113. A Simple Solution from Oceana plus Wet Notes news, information and commentary

The Great Shark Snapshot is back for its second year. Divers and snorkelers are asked to record all their sightings of sharks and rays in the Shark Trust Shark Log. This event runs from July 22 -30, 2023. Last year over 200 divers from 14 countries provided 1800 entries into the log. It has been 50 years since scientist first discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch 600 miles northeast of Hawaii. It has grown to 1.6 million square miles - two times the size of Texas. Divers Alert Network and PADI conducted a day-long Safety Seminar for the Dive Community at PADI HQ in CA. The seminar featured a number of short presentations along with in-water demonstrations. The event was open to PADI Club members and dive instructors. Aggressor Adventures is now offering a consumer protection program StormCheck for missed days of diving due to named tropical storms. If you diving or charter is impacted by a named storm, you will get a voucher for the missed days. Commentary Recently Aqualung has announced that they will return to the DEMA Show in 2023. This is very welcome news as in the past several years, major scuba equipment manufacturers have not attended. DEMA Show is our big opportunity to interact with various exhibitors, evaluate product, engage in dialog and make future purchasing decisions. It is vital to a health dive industry. I commend Aqualung on this decision and hope that other big players come to the same realization. This trade show matters. Oceana recently published a report titled A Simple Solution -  How President Biden can meet offshore clean energy goals and prevent new offshore drilling. Here are their four recommendations. President Biden must uphold his promise to end new offshore oil and gas leasing in his 5-year plan. Use his authority under section 12c to permanently protect areas from new offshore drilling Congress must pass legislation to reverse the linking of offshore wind leases to offshore oil and gas leases BSEE must seek transformative changes to oil and gas safety culture through inspection and enforcement and reduce the reliance on industry-written standards.