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Dear Steve, Rant and rave, call everyone every dirty name, make every slanderous statement and accusation that you care to, it bothers me not in the least. You can do your best G.I. III impersonation and it does not scare me, worry me, intimidate me or concern me. George does it much better than you do, and since he has none of those effects on me, you really can't expect to. You are quoting private correspondence between Joel (a friend of mine and a member of the Wahoo's crew) and I, which he had no business sharing with you, and which you have no business posting publicly. But that reflects on no one but you. In any case, there was nothing in that correspondence that was any big deal. Let's look at your correspondence in some detail: <<As a dive boat operator and President of the Eastern Dive Boat Association for twelve years we have tried to start an investigative process like the Cave Divers investigation process to uncover why an accident happened, but to no avail because many of the diving incidences are followed by law suits. Making dive boat operators not able to make statement because their lawyers won't let them.>> Ah yes, we all know that one, we'd like to but our (fill in the blank . . . lawyers, insurance, etc. . . . ) will not let us. <<There is no private slandering, when you say things that aren't true, in private or public its still slander . . . >> I was engaged in private communication with a member of your crew, that's hardly slander. <<You are wrong on all counts . . . The Wahoo has never "rolling bodies off the dock" or any other place. NO DIVE BOAT HAS, (Dive boat don't kill divers, divers kill themselves. ) >> That was the way an officer of the Rhode Island State Police described your delivery of a body to Block Island. Granted, I was not there, I did not witness it. <<Its assholes like you that make untrue statements out of ignorance and perpetuate lies that hurt our industry. You should find another way to be noticed. Your thin ego is showing, The URI accident data program had so many diving deaths listed for the Doria because John wanted to believe deep diving meant death, he told me so. John was getting so many reports on the same death and had too many listed for the Doria but would not change the number from 50 until he had investigated them all. John finally corrected the count . . . John Maciniff and I spoke many time about the number of diving deaths while diving the Andrea Doria, he said "50" this was back in the late eighties and there were only six at that time. As you said you were at URI so you know all the mistakes that were being made.>> I can not see how this ramble relates to your thinking that I have a thin ego. Gee . . . most folks would describe my ego as almost as think as yours. I am not now, nor was I then, responsible for John McAniff or his opinions. If time has increased the body count in my mind then I apologize for that error, if the fuss was put in the public mind by John McAniff, I frankly was unaware of that since after I took the Diving Safety Officer job at URI, John took it rather hard, and we rarely spoke about anything since I was not longer involved with the NUADC, he had little or no involvement with URI's Research Diving Safety Program, and we saw each other rarely being on different campuses of the university I at the Graduate School of Oceanography school and he in the Department of Physical Education. <<But we do not have any control over what a diver does after exiting the boat and goes underwater.>> Did I ever say or suggest otherwise? I don't feel that you need to be, or should be, responsible for the divers in the water. <<The Wahoo is a mode of transportation, Certified and document by the United States Coast Guard as a Research Vessel and is certified to carry 48 passengers for hire, up 100 miles oceans coastwise United States. The Wahoo was built to a SOLAS rating. We decided not to operate under the SOLAS rating because of the cost of maintaining the rating. (SOLAS have to do with International Voyages).>> I believe that being certified and documented as an R/V and carrying passengers for hire is not permitted. <<We are documented as a Research Vessel and we are certified to carry passengers and meet and exceed all Coast Guard regulations to carry passengers. We have not tried to get around any Coast Guard regulations. The Wahoo meets and exceeds USCG standards. YOU CAN CHECK WITH THE COAST GUARD under the freedom of information act on everything I have said here. >> All that I intend to check are the R/V rules as they relate to carrying passengers for hire. <<Or you can check the Wahoo COI posted on board along with all our licenses, Captain's Janet Bieser, Steve Bielenda, Hank Garvin, Phil Galletta Steve Lombardo and Kathy Wedig.>> That will tell me that you are all licensed and the boat is certified and documented as an R/V, those are issues that have never been in doubt. <<You probably won't because someone else isn't paying for it and you won't spend $70 bucks to go diving. I know the type if the University or someone else doesn't pay for it, you won't pay your self.>> Right on! <<And as far as you calling yourself Diving Safety Officer, shame on you, think back about the time your group came out on the Wahoo>> It was not my team, I was not in charge, my wife and I and our housemate were just there as invited guests. <<the equipments your team brought for a well-known person in the diving field, I wouldn't let him dive with the equipment that was brought and lent him my own equipment not the boat's rental stuff.>> I brought no equipment for anyone except my wife and myself. You loaned neither me, nor my wife, nor anyone associated with the University of Rhode Island any equipment or any kind. I was unaware that you loaned anyone else any equipment, but my wife and I were there to make a dive together and I really was not watching everyone else. In any case, it did not involve me, my wife or any URI personnel, and that is the limit of anything that I can by any extension, be expected to have any responsibility for, so why do you bother to include this here? <<I though more of his safety than you the Diving Safety officer, >> Glad that you did, but in any case . . it was not my operation, not my dive, not my diver, not my responsibility. <<You were the NAUI boys that all impressed with your selves with computerized personalized dive profiles. >> Don't know about any "NAUI boys," but Heinmiller and I were at that time heavily involved in the development of dive computers, something that, work on our part that is generally acknowledged as contributing to changing the face of diving. Did we do something wrong here? << Not to mention we had to rescue one off your group. Any rescue or help gotten while diving on the Wahoo remains on the Wahoo and we don't brag who fucked up and how we helped. Our egos are well-taken care of through respect, not by bragging.>> I'm glad that "Any rescue or help gotten while diving on the Wahoo remains on the Wahoo," since your memory of the act will have to be its own reward. I have no recollection of any rescue of anyone on that trip. Perhaps you're confusing outings? Perhaps this occurred when I was underwater? In any case, it did not involve me, my wife or any URI personnel, and that is the limit of anything that I can by any extension, be expected to have any responsibility for, so why do you bother to include this here? Phil Sharkey -- Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'. Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.
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