{"id":494,"date":"2019-07-01T01:36:12","date_gmt":"2019-07-01T01:36:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/?p=494"},"modified":"2019-07-01T01:37:37","modified_gmt":"2019-07-01T01:37:37","slug":"padi-dive-against-debris-specialty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/padi-dive-against-debris-specialty\/","title":{"rendered":"PADI Dive Against Debris Specialty"},"content":{"rendered":"

If your news feed is anything like mine you will be seeing daily posts about the harmful\u00a0effects of plastic on our oceans, our fish and even ourselves.\u00a0While there are plenty of great organisations highlighting the issues and offering solutions\u00a0the plastic problem can sometimes seem overwhelming but there are small steps we can\u00a0take to make a difference from not purchasing plastics to removing it from our favourite\u00a0dive sites.<\/p>\n

Project AWARE was initiated by the diving community in the late 80\u2019s and was registered as\u00a0a non-profit organisation in 1992. Since then over 150,000 conservation activities have\u00a0occurred in over 70 countries around the world and over 1 Million pieces of marine debris\u00a0have been removed from our oceans.<\/p>\n

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Project Aware launched the first underwater debris data collection program, Dive Against\u00a0Debris in 2011 and since then over 50,000 divers have participated in an underwater clean\u00a0up and logged their data. Dive Against Debris aims to improve our ocean ecosystems with\u00a0volunteer efforts and by providing information about underwater debris, creating a global\u00a0database to help inform policy change.<\/p>\n

The tagline \u2018Making Every Dive Count\u2019 is where we come in.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

As divers we are out exploring our favourite dive sites on a regular basis and we see the\u00a0issues of marine debris first hand. If you see debris what do you do? Close your eyes as you\u00a0swim past or pick it up and put in your pocket or catchbag or if you are like me swim around\u00a0until the end of the dive with a handful of rubbish!<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0\u00a0\"\"\u00a0\u00a0\"\"\u00a0\"\"<\/p>\n

Then what \u2013 put it in the bin and forget about it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The PADI Dive Against Debris Specialty plans to change that and encourages divers to\u00a0register every dive and record what debris was collected \u2013 even if nothing was!\u00a0Imagine that \u2013 completing a dive and seeing no marine debris!\u00a0During the specialty you will learn about the local impacts of marine debris and how to\u00a0organise an underwater clean up event with your buddy or think BIG and organise one with\u00a0your local dive club.\u00a0There are some safety concerns to consider such as the local environment especially around\u00a0wharves, visibility drops to nothing when collecting items from silt. The debris itself can be\u00a0extremely hazardous with sharp objects like broken glass, heavy objects like shopping\u00a0trolleys and tyres or they are entanglement hazards such as fishing line. You will also need\u00a0to organise collection and disposal of the debris but we have found local councils very\u00a0supportive of our cleanup efforts.<\/p>\n

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The hard work kicks in after the dive, especially if you have lots of divers collecting lots of\u00a0debris. The focus of the Dive Against Debris Specialty is sorting, counting and reporting data
\n\u2013 but many hands make light work and once the debris is organised reporting is made easy\u00a0with the Dive Against Debris App.<\/p>\n

Our last clean up has just been approved as 4 divers headed out as part of World Oceans\u00a0Day and collected 8 pieces of Debris. A surprising but pleasing result for this site.<\/p>\n

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As you start reporting more dives you can also review your stats on the app and aim for the\u00a0next target \u2013 for us that will be our 40th Dive Against Debris Clean Up!<\/p>\n

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If you want to make your dives count ask the team at Dive HQ about the PADI Dive Against\u00a0Debris Specialty and make a difference today!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If your news feed is anything like mine you will be seeing daily posts about the harmful\u00a0effects of plastic on our oceans, our fish and even ourselves.\u00a0While there are plenty of great organisations highlighting the issues and offering solutions\u00a0the plastic problem can sometimes seem overwhelming but there are small steps we can\u00a0take to make a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":505,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=494"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":515,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494\/revisions\/515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/divehq.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}