Tag Archives: divers

Balloon pollution !

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Saturday, February 23, 2002
Good Morning
WEATHER: Sky Overcast –Vis 7 Miles — Moderate Rain — Wind NNE 18 Knots –Sea 1 foot chop.
posted by Angus Matthews at 7:24 AMGood Evening
TEMPERATURE: Max. 5.0c >Min 4.2c >Reset 4.8c > Rain 6.0
MARINE LIFE: A day of some confusion as a total reorganisation of the Centre Rock occurred when a large male Elephant Seal returned to the rock and everyone had to trade places. Some confusion for the geese as well with the arrival of a third pair starting a turf war. Only 1 mature and 1 immature Bald Eagle seen today about 16:45.
HUMAN INTERACTION: One dive charter boat with 4 divers aboard in the MPA during the morning and 2 eco-tour boats through in the afternoon. One rental boat 14K-37805 with two people aboard set up to fish just west of the engine room but left when hailed and waved off. A TRIDENT submarine was observed steaming (or reacting) west out of the strait for places unknown under the oceans. One other unusual environmental impact today; as a consequence of a political protest at the BC legislature some 12 nautical miles from Race Rocks. Three blue balloons with the Hospital Employee’s Union logo floated through the MPA carried on the ebb tide and a NNE breeze. Unfortunate pollution.
I was joined by my wife Sandy and our friends Cathy Denny and David Anderson who are staying overnight as deputy assistant guest Eco-guardians. This resulted in a great dinner of Red Snapper. (NOT taken from the MPA!)
posted by Angus Matthews at 9:32 PM

Close call–

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Friday, February 22, 2002
Good Evening
TEMERATURE: Max. 9.0c >>> Min. 5.2c >>> Reset 5.2c >>> Rain 29.5mm
MARINELIFE: 3 mature and 1 immature Bald Eagles were around a good deal today. Two pairs of Canada Geese enjoyed wading in the large puddles that have formed on Great Race Island as we have experienced 71.7mm of rain in the past 48 hours. An Elephant Seal chose to lounge beside the jetty for part of the morning.
HUMAN INTERACTION: Pearson College divers were out for a drift dive on the ebb tide. A television crew from The New VI joined us as well. Rick Searle, the host of EnviroMental on the New VI, is preparing a segment about Race Rocks for the program. Watch for it coming soon on Channel 12 in Victoria.
One eco-tour boat through the MPA about 13:00.
At 14:20 a rental boat from a local marina tried to run the tide rips in the narrow gap between the South Islets at full speed. I couldn’t believe my eyes as they stopped just short of the reef. Mother Nature has ways of dealing with fools but she let them off easy today!
We had to settle for arranging a stern warning when they returned to the marina.
posted by Angus Matthews at 8:12 PM
Good Morning again. Mike and Carol have gone ashore for a week, a very rare occurance. I will be your guest host and eco-guardian.
posted by Angus Matthews at 10:19 AM

Webcasting for QuickTime Live

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On February 14 , 2002, we did a live webcast for Keith Mitchell of ALI ( Apple learning Interchange) in his presentation at QuickTime Live in Hollywood California. This was the first time we tried out the new webcasting software “LiveChannel” from our new partners Channel Storm.

 

Webcast crew

(L to R back) Garry,Damien, Nigel (L to R front) Kiprop, Ian(visitor), Monica, Olend, Chris . Thanks to Angus Matthews for the photos– Monica claims full responsibility for the commentary on this page!! Also see this write-up which appeared in the Pearson College Newsletter

The Race Rocks group setting up before the big day! Monica and Nigel peer intently into the eye of one of the cameras and Garry tests out the underwater cam before the dive, looking a bit like Roger Rabbit in the process.

