We maxed out at 1300ft and spent 3.5 hours cruising down Lophelia Reef, an amazing ecosystem of lophelia corals, white sponges, squat lobsters, pompom anemones, cat sharks, and sea lillies adorning house-sized boulders of fossilized coral and basalt.

The submarine is the hardest shooting environment I’ve encountered— low light, movement (both the sub and the animals), distorted perspective (the submarine’s convex viewport messes with depth perception), and cramped environment. On this expedition I mostly shot video (currently being editing), but several my still photos turned out decent.

Lia, I have no idea how you did it. I guess talent helps.

Enjoy these shots of alien life!

300ft: The surface fades away.

350ft: Massive elephant ear sponge

400ft: Looking up Half Moon Bay wall

700ft: Sea lilly reaching into the darkness

800ft: Unidentified fish (Karl claims to have never seen it before)

900ft: Polka dot anglerfish

1000ft: The sponge belt

1000ft: White sponges in the sponge belt

1100ft: Brilliant pompom anemone

1100ft: Incredible 30+ft long deep sea siphonophore (yes, this is an animal)

1300ft: Brittle stars along a wire coral

1300ft: Blood red anemone

1300ft: Squat lobster and crinoid

In many parts of the Western World, Friday is a special night of the week reserved for mischief and mayhem. After languishing for five days at the office, monotonously battling the personal demons deviously conspiring unleash their tequila-fueled furor upon the week’s conclusion, five o’clock finally arrives. As the sun sets, a new weekend rises. For this one night, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. (Then Saturday comes— recovery; and Sunday— repentance).

On Roatan, mere anarchy is a pervasive state of mind. How else can one rest comfortably in a Third World country while the government undergoes a miniature coup? Oh, wait, that’s right: on the beach with a glass of rum and pineapple.

I’m showering off the sea salt and rolling out on the West End Night Dive……. for now, enjoy this sneak preview of some shots from Karl Stanley’s submarine…

Welcome back to surreality!

This is just a quick update to explain my lack of updates over the last week. It’s not that I haven’t had material to write about. I have, and that is the problem. For those eager for the next update in the adventures of TheScubaGeek, I offer this list of events in my life. Each of these items warrants a proper follow-up article (and I swear I’ll get them done), but for now, this is the best I can manage at 1am on Honduran highspeed….

• Pete found a juvenile lionfish at 38ft near Dixie’s Place. We captured the bugger and brought him to the surface, where he survived for three days on a diet of rum and Funions.
• A poisoned dog dropped dead on the Coconut Tree Divers dock. Submarine Karl said he didn’t need the carcass to feed the six-gill sharks, so we took Lassie for her last walk… rope, cinderblock, boat, and abyss.
• I was dive-bombed by an eight-foot manta ray in an incredibly rare encounter with the living leviathan (my first on Roatan). My Open Water students (on only their second dive!) have no idea how spoiled they are…
• I crossed paths with an enormous loggerhead turtle at 50ft on White Hole. It had approximately a four foot carapace and a wicked prehistoric tail.

And last but not least,

• I spent three and a half hours in Karl Stanley’s submarine Idabel shooting video of the crazy inhabitants of the deep sea. This expedition (my third with Karl) certainly deserves its own article… how else can I descibe the mindblowing experience of cruising 1300ft underwater in a homemade submarine. Story, pictures, and movies coming soon……..

Right, more updates coming when my eyes can focus… until then…

I love my life!!!

Sweeping silently along the silty slopes 1400ft under the Caribbean Sea off Roatan, Honduras, Karl Stanley piloted his deep diving submarine Idabel upon a writhing mass of brittle stars entangled around the brilliant golden lattice of gold coral. My meager five megapixel camera did its best to capture the alien bundle of deep sea life, oblivious to the fact that the gold coral I was filming is over 2000 years old.

Turn down the audio… I never edited this video, so the white noise of the submarine is a bit blown out.

Read more about the amazingly ancient gold corals at Deep-Sea News…

Look closely…

Tank. BCD. Regulator. Slates. The abandoned weight belt lies some twenty feet below.

The depth? 370 feet (112m).

The reason? A dead diver.

Mind you, I was never stupid enough to see this site myself whilst scuba diving. Even with a Trimix tec rig and a proper dive plan, this depth is more than a bit insane. No, this eerie shot was taken from the safety of Karl Stanley’s deep diving submersible Idabel.

Diving is a very safe sport when done properly— though complete safety is never guaranteed, proper practices have consistently shown to successfully mitigate risk. Done improperly, however, one can quickly and tragically discover how unforgiving an environment the underwater world can be. It’s this healthy fear and respect that keeps us, our students, and our customers alive as professional divers. No matter how alluring the deep may be, there is nothing down there worth dying for.

In conclusion, any time I consider doing something a bit rash with regard to depths, the sobering image of this diver’s gear dangling over the icy abyss in eternal darkness, his corpse long since disintegrated, sears across my neuronal pathways— as I hope it does yours.

Remember: Safety First!