On Saturday, July 12, 2014, 119 volunteer divers gathered at Dive Friends Bonaire @ Yellow Submarine for the latest quarterly clean up dive.  Due to the summer holidays, there were a large number of families with younger divers in attendance.   There was also a group of American high school students from the Road Less Traveled, a summer community service program along with the STINAPA Junior Rangers of Bonaire.  Their enthusiasm for volunteering really added to the atmosphere of the day.  The chosen dive site was the world famous Town Pier, normally off limits to divers

 Asko Zuidam of Dive Friends Bonaire provided a safety briefing to address what items should be collected and explained that anything with coral growing on it or creatures living inside of it should be left behind.   He also gave an explanation of how to carefully remove fishing line so as not to damage delicate sponges or corals. 

 After the briefing, the divers entered the water at Town Pier. When their bags were filled with marine debris, they brought the bags to the surface and handed them over to the Dive Friends crew who were working as shore support.  Volunteers checked once again to be sure that no marine creatures had been inadvertently included.  Then, everything was counted, tallied for Project AWARE’s Dive Against Debris program, and disposed of responsibly. 

Volunteers collected 414 glass beverage bottles,  107 cans, 46 pieces of dangerous fishing line, 15 hats,  97 plastic fragments, 29 plastic cups, 10 plastic flowers, 50 metal fragments, 1 highway cone, 1 live bullet, 2 rubber boots, 11 shoes and much more.  A total of 1,308 items were removed from the marine environment. 

 All participants and their families were welcomed back for a sunset BBQ and raffle at Dive Friends Bonaire @ Hamlet Oasis.  Dive Friends Bonaire and sponsors provided drinks and main courses, while participants supplied the pot luck side dishes.   In keeping with the spirit of “reduce, reuse, recycle,” Dive Friends Bonaire does not use disposable plates and cutlery, so the Road Less Traveled volunteers also spent a lot of extra time cleaning up after the clean-up.

Sponsors for the event include:  Deep Blue Gear, Ouray, Van Den Tweel, Sea Turtle Conservation Bonaire, Reef Safe Suncare, Body Glove, Bonaire East Coast Diving and Reef.

 The next quarterly Dive Friends Bonaire underwater cleanup is scheduled for Saturday, October 18th, 2014. 

Additional information about the cleanups is available at: http://www.dive-friends-bonaire.com/activities.html#cleanups .   All are welcome to join in.

 For more information about the Debris Free Bonaire initiative, visit www.debrisfreebonaire.com.

For more information about the Road Less Traveled, visit http://www.theroadlesstraveled.com/

For more information about the STINAPA Junior Rangers, visit http://www.stinapa.org/nee/juniorrangers.html

Dive Friends Bonaire is one of Bonaire’s premier diving facilities with convenient locations at Yellow Submarine, Hamlet Bonaire, Dive Inn, Sand Dollar and at Port Bonaire and three retail stores in Kralendijk. For additional information, visit http://www.dive-friends-bonaire.com.