News Article: April/May 2002

Local News

Two freediving spearfishermen lost

-04-2002

Two divers drowned after apparently suffering a shallow water blackout while spearfishing. More

Nelson Dive Centre goes back to court

-04-2002

Nelson Dive Centre has partially succeeded in its High Court appeal against a sentence over the diving accident in French Pass, Marlborough Sounds, March 2000. More

Dolphins die in nets

-04-2002

Two more North Island Hector’s dolphins – from a population of only 100 – have been found dead in nets off the Manukau Harbour and Kariotahi Beach during February. More

Juvenile giant squid filmed alive

-04-2002

While Discovery Channel were filming off New Zealand for a sereis ‘Chasing Giants- on the trail of the giant squid’ with cooperation of NIWA they filmed for the first time juvenile (Architeuthis) in the laval stage, ranging in size from nine to 13mm.

NIWA, marine biologist Dr Steve O’Shea, is planning in the future to keep the larvae alive and raise them to giant size adulthood.

Squid egg masses have been sighted at the Poor Knights in recent years. More

Shellfish poachers

-04-2002

Police and Ministry of Fisheries officers commenced a series of raids at dawn on 13 March. More

Hyperbaric treatments implicated in increased raised hormone levels

-04-2002

In the latest research into hyperbaric therapy, it has been found that raised hormone levels are a direct consequence of repeated dives. More

Hooker sea lion pups die

-04-2002

A mystery flesh-eating disease is again killing sea lion pups in the subantarctic Auckland Islands. More

Researchers on ice post their progress on the web

-04-2002

According to the University of California Santa Cruze (UCSC) Weddell seals feed by diving beneath the frozen Antarctic sea ice to hunt fish in darkness and freezing cold water at depths so great the pressure collapses their lungs.

Thanks to a new website, anyone can check out the lives of Weddell seals and the travels of the of the scientists studying them.

Created by Terrie Williams, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at UCSC, the website (www.biology.ucsc.edu/people/williams/antarctic/) chronicles her ongoing investigation of the feeding biology of Weddell seals.

Her website features weekly instalments with photographs and field notes describing the process of the 10-week expedition, which is sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

‘I designed it for schoolchildren and teachers, because I wanted to give kids in science classes a taste of the thrill of scientific discovery - I hope to bring that moment of discovery alive.’

Still to come, the researchers will be choosing seals to use in their experiments. More

International News

Freedive records

-04-2002

On Sunday 23 December 2001, at the Woree Olympic Swimming Pool (Cairns, Australia) a local dive instructor, Sebastien ‘The Sub’ Murat, (33) of the Amphibios Freedive Team set a new benchmark in world freediving, swimming 176 metres underwater on one breath. More

What you see when you dive deeper

-04-2002

An enormous squid that grows to 7 metres long and lives more than 900 metres below the surface has been discovered by scientists in submersible vehicles. More

Benthos assists in World Trade Centre recovery efforts

-04-2002

There has been a focused effort to locate the flight data recorders and cockpit voice records, ‘black boxes’, from the aircraft that crashed into the World Trade Centre towers on 11 September.

Recorders used by commercial aircraft must be equipped with underwater locating devices.

According to Benthos, shortly after the crash, Rock Babicz, product manager for Benthos’ locator products, received several calls from the agencies involved in the recovery efforts. More