Workshop 2010 Presenters
Saturday Presenters:
Kevin Gurr
Kevin Gurr was there at the beginning of technical diving and has remained active in the concept ever since. Kevin is both a shipwreck and a cave diver and was the first Trimix instructor outside of the USA. A marine engineer by trade his company are responsible for the design and development of many advanced diving products such as the VR3 computer and both the Ouroboros and Sentinel closed circuit rebreathers. Kevin's diving projects range from the first expedition to the Britannic in 1997 to diving the Titanic in the MIR submersibles.
Brian Kakuk – Founder/Director of the Bahamas Caves Research Foundation
Brian is a former U.S. Navy Diver with 27 years of professional diving experience. His work has taken him beneath nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers, to jumping from helicopters into 10 foot seas, to record penetrations of underwater cave systems around the world. His research diving work with the National Museum of the Bahamas and various governmental and scientific institutions has revealed new species of cave adapted marine life and new species of extinct terrestrial animal fossils that are now repainting the picture of the Bahamas past environment. His expertise in diving safety has been used widely in the feature film industry as a Diving Safety Officer and underwater stuntman. With more than 3000 exploration cave dives, Brian is considered one of the leading authorities on the underwater/underground environments of the Bahamas and is a veteran of multiple high profile underwater cave expeditions in the Bahamas, Mexico and the U.S.
Jill Heinerth
Jill Heinerth is a true explorer, using her creativity to give us a peek at a breathtaking world few will ever experience. One of the most experienced rebreather divers in the world, Jill is also an award-winning filmmaker. She wrote, produced, and appeared in Water’s Journey, the PBS documentary series that takes viewers on travels through the world’s greatest water systems. Jills numerous commendations include induction to the Women Diver's Hall of Fame and being named a living legend by Sport Diving Magazine. She was named Canadian Technical Diver of the Year, and holds numerous pioneering diving records.
Walter Pickel
Walter has been diving for over 25 years. He grew up diving golf course lakes for golf balls and the black rivers of the South Carolina low country in hopes of finding treasure or anything historic. In the US Navy, he became a diver and worked as a ship’s diver (submarines) and as an underwater husbandry diver (submarine tender). After moving to Florida and a break from diving, Walter’s interests soon fell back to diving and he started focusing on technical diving, eventually finding his way into the beauty of Florida’s caverns and caves.
Having developed the taste for exploration through participation in several expeditions to Mexico, as well as exploration projects in Florida, Walter generally focuses on lesser-known or unexplored systems. His most recent expeditions have been in the Dominican Republic as well as the state of Yucatan, Mexico.
Walter is a NACD certified Cave Diver, KISS CCR diver, DPV Pilot and Cave Rescue and Recovery diver. Additionally, Walter holds TRIMIX certifications and is certified as a NAUI Technical Support Team Leader. Previously he served as the NACD Public Relations Committee Chairman, Election Administrator for the NSS-CDS and Board of Director member of Karst Underwater Research. He is presently the DSO (Dive Safety Officer) for the Weeki Wachee Springs Exploration Project and serves on the Board of Directors for the Advanced Diver Magazine Exploration Foundation.
Jason Richards
Jason Richards has been caving for more than 15 years. He started as a cave diver, but later turned to dry caving and sump diving in an attempt to access more cave dives. He is currently involved in multiple mapping and exploration projects in his home state of Tennessee, where, with the help of other Tennessee cave divers, he has doubled the number of known dive caves in Tennessee. In addition, he is also involved in exploration and survey projects in Florida, to include Jackson Blue Cave, Hole in the Wall Cave, Springboard Cave, Maunds Spring and others. His most recent publications include a chapter in the new book "Blue Spring Cave," where he describes the dives made attempting to connect Blue Spring Cave (Sparta, TN) with its resurgence spring. He also contributed two chapters to the NSS-CDS book /Articles and Opinions/, is a regular contributor to Underwater Speleology and an infrequent contributor to The Journal of American Mexican Cave Studies, and Advanced Diver Magazine. Jason has been very involved in state cave surveys, helping to re-invigorate the Florida Cave Survey after more than 20 years of inactivity, and in Tennessee, creating a digital archive of all submitted maps less than Grade 5, which had previously been ignored as insignificant. Jason is also very interested in the conservation of Mexican caves, and has been actively working with the Independent University of Yucatan (Merida) cataloging and mapping archaeologically significant caves for the Mexican government, with an eye for preserving Mexican national heritage sites before they are destroyed by commercial ventures or pollution. In addition, he has been working with the Quintana Roo Speleological Society to create a highly detailed map of a cave system known for harboring two very rare species of remipedes. Jason believes that unmapped cave is unexplored cave, and that every jump reel should come with knotted line.
Harley Means (of the Florida Geological Survey) – The State Of Our Springs
Harley has spent years working to understand Florida's hydrogeology. He served on the Governor's Spring's Task Force and is a champion of our springs and caves. One of the most knowledgeable ambassadors for the aquifer, he will bring us up to date on the health of our rivers and springs.
Agnes Milowka
While initially fascinated with reefs and wrecks, these days it is the caves, both wet and dry, that have Ag enthralled. She is most passionate about the exploration of never before seen passage. Ag spent a year living and diving in Florida's cave country, where she got her first taste of laying line. It is a phenomenal feeling to reach a place that no other human has ever seen before and she was hooked. Upon her return to Oz she became one of only a handful of divers to dive to the back end of Cocklebiddy Cave, the longest cave in Australia. Recently she pushed through numerous sumps in order to discover in excess of 1500m of dry cave passage, in what has become the deepest cave in Victoria. Ag continues to go where no man has gone before, exploring and pushing new cave systems and bringing back images from her adventures... and is looking forward to sharing them at the workshop.
