Lost and disoriented scuba divers on Blacktip Island will soon be able to find their dive boat without surfacing—and suffering the ensuing embarrassment—with the introduction of a local entrepreneur’s See-Buoy float camera. (photo courtesy of Dorothy)
Scuba divers lost on Blacktip Island’s reefs will soon be able to relocate their boat without surfacing by using a local inventor’s lift-bag inspired mini-camera float.
“Divers get lost all the time, and there’s a huge stigma about surfacing to get your bearings,” Rusty Bollard said. “Anybody on the boat sees you, ‘specially dive staff, you’ll get ribbed like hell the rest of the week. That’s where the See-Buoy comes in.
“You get lost, just clip your reel line to it, give it a puff of air and shoot it to the surface,” Bollard said. “It’ll do a 360 scan to find the boat, give you the direction on a wrist unit, then you pull it back down like nothing happened. Inflated, it’s about the size of your fist, so no one’ll notice.”
Product testers raved about the device.
“Some of us are just navigationally challenged,” Rosie Blenny said. “The See-Buoy works perfectly to find the boat, or the shore, without any embarrassment. I used to use a little PVC periscope, or my buddy, but this works way better.
“The cool thing is it comes with multiple covers to match whatever water you’re in,” Blenny said. “Whether it’s bright turquoise for over the sand, darker blue for over coral, or green for bad visibility, you’re set. They even have a brown cover for lake and quarry divers.”
Island dive staff embraced the idea.
“Divers get lost all the time, and that sends our pulse and blood pressure soaring,” Eagle Ray Divers divemaster Marina DeLow said. “If this gizmo’ll help lost guests find their way back, there’s nothing but upside to it. It makes my job a hundred times easier. Also, if they deploy the buoy, and leave it deployed, it makes it way easier to keep track of them.”
Others opposed the idea.
“If our divers get too self-reliant, that erodes my job security,” Eagle Ray Divers’ Lee Helm said. “If I’m not out doing searches and making rescues, that takes money from my pocket. Dive ops’ll start hiring fewer divemasters, and that affects all of us.
“It also means guests’re taking fewer navigation courses, and that takes money away, as well,” Helm said. “This is just a way for Rusty to make money off confused divers, at our expense. If people really get that disoriented underwater, they should just stick close to a dive guide. Or take up golf.”
Bollard said See-Buoy is currently in the prototype stage, and expects working models to be available for sale by the busy holiday season this December.
The Blacktip Times 