their science buddies, want to argue that healthy populations of ocean predators is actually a good thing. Alright, I misspoke; most divers and scientists believe it. These would be the same people, I suppose, who claim that diving in the same ocean with sharks and big grouper is safe. Still, let’s look at their case.

They argue that predators are essential to the ocean’s (the world’s) ecology. Everything is hunting something, and the “balance of nature” is a theory that ecological systems are basically in a state of stable equilibrium. But other scientists disagree. They point to observations that indicate predator and prey populations instead are in a constant state of disturbance and fluctuation, rather than in balance. They propose that equilibrium is illusory; more like a seesaw, where the size of prey and predator populations constantly change based on the relationship between populations and their food source, and differing external factors. I don’t know. Both theories sound like different ways for nature to achieve the same thing.

Except for one thing. Everyone seems to agree that the external factors are becoming more radical. According to reputable sources like the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, almost 70 percent of the world’s fisheries are fully to overexploited, depleted or in a state of collapse. And, as for the big boys, the ones that keep our potential divers away, about 90 percent of large predatory fish stocks, worldwide, are already gone.

Wait a minute. It is scary down there.

This editorial is in reference to the feature story, “Predators as Protectors,” that begins on Page 30, Dive Training magazine, March 2011

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SEA STATESMEN

Written by Mark Young

What comes to mind when you think of Benjamin Franklin? We know him as a statesman. One of our founding fathers, he helped frame and then signed the Constitution. He was a prolific author, a printer, an inventor (the furnace stove, bifocals … a carriage odometer?), political theorist, satirist and a philosopher. He formed the first lending library and fire department in Pennsylvania, published and wrote Poor Richard’s Almanack and The Pennsylvania Gazette, and had a major role in founding both the University of Pennsylvania and Franklin & Marshall College. Not bad for a guy whose formal schooling ended at the age of 10.

But your first thought might be the image of Franklin flying a kite during a thunderstorm; he was also a scientist (or, in his day, a natural philosopher). What many people don’t know, however, is that Franklin was also an early oceanographer. He became that by way of his position as deputy postmaster general of North America. It started with a question posed by the English Postal Authority. How, they asked, can American postal ships make the journey back from England to the colonies sometimes weeks faster than the English mail ships. Franklin consulted his whaling captain cousin, Timothy Folger. He learned of an ocean current that American and Spanish ship captains were aware of. They knew to sail with it traveling to England and stay out of it when returning to the colonies. The English mail packet captains were sailing dead against it.

It took years of blank stares before the British followed Franklin’s advice about navigating the current, but that’s another story. Franklin became intrigued by the idea of a “stream” existing in the ocean. During his trips between the colonies and England he took measurements and notes about the water temperature, currents, water color and Gulf weed content. He knew that the current carries warm water from the south to the north, and that his measurements would mark the location of this “river in the ocean.” He also gathered data from Folger and other ship captains, learning enough to chart the Gulf Stream, and giving it the name by which it is known today. It’s a hoot that the first map of the Gulf Stream, published by Franklin in 1768, so closely mirrors today’s satellite images.

Franklin was by no means the first oceanographer. Although it is one of the newest fields of science, formally dating to organized expeditions in the late 19th century, oceanography can be traced back tens of thousands of years to the earliest seafarers who began observing the waves, tides and currents that carried their boats. Oceanography has essentially evolved from the need to find fish along coastlines, past the discovery that the Earth is not flat and can be navigated, past Franklin’s observations about currents, to today’s need to understand the place of the oceans in global climate.

The history of oceanography is as interesting as the discipline itself. In this issue, for our perspective as divers, author Robert Rossier examines what we know about tides, currents and waves, and most of what we know is from the observations made by Franklin and countless others who came before and after he turned his remarkable intellect to the sea.

Franklin’s unique genius was turning his observations to practical use. While the next guy to research electricity with a kite in a storm was killed doing it, Franklin invented the lightning rod. In the same way, the publication of his accumulated oceanographic findings, “Maritime Observations,” contains Franklin’s ideas for sea anchors, watertight compartments, catamaran hulls, shipboard lightning rods, and even a soup bowl that stays in place in rough seas. Oceanographic observation has done much for our lives, and we have benefited as divers — certainly for our ability to understand and continue learning about what we are most privileged to observe.