Isolation Room whale Bone Restoration Dive 1

[Superlyte27]

Please note we had divers from 3 organizations NACD, NSS-CDS and GUE.

And the IANTD

[Sludge]

Please explain "land owner". Who actually "owns" the underwater caves?

In this case, the citizens of the state of Florida.

[MichaelAngelo]

And the IANTD

thanks for letting me know and I should say certified by.
and thanks for your work

[jstrang]

Pete working. Two words I would never have put together in a sentence.


Great job everyone!

[Diverlee]

Thanks for your work and a big congrats on 500!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[MichaelAngelo]

Whale Bone Restoration Report
I am sorry this is late but some personal issues took up my time for this last week. On March 2nd and 3rd the restoration team made dives furthering the restoration of the whale bone. On March 2nd the team consisting of Peter McCumber (assistant), David Sheard (photographer and safety diver) and myself – Michael Angelo Gagliardi. We scootered to stage rock where we dropped stage bottles and recovered tools we had stored there. We then scootered to the 2100 line marker where we had left a jump reel on February 27th. Dropping the DPVs we swam to the whalebone. I finished attaching the pieces I had reconstructed in my studio with the Epoxy. The epoxy out of the tube is clear heavy body2 part glue dispensed thru a mixing tip on a dispensing gun. It is similar in look to Aquaseal. When glue the pieces back on I strove to keep the epoxy away from edges of each piece. After attaching all the pieces I did a cleanup of any dripped glue. Peter was excellent as my assistant where we used simple hand signals to pass the epoxy gun back and forth. Peter would hand me the gun then when I past it back he’d change the mixing tip ready to hand back to me. In the studio, I was able to add coloring agents to the epoxy in an attempt to match the color of the fossil. The question became how do we add the color under water in the cave? What we did was put the color in zip lock baggies then put the gun tip into the bag and add the epoxy. Kneading the bag mixed the colorant into the epoxy. I then pulled the bag over my right hand so it was inside out. This allowed me to scrap the epoxy off the bag with an artist palette knife and fill voids and sculpt in missing pieces. At about 60 minutes onsite I thumbed the dive. We returned to the scooters and did our exit as planned. Dive time:165 minutes, Depth 97 feet.
On March 3rd, the work was for all practical purposes the same as March 2nd with the exception that David Sheard did some marco photography documenting the restoration. The team consisted of myself (project leader), Peter McCumber (assistant), David Sheard (photography) and Jesse Folker (safety diver). We reached a point where the fossil is whole again but the epoxy was too soft to carve to match the original pieces. I turned the dive after about 30 – 45 minutes onsite because I felt this was as far as I could go at this point. I will periodically revisit the site to check how the epoxy cures. I believe it will stiffen up enough to finish carving in a few months. The color is also slightly lighter but again I think it will darken with age. If the epoxy system continues to work in the future months then we can consider other repairs. We removed all tools and the storage bags. Dive Time: 125 Minutes. I wish to thank the following volunteers. Advisory - Kelley Jessop, Forrest Wilson. Recovery Phase – Rich Courtney and Stacy Dreher. Studio documentation – Gene Page. In Water Phase – Peter McCumber, David Sheard, Jesse Folker, Krzysztof Dupel, Jeff Rouse. Shops – Amigo’s Dive Center and Cave Country Dive for supplying free gas to the team. I also worked closely with Rose Meadows and Ginnie Springs Resort.

[MichaelAngelo]

In this case, the citizens of the state of Florida.

Since it was impossible to contact all Florida's Citizens I worked with Ginnie Springs who manages the site.

[Sludge]

impossible to contact all Florida's Citizens

I was sitting by the phone, waiting for your call.

[MichaelAngelo]

I was sitting by the phone, waiting for your call.

I sent a mass e-mail to all the citizens of Florida but a demon bounced it back. I suggest a mass internet exorcism.

[Sludge]

No, I think the problem is that I still have a Georgia area code.