SHOWNEWS
Becks Martin helps grow clubs
Sophie Rennie leads a safety skills refresher
PHOTO: JASON BROWN
whose motion has so far been passed by 34 councils, together representing more than 4 million people.“ We operate from the principle that every person needs the ocean to be healthy, wherever they live,” Emily said.“ Our aim is for local councils to support a more ecologically healthy sea and to rethink how the ocean is taken into account in planning and decision-making at local level.” BSAC’ s Club Support specialist Becks
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Main stage stars( l-r) Dawn Kernagis, Rannva Joermundsson, Andy Torbet, Steve Backshall, Monty Halls
Martin, a member of Bedford Scuba Divers, led a workshop offering tips on how to grow your club. Becks explained how her branch turned a 25 per cent Ocean Diver retention rate and zero income from try dives into 100 per cent retention and £ 1,000 a year income. Getting noticed was the start, with a new website created to showcase the club and its members. Then social media and Google reviews were used to build the club’ s online presence.
Tyrannosaur tribute to Helen Hadley
PHOTO: JASON BROWN
Go Diving highlights
Elsewhere at the show, the main stage was dominated by some of the traditional stars of the UK diving scene, with expeditionary specialists Steve Backshall and Monty Halls attracting crowds to the main stage with their finely-honed presentational skills. There was balance against the testosterone in the form of three high profile women divers. Rannva Joermundsson reported on Expedition Buteng, a survey of cave systems and biodiversity in Indonesia; Dr Dawn Kernagis presented on subsea habitation technology, while Maria Bollerup spoke on her experiences sailing across the Pacific in a 100-year-old Dutch tall-ship. Photography was well represented, with a display of winning images from Underwater Photographer of the Year( UPY) on display in the café area. A UPY presentation was made on the main stage, not by the competition’ s figurehead Alex Mustard( absent, leading a group in the Philippines) but fellow photo-pro Saeed Rashid. Saeed set about dismantling the format, first brandishing a lifesize Alex Mustard mask and then peppering the presentation with photographs of... his cats [ inset photo, left ].
Somehow, it worked. One of the show’ s standout moments was a memorial to Helen Hadley of the Scapa Flow liveaboard MV Valhalla, who died earlier this year to the shock of the diving community. A warm hearted woman with a famously quirky sense of humour, she would have relished the memorial. It started with a flash mob of her friends dressed in comedy tyrannosaur suits invading the hall and gathering on the main stage. It was one of the show’ s biggest talking points, and a fitting tribute to Helen. �