Week 3, Day 13

Today we worked with an airlift which has absolutely nothing to do with flying. Basically it is a vacuum that is used to dredge or clean the sea bed of sand and mud. Given my high level of cleanliness at home my wife would say I am in my element. Our task was to clean a concrete block that we had previously used to drill on. The Airlift was made up of a 12 foot long aluminum pipe connected to a pneumatic hose. As compressed air is injected into the pipe the resulting bubbles rise towards the output end of the pipe. The bubbles move water through the pipe sucking debris from the lower end and depositing it from the upper end of the pipe.

Underneath the water it can be quiet heavy but nowhere near it’s weight on the surface. It was a lot of fun and after taking turns, the day flew by.

After out dive we headed back to The Underwater Centre and completed our second theory assessment on diver tables. It was not very hard, however several questions had similar answers and some were phrased in a way that could confuse you. I attained a 85% which was good, however several students failed so anybody doing this course… make sure you know your diving tables well!