The book, Cave Diving Articles and Opinions is on sale in the online store for $25. The link to the online shop is at the top of the page.

Wes Skiles
1958 – 2010

By Jill Heinerth, Photo by Louis Lamar

Wes was one of the greatest catalysts in our diving family.  I have no doubt that many people have had their most exciting, most frightening, wild, fulfilling times in life with Wes.  He was the spark that set creativity afire, that ignited the child in all of us. He was a teacher, from a family of teachers.  He mentored and nurtured almost everyday of his life.  He loved getting people started in anything… gave us encouragement, told us to dream and go get whatever it is that makes us whole. Read more »

From the Skiles Family - Memorial Service

In Memory of
WESLEY C. SKILES

Memorial Celebration and Service
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
at Ginnie Springs

The memorial service will begin at 6:00 pm
followed by a celebration of Wes’s life.

Ginnie Springs will be open to our guests
all afternoon. The celebration will last
into the evening. You may want to bring the
beverage of your choice and a picnic
supper or food to share.

The family requests that in lieu of flowers
donations be made in Wes’s name to:
the Alachua Conservation Trust.
alachuaconservationtrust.org

CDS BoD Meeting Agenda - 15 Aug 2010

At Ginnie Springs, FL

Revised - 07/16/10

12 Noon - Call to order

Old business: Read more »

When we switched to the new web server software we hoped to have a Web 2.0 site with a vibrant user community, sparkling discussions on our forums, a progressive online storefront, and valuable members-only content.  Over the last several months we've found that the membership would rather use the forums on CDF and TDS, the available storefront software does not integrate well with our accounting software (so we are using a third-party-hosted storefront), and we would rather just make all of the content available to everyone.  We have also found it nearly impossible to integrate the official membership list with the web site users list.

So we have eliminated logins for all general users.  We are still debating how to make the member list available in a form that does not cause the members to be spammed.  At some point in the future when we can manage the member/user lists better we might reinstate logins, but there are no specific plans to right now.

Essex Junction, Vermont
2-6 August, 2010

http://www.nss2010.com/

This year, the annual convention of the National Speleological Society will be held in Vermont near Lake Champlain.  Vermont may be a bit distant from our 'cave country', but unlike NFL, it is a nice place to be in August. Read more »

The new officers are:

Gene Melton - Chairman
Forrest Wilson - Vice Chairman
Wayne Kinard - Secretary
Tom McMillan - Treasurer
Frank Ohidy - Program Director (Property Manager)
Bill Rotella - Program Director (volunteers, committees)
Harry Averill - Training Chairman.

North Florida Springs Alliance

Kelly Jessop

The North Florida Springs Alliance is a Citizen Support Organization (CSO) for Peacock and Troy Springs State Park.  What is a CSO?  It is a nonprofit cooperative between state parks and the users, created by Florida legislation to conduct programs and activities to better the state park. Read more »

Beneath The Sea is America's largest consumer scuba and dive travel show.  It is held annually in Secaucus New Jersey, which is just a few miles from New York City.  The NSS-CDS will be selling books, tee-shirts, hats, videos, and whatever else we have laying around at booth 400A.  Stop by to replenish your collection of tee-shirts that make your non-cave-diving friends go 'huh?', or just to chat with current board of directors member Frank Ohidy, past chairman of the board of directors Gene Melton, or current web flunky, John DeRoo.