2500 to 3000 sea birds feeding

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Thursday, January 03, 2002
Good Evening
TEMPERATURE: Max. 10.0C — Min. 6.9C – Reset 7.7C — Rain 1.3 mm
MARINE LIFE:Another red letter day,calm sea,blue sky and wonderful warm sunshine. There were 3 ( 1 mature ) Bald Eagles today. Counted 18 Black Oyster Catchers and again 7 Harlequins ( 4 Male ). There was a lot of feed in the water in the tide lines, 200-300 hundred metres off the reserve to the west and north,and into Pedder Bay.There must have been 2500 to 3000 sea birds feeding. The eagles were flying low just skimming the surface, talons outstretched as they hit the water.As the eagles circled,the other birds flew off and landed some distance away, except for about 7 or 8 gulls that tried to ‘herd’ the eagles away.Every once in a while the eagles would dive at the gulls, I think more out of frustration from the harassment then wanting to catch the gull- it was the fish they were after.It is so quiet with the light wind that we have heard Elephant Seals vocalizing tonight.
HUMAN INTERACTION: There were 4 boats through the reserve today 2 orange Ribs ( 1 whale watcher ) 1 pleasure craft-sight seeing and 1- 4 metre boat with 3 divers between Gr. Race and West Race.
posted by Carol or Mike S at 6:10 PM

Good Morning

WEATHER: Sky Cloudy — Vis. 15 Miles — Wind South East 3 Knots — Sea Rippled
posted by Carol or Mike S at 8:11 AM

Webcasting Crew out

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Saturday, November 24, 2001
Good evening
TEMPERATURE: Max. 8.5ºC — Min. 7.3 — Reset 8.1ºC — Rain 0.2 mm
HUMAN INTERACTION: Not the best weather for live web casting -however the “crew” arrived after a bumpy ride in the 2nd Nature and braved the very cold North Easterly.There were also the hardy divers on the ‘Juan de Fuca Warrior’ diving the West Race Area.
posted by Carol or Mike S at 6:05 PM
Good morning
WEATHER: Sky overcast — Vis. 15 miles — Wind north east 23 knots — Sea 3 foot moderate
posted by Carol or Mike S at 7:27 AM

Webcast to Conference in New York from underwater Race Rocks

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During a presentation to the ETC conference at the United Nations School in New York in the spring of 2001, we tried out the underwater audio link from DIVELINK . An audio signal is relayed by SONAR for Ryan to a receiver near the docks. This receiver was connected to the audio input on the G3 laptop computer and to the shore tender as well. Both voices could be carried by the Sorenson Broadcaster first by wireless AirPort and then onto the internet. In this way we were able to communicate from underwater in the Pacific Ocean live by internet to the Altlantic coast. In this video, Ryan Murphy, a student at Pearson College, operates the device and the camera was operated by Jean-Olivier Dalphond, also a student at the college.

Installation of Sensor Bar underwater at Race Rocks

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In this video, the diving students of Lester Pearson College brave several cold hours in the water to bolt down the 5 meter aluminum sensor bar in 8 meters of water off the docks at Race Rocks. Faculty members Garry Fletcher and Chris Blondeau join them to help install the first three sensors.

The orange rope previously installed in the 3 inch conduit is attached to the top end of the sensor cables. These cables are pulled through the buried conduit from the installation location in the ocean, up to the top of the docks where they connect with the instrumentation to allow the data eventually to be made available on-line. The sensors are brought down by a diver and fitted to the bar as the cable gets pulled through. Next the crew straps the sensors and their electrical terminal boxes to the bar. The hydrophone points upwards, the other two sensors, for chlorophyll and turbidity point down. A special thanks is due to our video expert Jean-Olivier Dalphond for enduring almost three hours in the 8 degree Celsius water to video the process.

See other Diving Videos:

Ryan Murphy films underwater at West Race Rocks

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This video was shot by the team of Pearson College divers while practicing for the live webcast for the QuickTime Live Conference in California- Oct 2000 .

