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BOARD
DONATIONS
THE FREEDIVER'S RECOVERY VEST TEAM (alphabetical)
Chip Bissell
Co-inventor Chip Bissell, a registered
patent attorney and Southern California native, a lifelong diver as well as an
accomplished freediver and innovator.
Jason Bush
Co-inventor Jason Bush, a California
native, diver and freediver, with extensive entrepreneurial skills and experience in the
communications industry, manufacturing, distribution and marketing.
Sheri Daye
Co-inventor Sheri Daye, of Boca Raton, Florida, is a spearfishing National Champ and holds several world
records. She has a mechanical engineering degree, an MBA, and works for a Fortune 500
company.
Tony Grogan
Tony is the owner of Spearfishing Magazine and the world's largest
spearfishing website Spearboard.com. He is a businessman and spearfisherman with a great
passion for the sport and hopes to contribute positively to its preservation and
enhancement. Tony has extensive experience in strategic marketing and financing, as well
as video and television production. Early in his career, Tony was a CPA with one of the
largest accounting firms in the world - Coopers & Lybrand, CPAs. He has held Chief
Financial Officer positions with numerous companies. Tony currently is the president of
his own consulting firm - Enterprise Advisors. He is a certified technical diver and goes
spearfishing at least twice a week on his boat "Enterprise" in Palm Beach
County, Florida. Tony firmly believes the freedive recovery vest is an outstanding safety
concept that will become a "must-have" equipment standard for divers everywhere.
Sterling Kaya
Publisher of Hawaii Skin Diver Magazine, Associate Producer of Hawaii Skin
Diver Television. Owner of Hana Pa'a Fishing Co., a retail spearfishing and fishing supply
company. Sterling is also an avid freedive/spearfishing photographer and videographer. He
says, "The spearfishing community is a small, close-knit group in Hawaii, or around
the U.S. for that matter. Thus, I always cringe when I hear of an accident involving a
diver. Inevitably, I know that person or know someone who was close to that person. I've
personally lost two very good friends, an employee, and numerous acquaintances to SWB. I
fully support the freediver parachute. If it can prevent even one drowning death, then any
effort I put into promoting the device will have been well worthwhile."
Kirk Krack
Kirk Krack is a prominent and respected pioneer in the global dive
industry, with over 15 years experience as an instructor, trainer, researcher, business
owner and manager. Kirk has organized World Championship freediving competitions and
coached athletes to 20 World Records, earned IANTD/TDI qualifications as a Trimix and
Rebreather Instructor Trainer and holds PADI certification as a Master Instructor. As
President and founder of Performance Freediving International, Kirk has trained over 1,600
freedivers world wide. "I support the concept and development of the Freedivers
Recovery Vest, not as a replacement for proper training and buddy system procedures, but
as an additional level of safety. I look forward to providing input into the development
of this product for its proper utilization."
Terry Maas
Co-inventor Oral
Surgeon, National Champion (4-individual, 12-team), current and former world record holder
for bluefin and yellowfin tuna, author, Chairman of the International Blue Water
Spearfishing Records Committee, and underwater photographer. Expanded biography
Mike McGuire
Mike has been diving competitive since 1974 at State, National, and
World levels. He has owned 2 dive shops for 10 years and helped develop 3 charter boat
systems. Mike stays very active with DEMA, USIA, and all aspects of freediving and
Spearfishing. Mike says, "I support this long over due project in the memory of all
the friends I have lost to this sport. This is the least I can do to help make our sport
safer for our family."
David Sipperly
Co-inventor David Sipperly,
of Wakefield, Rhode Island, is a three-time All-American Freediver, author and instructor.
He holds instructor credentials for a wide range of freediving and scuba classes, from
basic training to instructor certification. He is a frequent speaker at national and
regional dive shows. David is a founding
member of Technical Diving International, has been the Daytime Chairman of the Boston Sea
Rovers for over ten years and was the National Sales Manager for Sporasub, USA, a division
of HEAD sports. His photography has appeared in specials for NBC, HBO and The Discovery
Channel.
Joe Tobin
Joe Tobin is a Firefighter-Paramedic with over 25 years of experience in drowning
resuscitation. Joe’s freediving experience spans 28 years and he holds a former world
record for California yellowtail and the current California state record for albacore
tuna. His many underwater photographs and articles have appeared in Hawaii Skin Diver, International Freediving and Spearfishing News, California Diving News and Western Outdoor News. “The Freedivers Recovery Vest will become
a vital tool in reducing deaths from shallow water black-out. Getting the victim to the surface is the first
step before treatment can begin. This device
will save critical time that is often lost trying to locate and recover a freediver who
has lost consciousness.”
Dr. Richard Vann
Dr. Richard Vann has spent his career in environmental
physiology and operational diving with emphasis on understanding the physiology of
decompression illness (DCI) and on developing procedures to avoid DCI. Beginning at Ocean
Systems in 1967, he served as a Diving Engineer where, among other duties, he learned to
compute decompression tables and acted as an experimental subject for dive trials to 650
feet. This was followed by four years in the Navy, two as the Diving Officer for
Underwater Demolition 12, where he developed an interest in breath-hold diving used by
combat swimmers for hydrographic reconnaissance and obstacle demolition. After receiving a
Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering at Duke University in 1976, he joined the faculty of the Duke
Hyperbaric Center where he has conducted experiments to investigate bubble formation and
inert gas exchange, developed decompression procedures for scientific diving, developed
methods used by astronauts for extravehicular activity from the Space Station, and
conducted research in breath-hold diving with oxygen. As Research Director for the Divers
Alert Network since 1992, he has investigated the causes of fatal and non-fatal injuries
and published on dive computers, nitrox diving, flying after diving, prognostic factors in
DCI therapy, flying with DCI, flying after DCI therapy, and first aid oxygen at sea level
for DCI. His investigation of depth-time recordings from 132,000 dives showed that the DCI
risk of recreational dives in the cold water of Scotland was 15-times greater than during
warm water dives in the Caribbean. His experimental flying after diving trials at the Duke
Hyperbaric Center were the basis of consensus guidelines for flying after recreational
diving. He is beginning a study of technical diving which is growing in popularity within
recreational diving, particularly with rebreathers, and is planning a technical diving
conference for January 2008. "Freediving is a great sport, and
sporting activities should be safe. The Freediver's Recovery Vest should reduce the
unusual but persistent hazard of freediver blackout."
DONATIONS
While not actively seeking donations, Oceanic Safety Systems LLC is
honored and proud to announce the donation of $10,000 to the project by Michael Dewhirst
in the name of his friend Dimitris Vassilakis
Michael Dewhirst a spearo from England had a very close relationship
with Dimitris Vassilakis who died of freediver blackout last September (2007) in Greece.
Dimitris was widely liked and respected, both in the spearfishing community and in the
pure apnea community as well. He was a physician of Internal Medecine.
Dimitris taught Michael to be a selective hunter, one more concerned
about the quality of his catch than how much meat he can put on his table. Here is Michael’s
dedication message:
“The loss of Dimitris Vassilakis was a terrible tragedy on a
personal and many other levels. He was my best friend and helped me massively improve with
my free-diving and spear-fishing. He taught me many other things too. Those who knew him
know what an amazing person he was. Through this donation I hope to help the sport any way
I can and commemorate Dimitris.”
On behalf of all freedivers interested in this project, Thank you
Michael Dewhirst!
(Dimitris is on the left and Michael on the right)
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