A scientific ‘all-rounder’, South Australian, Reg Sprigg (b.1919 – d.1994) was a geologist and early environmentalist whose many credits include the discovery of the world’s oldest fossils in South Australia’s, Flinders Ranges and the first person in Australia to make… Read More ›
technical diving
Inky and Pinky: Puppy Love
1965 was, ‘The Year of Living Dangerously’. Operating in and out of Singapore and the dockyard at Sembawang throughout 1965 – during ‘Konfrontasi’ with Indonesia – there were, before again falling into an on-going routine of ship’s bottom searches and… Read More ›
The ‘Polly-Gaff’ Gas Analyser
Technology has enjoyed considerable advances since the Polly-Gaff’ Gas Analyser was first announced – almost thirty years ago, in the May 1997 pages of Scuba Diver Magazine —————– The inherent problem with gas analysers is their frailty. While primary diving… Read More ›
‘Margaret’ and Me
In the early ‘seventies the heavy demand for divers to work on the North Sea gas and oil platforms exceeded supply. Wages were high. So was the diver mortality rate. Confronted by a harsh environment and difficulties not previously encountered… Read More ›
Vale John Whitehead
Death seems intent on proving itself to me to be life’s last ‘Great Adventure’. On the weekend of October 4th & 5th 2025, yet another of my closest – and longest lasting – friends died. John Whitehead was a man… Read More ›
Vale Michael Menduno
On the 3rd October 2025, Michael Menduno – one of modern diving’s most enigmatic personalities – died following a stroke. Despite a public persona as the person whose name will, forever, be synonymous with the advent of ‘Technical Diving’ (as… Read More ›