Poop Cleaning Here I Come...

With my training all done and the long wait until the schedule was written up behind me, it was time for my first Aquarium dive.  With enough fear and anxiety to fill my van I arrived at the Vancouver Aquarium and waited outside the door I was told to wait by.... I guess arriving at just after 7:00 for an 8:00 shift was a little too early...lol.  But to my relief after waiting a little less than a half hour one of the divers I would be joining today arrived and showed me another door to check for an employee who could let us in.  Once inside and all the way down to the dive room it was time to start getting ready.  Needless to say I was sweating from nerves long before being inundated with the heat from the dive room situated beneath miles of heat pipes and far warmer than I would have liked it.  After grabbing a weight belt and getting it and my BCD set up it was time to head to the deck and see if our tender for the day, Kristi Hefron (yes the same Kristi from Certified Poop Cleaner...) needed any help setting up.  With everything ready for the dive it was time to finish gearing up and head to the exhibit.  Being a new diver I am only allowed to use Beauty (the twin scrubber) and limited to the Wild Coast Exhibit, home to my friends the dolphins Hana, Helen and Spinaker.

So with my kit on, I took my seat on the edge of the deck and waited while Kristi fastened the surface supply to my BCD and passed me my hose for my Dry Suit and my regulator... then it was time to dive in.  Using the seated entry and then joining my dive buddy for the day we descended together taking beauty to the bottom of the tank.  With the vacuum hose attached it was time to start my cleaning.  Following a 62 minute dive, one of my first dives beyond an hour and one of the advantages of diving surface supply, it was time to exit the water and call it a day.  With the cleaning done, and my coupon for a free coffee and muffin in hand it was time to head out and look forward to my next dive... dive number 50... and the final step in my certification as a Master Scuba Diver!

Certified Poop Cleaner...

This week, for four days I went through a fairly intensive training regimen on diving including learning the (new to me) DCIEM tables used by the Canadian Military and promoted by Worksafe BC.  We covered the history of diving from Robert Boyle and Jacques Charles to Joseph Gay-Lussac, John Dalton and William Henry on day one and a day of learning and certifying as a DAN Emergency Oxygen Provider, then, it was time to get wet!  Off to a local pool where it was time for us to swim laps.. oh yes, my favourite thing...lol... followed by free diving to the bottom of a 15 foot pool to recover a weight and return to the surface.  The morning of day number three started promptly, and with most of us on time, we started by dragging all of our gear and tanks out to pool side and were greeted by an amazing surprise.  Apparently despite Melanie's claims in You may call me... "The Dolphin Poop Cleaner" about us not being around or in direct contact with the animals, we would be diving with Daisy.

Daisy is an an orphaned harbor porpoise currently being rehabilitated and trained by the Marine Mammal trainers and Doctors at the Aquarium.

We would be given this amazing opportunity, under the direct supervision of Kristi Hefron (Senior Marine Mammal Trainer at the Vancouver Aquarium). Going two divers at a time, along with Jeremy Heywood (Dive Safety Officer at the Vancouver Aquarium), we would enter the water to demonstrate our in water skills.  Step one though, and my most difficult, was to follow Kristi's instruction to "not touch Daisy"... This is tough, and for anyone who ever gets the chance to see her you'll understand, she is incredibly playful and loves people.  So to get in the water you need to wait until she is out of the way (or usually distracted by Kristi throwing a toy) and then do a very careful and quiet seated entry into the pool.  Now to just resist the temptation to touch Daisy as she comes up to see what new toys Kristi has brought for her to play with...lol.  Then it was on to skills... pretty simple stuff, swim out to the centre of the pool, descend and wait for Jeremy, then, when indicated, do a reg remove and recover, mask flood and clear, (If it ain't broke don't fix it.... and from SORTED to super STARS), and finally remove your weight belt and bcd and then put them back on... no worries.. a couple flash-backs to Seals to Emergencies but other than that no issues.  The afternoon was just as easy, and just as hard not to touch daisy...lol.  Back in the water but this time with the surface supply attached, now we can breathe forever if they keep switching tanks up top...lol.  A couple laps of the pool and all done, time for the next group and then the end of another fun day.  Day four of our training and day two in the water saw us setting up gear beside the Beluga med tank, today we would be taking turns descending into the 10 foot med tank on surface supply and learn to operate the double scrubber lovingly named Beauty.  With everyone finished we cleaned up the equipment, rinsed the gear and changed back into our street clothes to debrief with Jeremy and have him sign off in our log books marking our completion of our program and making us official and certified Poop Cleaners!