Seeking feedback on Aqaba Divesites

[amyzengrace]

Hi,
I'm working on an article for the marine conservation society here in Jordan and am interested in any impressions divers who have dived in the Red Sea in Aqaba have had on the condition of the reefs and the general underwater environment.
Your feedback is urgently needed due to the increasing development and infrastructure projects Aqaba currently is experiencing. Thank you for your time.

[Edward]

Hi,
I'm working on an article for the marine conservation society here in Jordan and am interested in any impressions divers who have dived in the Red Sea in Aqaba have had on the condition of the reefs and the general underwater environment.
Your feedback is urgently needed due to the increasing development and infrastructure projects Aqaba currently is experiencing. Thank you for your time.

Hi,

I believe the only way of providing acceptable 'evidence' of the reef's current condition is to find a scientific survey done in the past and compare it with another survey conducted to the same standards by yourself. Anything else is just perception.

From my experience talking to scientists in the Caribbean is that funding is easier to secure if the research is aiming to 'prove' Global Warming than one that doesn't have that preconception from the outset. From you description you appear to have already concluded the development has been detrimental to the marine environment.

Regards

Edward

[amyzengrace]

Hi again;
Thanks for your comments, but I'm looking for the impressions divers have of the Aqaba reefs and conditions. Our campaign is targeting the local population on the importance of the reefs and the necessity of being proactive when it comes to things like plastic and other garbage, chemicals and silt dredged up from ongoing development projects, anchoring on the reefs and jet skiin in the Marine Park.
We have had a lot of negative comments from PADI divers, which are well-represented in Aqaba, and I am eager to get further comparative input from people who take vacations to go diving.
If we can show the local people enough negative comments about the dive sites, they might connect "economic survival" to "preservation of the reefs" as tourism is the major source of income for that whole region.
Thanks again.

[seadeuce]

Hi,

I dived Aqaba back in 2001, and again in March of this year.

My recollections of the first trip are of some damaged reefs and some lovely ones.

This time out I dived Cable Canyons and ended up doing a clearance operation at 46m with Rod A., whom you no doubt know well.
Cans, rubbish, plastics. I could have filled ten bags rather than the one I had been handed by Rod!

I will say I have no problem with doing this on a dive that I paid to do, and would do so again.

You guys need to educate the locals that the sea is not a dumping ground, and especially in a place like Aqaba, there are very few currents to disperse the waste.
Where it lands, there it stays.

Jordan is a lovely country, the people are friendly, and the topside attractions are excellent.
But beneath your part of the Red Sea neglect is making itself felt, and all too visibly.

A pity!

I'd like to show your locals "before and after" video/photos from the reefs. They might then take some interest. The younger ones, that is. I doubt if the older generation would ever change.

You need to make an environmental video showing how a discarded plastic bottle desecrates an area of reef. Talk won't do the job.

BTW I'm a CMAS diver, not PADI. But I value the underwater scenery and hate to find that Coke can on a dive. It really spoils the scene and reminds me of how uncaring some people can be.

Best of luck,

Seadeuce

[amyzengrace]

Thanks, Seadeuce,(great name)
I agree with you about the reefs. I'm BSAC, having learned to dive in Yanbu, Saudi 20+ years ago. Unfortunately, nothing compares, and when I hit the water in Aqaba, I thought I had seen better dive sites in the hurricane ravaged Caribbean.
There is so much development (resorts, infrastructure, etc) going in down in Aqaba that it is having an adverse affect on the reefs. Tala Bay resort has closed off the 5 most southern dive sites in the Marine Park from the shore, unless you pay them. The Saudi Boarder wall dive is prohibited due to security concerns, leaving only the Exectric Plant as the only wall dive, but when I was last down there at the end of August, some kind soul had swiped the mooring buoy and we couldn't dive there. We were down there for an underwater cleanup campaign... 70 divers took 25 minutes to pull over one tonne of plastic bottles, plates, cups, and crap out of Eel Canyon. The public cleaned up 1/2 tonne of similar off the beach.
Yes, I know Rod A.... wouldn't dive with anyone else because he has a boat. The local dive operators, including the son of the instructor who trained King Hussein in 1956, are complaining because they have 5 beach-access dive sites available to them with all this crap being developed. They've approached the authorities, but the reply was, "Get a boat." Go figure.
The Cedar Pride is still there, but all the soft corals are gone. Reading Lonely Planet's Red Sea Diving (?) about Aqaba dive sites is like reading about something in another universe because it resembles nothing I've seen.
I'm working with the Royal Conservation Society on a public awareness campaign--just trying to get them to realise that dead reefs don't bring diving tourists. Somewhere, someone did a masters thesis on the economic impact diving tourism has on city of Aqaba... i'm still trying to get it.
I want to thank you for your input==if it's ok with you, I'd like to quote you in my article, can change the name to protect the innocent. By the way, Rod is the biggest bitcher about all the problems underwater, and probably the greatest cleaner of the environment. 5 stars to him. Thanks again

[Steph]

Thanks, Seadeuce,(great name)
Somewhere, someone did a masters thesis on the economic impact diving tourism has on city of Aqaba... i'm still trying to get it.


we got:

MSc. Thesis 1999 Smith, D. J.
A survey of community structure and species diversity of the coral reefs of Aqaba, Jordan (Red Sea)


Any good?


Do you perhaps have the correct title, or author of the tourist one?
Then i will have another look.
Tourism aqaba just produces to many none related hits to wade through all of them... our library catalogue search facillities are not the most sophisticated i'm afraid.

or have a look yourself here, If it was a MSc thesis from the UK you stand a good chance that it was done here in Bangor.

http://library.bangor.ac.uk/search

Steph

[Eddie Clamp]

Thanks, Seadeuce,(great name)

There is so much development (resorts, infrastructure, etc) going in down in Aqaba that it is having an adverse affect on the reefs. Tala Bay resort has closed off the 5 most southern dive sites in the Marine Park from the shore, unless you pay them. The Saudi Boarder wall dive is prohibited due to security concerns, leaving only the Exectric Plant as the only wall dive, but when I was last down there at the end of August, some kind soul had swiped the mooring buoy and we couldn't dive there. We were down there for an underwater cleanup campaign... 70 divers took 25 minutes to pull over one tonne of plastic bottles, plates, cups, and crap out of Eel Canyon. The public cleaned up 1/2 tonne of similar off the beach.
The Cedar Pride is still there, but all the soft corals are gone. Reading Lonely Planet's Red Sea Diving (?) about Aqaba dive sites is like reading about something in another universe because it resembles nothing I've seen.
I'm working with the Royal Conservation Society on a public awareness campaign--just trying to get them to realise that dead reefs don't bring diving tourists. Somewhere, someone did a masters thesis on the economic impact diving tourism has on city of Aqaba... i'm still trying to get it.


Sorry to hear that the reefs of Aqaba are suffering. My logbook shows that I dived there for a few days while there on an RN Ship in December 86. Three dives with the International Diving Centre - run by the Colcloughs.

Went back there for a week with an Army diving Exped from Cyprus during Jan -89. Dived around the Royal Diving Centre, Black Rock, Old Ship, Cedar Pride, Saudi border + others.

My log enthuses about the quality of the reef and the fishes. All changed now it appears :mad:.

Eddie