On the 4th of October, a 5 member diving team brought the camera to West Race Rock to film the marine life there. Along with Red Sea Urchins (Strongylocentrotus franciscanus), Plumose Anemones (Metridium farcimen), and a Tiger Rockfish (Sebastes nigrocinctus) was a large school of Black Rockfish (Sebastes melanops). The camera crew for the dive was J.O. Dalphond, Hana Boye, and myself. Organism identification responsibility falls on me. Hinted streaming video time is 3 minutes 22 secs
My name is Ryan Murphy and I am a Year 26 Pearson Student from Newfoundland. I am doing the editing on this movie. I’m the diver with the blue snorkel signalling “OK” at the beginning. Garry, our Guru, is showing me how to do this in iMovie as this is my first movie, I hope you enjoy it.

The Johan Ashuvud Project, 2000

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crews-1

Victor David and Satoshi: For two weeks in May and June of 2000, Lester Pearson College graduating students, Victor Rakou, David Mesiha and Satoshi Kimura, and in the last week, Juan Manuel Alva and Martin Kryl, joined the sea gulls and stayed at Race Rocks running daily programs on a live camera, and broadcasting directly to the web. Faculty member Garry Fletcher worked with them for the daily webcasts from the shore and from underwater. Sponsorship for this week came from the Johan Ashuvud memorial fund.

The first big event was the Swiftsure Race Weekend. A camera was set up along with a supporting G4 computer in the top of the light tower. Two streams were broadcast, one to camera 4 on the website and a special experimental dedicated stream to Shaw Cable. This stream was of TV quality at 1Mbps and 21 FPS.

Our thanks to Kevin Sytsma of LGS for coming out to help setup for this 2 day broadcast and to Ken Dunham ( PC year 9) for reconfiguring the server from Ottawa in order to handle this experiment.

Each day at Low tide we set up in different locations around the island, always being careful to not disturb the nesting seabirds futher up on land. A Sony camera linked by Firewire to a G3 500 Mghz computer was located in the intertidal zone. From here, Audio and Video Signal went by the wireless Macintosh AirPort Link to the Science Centre. From here the signal traveled by Cat.5 cable to the top of the light tower where it was sent by radio to the Telus antenna at Lester Pearson College. From there it was webcast in live streaming video to the internet by a Macintosh G4 500.

Content through the week ranged from adaptations of organisms to the special ecological niches of tidepools and intertidal slopes, to First Nations use of resources and the role of community/ stakeholder participation in the Marine Protected Areas Pilot process.

The airport wireless base station was tried in a number of locations. We relied on David to find the best locations for connectivity. Best wireless transmission was achieved when we hoisted it up to the roof of the science house. The radio waves go through buildings but not through rocks!

Further editing for the video archives took place in the science centre in the evenings.

Video created this week by the team:

june92000s jochensealions newgulls wwfgulls
Underwater Invertebrates and Fish On the last day of live webcasting, sea lions visited Glaucous-winged gull behaviour Gull territorial aggression

Chris Blondeau from Lester Pearson College joined us for a session on the care and maintenance of the underwater camera and housing. Chris is in charge of the shore-front at the college and is in charge of the SCUBA Diving program there.

We were also fortunate to have some visitors take part in the intertidal discussions we had on the islands. Dr. Jochen Kuum ( PC year 10) is seen here with Garry and diving with Satoshi and Victor Stephen Haggarty (PC year19) also participated above and below water. This video was made on the last dive

 

Carol Slater, who along with her husband Mike are the guardians of the MPA joined us to talk about the Black Oyster Catcher. We examined the trays of shells from last years midden of one nest. This parent bird was foraging off to the East of the dock where they hatched two chicks this year

Race Rocks viewed from the South at Rosedale Rocks Buoy.

One of the best parts in staying at Race Rocks overnight while doing these webcasts was the great sunsets. Sometimes you can view these on the remote control camera 1 and camera 5.

 

Live Transmission to the Internet from Underwater-2000

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n June 2000, Lester B. Pearson College divers stayed at Race Rocks for two weeks, for the Johan Ashuvud Week doing live underwater transmissions to the internet. This video is a sample of scenes from the live webcast. It shows some of the colourful invertebrate life at 8 meters depth, on the north side of Great Race.

See https://www.racerocks.ca/the-johan-ashuvud-project-2000/