Remember, remember the Fifth of November,

Last night the Technical Diving Team took a night off to celebrate another Guy Fawkes night at Moov Bar.  The event was hosted by Moov and Ace Marine Images to thank everyone for their support during their research into  whale sharks in Koh Tao (which we have a lot of). Nothing really says thank you like a bon fire and free shots so you can imagine the turn out was quite high and then the ride home was most definetly messy.

Looking at the Ace Marine Images Website, you find the early buildings of a database. We’ve copied it below for all to see.

Currently we are processing hundreds of images to create the “fingerprint files”; the next step is to submit them all to several global databases to check where else, if anywhere, these sharks have been seen.

Feel free contact us at whaleshark@acemarineimages.comThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it if you have any questions or need more information on how to prepare your images for submission.

Whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) are the largest fish in the world. The iconic status and placid nature of the species has made these sharks the subject of popular marine tourism industries. However, it has become increasingly evident in recent years that regional whale shark populations have suffered major declines. These declines are linked to directed fisheries targeting whale sharks for their fins and meat, and the continuing nature of this threat has led to whale sharks being listed as ‘Vulnerable’ internationally on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

Though broadly distributed through tropical and subtropical waters, whale sharks are rare or seasonal throughout most of their range. Whale sharks are a highly migratory species and individual sharks are likely to regularly travel through multiple political jurisdictions, potentially varying from fisheries target to protected species as they do so. Thus, to effectively conserve the species it is important to assess its population status over broad geographical scales. Researchers need to estimate the size of remaining populations and whether the global whale shark population is subdivided into different stocks, which would then necessitate a series of independent regional population estimates. Though data is difficult to gather as individual scientists and research teams, these aims can be achieved relatively quickly and inexpensively through collaborative studies.

Good job guys and thanks for the free booze!

Thank you to everyone who responded to the Barack Obama post about his involvement in the USS Lagarto wreck topic. If anyone else has a source of information we would love to see it. We emailed his campaign people, i’m sure they have nothing better to do, so we’re not holding our breathes on that one, This wreck wasn’t found by us and it’s very rarely dived but it’s nice to have a permanent online record since it looks like he’ll be the most powerful man in the world in a few weeks.

However, tomorrow we’re off on a Wreck Wednesday trip and more technical training for Hannah. We’re climbing aboard the Mv Trident Technical Liveaboard Vessel for her last local training dives on the Unicorn Wreck. After that we’re off for 3 days and 3 nights of deep ocean technical wreck diving on the HTMS Pangan. Let’s hope the weather holds out which has been spotty with rain and clouds, but who cares when you have a full service vessel, you just watch a dvd or have a nap if the deck is wet (after all, we’re there to get wet)

Unfortunately this will be the last trip on the Trident for the season (awwwwww) an excerpt from their website reads:

“The season is nearly finished for any long range trips on this side of Thailand.

In a few days we have our last trip, to the Pangan and to a Chinese pottery wreck hundreds of years old.

2008 has been a good year, a few big new steel wrecks and the Chinese ones for a change.

Fuel prices hit us hard for a while so we encouraged divers to dive an extra day on trips to cover the increase, it worked well.

Have a look at our new promo video

http://www.facebook.com/n/?video/video.php&v=35697301335

The boat is off to the yard very soon, some paint and new seals only if all goes to plan.

Hope to see you aboard next year”

But have no fear, similans technical is here. During the departure of the MV Trident we’ll be doing deep ocean technical diving in the Similans Islands on one of the many liveaboards, a few of them fitting for technical diving as we speak.

As you may of noticed there’s mention of a new promo video for Trident. This video was created by Ace Marine Images and showcases their new wrecks and a bit about what its like on board. I personally think it’s a a bit long for a promo at 16 minutes but if you love this sort of diving you’ll love the video.. here’s a link to it from YouTube

Tomorrow we’ll post some more information about technical diving in the Smilans, however we’ll be a bit quiet for a few days as we’re out into the blue on the trip. A full trip report and pictures to follow

Published photo journalist, Ayesha Cantrell, who’s work can be found in Dive Magazine, the Undersea Journal and several online publications has approached one of our staff Niall “Mac” Mackenzie for an interview about his story with technical diving, the tottori maru and the history with his family and now a staff member in a technical school. Ayesha is resident photography instructor for Ace Marine Images and co-owner of Buddha View Technical with her boyfriend Wiclo Booth.

Niall’s story is unique because of his father’s fascination with all ships built in scotland. His father was a fan and still keeps a fan club of vessels manufactured in scotland during the war. The tottori maru, a famous hell ship from japan, was built in Scotland. When Niall first came to Koh Tao he was unaware that the very same vessel that his father had such passion for was sunk only a few miles away. It wasn’t until he got into technical diving that this vessel was even mentioned. Early 2008 Niall got the chance and dove on the Torrori Maru with us on the Mv Trident technical liveaboard. He later became and instructor and now works in the industry.

You can read more about their latest trip here, written by Ayesha.