Over the last decade diving in Antarctica has become a tourist activity and so it is not surprising that a book has now surfaced on this subject. Its intention is to introduce the general public/Antarctic tourist to recreational diving in Antarctica and to describe potential sites for diving activities. It gives an overview of the history of diving in Antarctica, the ways a tourist can approach Antarctic diving, information on guidelines to Antarctica for visitors and it describes 25 dive sites with illustrations and maps. That this information can also be useful for scientific diving was shown when we used her site descriptions to evaluate which sites were of scientific interest for our scientific cruise to Antarctica in 2006.
The book is organized in two major section - ‘Diving in Antarctica’ and ‘The site guide’ - which are split into smaller chapters on ‘How to get there’, ‘The Diving’, special notes about leopard seals, underwater imaging systems and individual dives site descriptions. The illustrations, maps and underwater colour photographs are well chosen and presented, but the figure legends describing the underwater life are not always correct.
The section describing the history of diving in Antarctica is brief and, although interesting, could have been more so if the author had referenced the scientific dive programmes undertaken by several nations for decades. I see scientific diving as an important part of the history of diving in the Southern Ocean, not only in terms of the changes in diving equipment used but also with respect to safe operating procedures for diving in such cold water. In general the advice given in regard to Health and Safety aspects of diving and the consequences of potential dive accidents could have been more precise - a dive accident during an Antarctic cruise will have a major impact on the trip for everybody else on board.
Lisa Trotter gives a sound account of the different travel options for tourists with an interest in diving and discusses the pros and cons of different sized vessels for diving expeditions. Her descriptions of the dive sites, 19 along the Antarctic Peninsula and six on South Georgia, are the highlight of the book. They give potential divers and interested readers a short introduction to the history of each site and describe conditions that can be experienced within the dive. An internationally known icon key provides a quick summary of the characteristics of each site. The depth of the dive is given as well as comments on potential ice conditions and lists of the marine flora and fauna which might be encountered. ‘Special note’ boxes are given for dive sites where possible dangers like leopard seals or small boat traffic might occur. Unfortunately some of the boxes (e.g. on p. 50) end with an unfinished sentence.
For me the book has two negative features; one is the description of the dive sites in the relation to safety and the other is the biological information provided.
In her introduction Trotter refers to the special conditions for diving in Antarctica and the non-availability of hyperbaric chambers. She writes that diving is often limited to a depth of 18 m, which I see as a sensible statement. Unfortunately nine dive sites, including Aitcho Island and Paradise Harbour, are described down to 40 m, a depth not recommended for either the Antarctic or indeed anywhere for sports diver. These descriptions could encourage the recreational diver to break depth limits and explore to these depths. I cannot agree with her statement ‘that most companies limit diving to profiles where decompression problems won't be an issue’ (p. 18). Decompression sickness (DCS) can be an issue also on shallow dives, especially where they are repeated, and the readers should be made aware that increased circulation and movement during dives in Antarctica, e.g. to keep the body temperature high, can increase the risk of gas bubble formation in the diver's blood which is the first stage to DCS. Research has been carried out in on the formation of microbubbles in Antarctic divers and I would recommend that any edition of this book includes a section on this.
The author describes the Antarctic marine flora and fauna using common names and provides a glossary for scientific names. Unfortunately not all the information is correct, and I do not refer just to the misspellings in particular scientific names. For example, information given about Antarctic octopus (p. 73) is wrong - currently there are 36 species known from Antarctica. The animal group called ‘Chitins’ are chitons, also called Polyplacophora or ‘Coat of mail shells’. Chitin is a polysaccharide found in the skeleton of invertebrates. I was disappointed to see a photo of a diver's hand holding a sea spider (p. 79), encouraging recreational divers to touch or pick up animals during their dives. Marine animals or plants should not be touched by recreational divers, either in the Antarctic or anywhere else.
Overall the book has many interesting features and is well worth consulting, even if some of the details are not correct. The book is at present the first and only dive guide to Antarctic waters and will be read by scientists and tourists. The main market for the book will be divers and tourists to Antarctica.
