In attendance:

Jim Hull
Chris A. Auth
Kaitlin Hale
Denise Roberts
Wade Pfennig
Claudia Pfennig
Lyle Carlisle
Mary Graesch
Kathy Washburn
Dave Washburn
Mark Evans

Club Finance Report: In April, the club balance was $210.56.

Thanks to last month’s presenters, the Bureau of Reclamation Dive Team and Dennis Hawkins.

Trip Reports: Folks are out diving….Wendover, Crane Falls and Bob Rice reports on the web page. Temp at Bob Rice Pond is 45-47 degrees.

Upcoming meetings:
May 8th, General Fire Tour and Hydro Testing Facilites, location TBD.
We’re planning a possible Lucky Peak dive in May.
June 12th meeting will be a dive at Bob Rice Pond. In June, the Lake Harbor cleanup will take place as well.
July will be a Lucky Peak dive and hopefully the Blue Hart Springs dive.

Regional Dive Trips: Jim Hull had some ideas about regional dive trips. Call or email Jim if interested. Some of the proposed trips are Tahoe, Coeur d’Alene, Lake Pend Orielle, June 23 Point Defiance in Tacoma.

Our Yahoo Group Site: Jim Hull asked for input on the proposal to clean up our email distribution list that is currently located on the www.ddofid.com website. The proposal is to have folks migrate over to the yahoo group posting board by requiring everyone to have a yahoo logon. This would consolidate two distribution lists into one and make maintenance so much easier. This does not mean that you have to use a yahoo email account, but with the yahoo logon you can go the posting board and enter the email that you wish to use and that would be the one distribution list that we maintain. The current method is difficult to maintain because of a variety of emails per person, and they are not always kept up to date. Everyone present was in favor of the change. Jim will send out specific information and the goal is to have the streamlining done by July 1st, 2007. Contact Jim with any concerns or questions.

Speaker - Gene and Sandy Ralston of Ralston and Associates were the presenters. They are environmental consultants, dealing with water issues and are semi retired. In the mid 1980’s they began building search and recovery jet boats for the Boise River. Since that time they have been involved in search and rescue.

In 1999 they saw a Side Scan Sonar used at a site in Oregon. They purchased the equipment themselves and have been doing search and recovery with side scan for 6-7 years now. They have recovered 47 people in the last 6 years.

Some of the more interesting projects they have worked on:
-search and location of a person in Priest Lake in 300 ft of water that they believe is a priest from the late 1800’s.
- the Natalie Hollaway case in Aruba.
- Finding a car from 1929 in Lake Crescent.
- Locating homicide victims of the Russian mob.
- Bringing peace to so many families who have lost loved ones.

Side Scan Sonar uses sound to create images. A computer processes the returned signal into a plan view of the bottom. A tow fish is the object towed under the boat that sends and receives the sound waves. Many times they are made of pvc and are very lightweight (approximately 20 lbs). The one they use is custom designed, stainless steel, and heavy enough that it hangs more vertical in the water, therefore using less cable to run it deep.

They have about 1000 foot of cable for the umbilical, which contains 3 co-axial cables and 6 conductors. They get the real time image displayed in bands across the monitor and the picture is a scrolling image built up from each successive band.

It takes a lot of practical experience in reading the display to pick out objects. Keys are using the shadows behind objects to help flesh out the picture of the object in you head and to identify it as of interest or not of interest.

Problems can arise from debris on the bottom (trees, logs, boulders) as well as composition of the bottom (rock, sand, silt, mud). Too much debris can hide objects of interest. If the bottom is rockier or harder, there is less the differentiation between objects of interest and the bottom, so they are harder to spot. Many times the sonar can even locate items buried in silt that are not visible to the eye, as the composition of the object would reflect differently from the surrounding mud.

Gene and Sandy spend 150-250 days a year on search and recovery projects all over the U.S., typically only getting their expenses covered. They do this because their heart is in it, not to make money. We are all very lucky that folks like Gene and Sandy do what they do. They are very kind and generous people, and the presentation was extremely interesting. Thanks to Gene and Sandy for their time!!