Kelly Jessop - The North Florida Springs Alliance
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. Kelly has served as Chairman for the NFSA BOD for a little over a year now and, with the BOD, has brought many great projects to fruition.
Fritzi Olsen - Current Problems
Fritzi's life has always revolved around the water -- first in swimming, then her sculpture inspiration, her choice of recreational pursuits, and now her work with Current Problems. CURRENT PROBLEMS, INC., a non-profit organization, was established in 1993 when a small group of friends began working together to clean up the trash and contaminants in and along the banks of north Florida’s Santa Fe River. Fifteen years later, this grassroots organization has expanded its focus to include urban creeks, rivers, ponds and lakes throughout north central Florida.
Sunday Clinic Leaders:
Lamar Hires - IUCRR Workshop and Sidemount Clinic
Open water certified in 1979, Lamar went on to become a modern day explorer and dive pioneer. He has spent over twenty five years exploring and surveying the extensive underwater cave systems near his home in north central Florida. A legend among Florida cave divers, Lamar is known for his expertise in sidemount diving. He developed the very first training guidelines for sidemounting and has taught many of today's well-known sidemount divers. Lamar is the training coordinator for IUCRR whose mission is to support all Public Safety Agencies in the rescue and/or recovery of victims in an underwater environment (with an overhead obstruction such as caves, caverns, mine shafts, etc.).
Kevin Gurr - In-water rebreather experience
See profile above.
Frank Ohidy - Haskel Booster repair & maintenance
Rodney Nairne & Suzi Dudas - Scooter clinic
Over the years, many types of underwater scooters /DPV's have been used to ease the drudgery of swimming long distances with a heavy equipment load. In 2000, Submerge Inc. was started to develop a state-of-the-art underwater scooter. The design and engineering process have made Rodney and Suzi the leading experts in the world on scooters.
Jason Richards & Mike Poucher - Survey clinics - Classroom & Field
Cave surveyors Michael Poucher and Jason Richards will be presenting two concurrent cave survey classes for surveyors at different levels. For the new surveyors and divers interested in the basic mechanics of cave survey, Michael Poucher will be teaching how to start your cave survey, the mechanics of underwater cave survey, instruments, setting up your data, and much more.
For the cave surveyor who already has some data, Jason Richards will be showing how to turn your data into a raw line plot using Walls that can be exported toArcGIS for plotting onto a topo map, or into Adobe Illustrator for drawing a full detail map. Jason will also demonstrate how "round-tripping" can be used between Walls and Adobe Illustrator to draw your cave map in small sections, rather than waiting until all of the data is collected.
Mike Poucher's survey workshop will run from 9 am to about 3 pm. Plan to meet on site on Sunday. Maps will be handed out on Saturday to those that sign up.
The class will be held at the Santa Fe Community College Bat Cave Preserve. Mike will lecture on surveying techniques and do a couple land drills before breaking into small groups and going into the cave and doing a knotted line survey of one of the passages. This is a dry cave and may require some crawling through mud depending on the weather. We recommend long pants and lace up shoes or boots to go into the cave (no flip flops). Helmets with lights will be provided or you can bring your own. We ask for a $5 donation to offset the cost of helmet maintenance.
We will eat lunch on-site, so bring a bag lunch and something to drink. Also water for the rest of the day.
There are bathroom facilities on-site and a pavillion with picnic tables for the lecture and lunch. <!--EndFragment-->
Jason Richard's Class: Plan to meet at Otter Springs at the Spring House Lodge. To get the most out of this class, you will need to bring along a laptop computer running Windows XP or better. Required software will be provided on a CD-ROM. If you have any cave data from a survey that you are working on, please bring it along, and we can use it for examples. <!--EndFragment-->
Tom Morris - EcoTours at Otter Springs (hike & paddle)
Probably best known for his roles in the PBS documentaries Water's Journey, Tom is an ecosystems biologist and one of the most knowledgeable scientists in the world on the flora and fauna of Florida. Tom brings passion and the ability to convey complex systems in understandable lay terms. Tom's field trips are the opportunity of a lifetime.
Pete Butt - Dry Caving field trip to Bat Cave
Pete Butt is the co-owner of Karst Environmental Services, a hydrogeological consulting firm specializing in scientific investigations of surface and subterranean hydrogeologic and biologic properties of karst terrains, including springs, sinkholes, rivers and associated ecosystems. Pete is a veteran dry caver, having led many trips of new and experienced dry cavers through Bat Cave in Alachua County.
Bob Sheridan - Technical Cylinder System Inspections
An overview of what takes places during inspections on cylinders, valves and manifolds for use with air, oxygen, nitrox and mixed gases.
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Ocean Management Systems “OMS” Regulators
The function, features, care and maintenance of the Workhorse, High Performance and Deep Performance regulators.
Bob Sheridan is the OMS Florida rep and regulator repair trainer. Bob built the first Nitrox regulator for the dive industry while working for Beuchat USA and Fr. He has been diving since 1958, training diving instructors since 1972 and started UDT (dive agency) in 2000, of which he is now president.