Biminibill
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Notice to one and All:
Rebreathers are NOT legal for spearfishing in Federal Waters in the South Atlantic EEZ. I read an earlier post that says they're still legal un the Gulf but this surprises me since it was at the time of regulation, supposed to be banned in both. Back in the beginning of the modern movement toward recreational rebreathers we (yes, Denny and Rich, that would be me, Jay Jeffries and a couple of others) went to the Feds and the State of Florida and successfully got them to ban rebreathers for spearfishing. Further, the State banned them for ANY harvesting of living resource without an SAL. They are also illegal to use to collect tropical fish and invertebrate species in Federal waters adjacent to the State of Florida since the state manages marine life for both state and Federal waters off the Florida coast. The reasons were quite simple to understand.
1. Safe use of these units requires much more attention to maintenance, cleaning etc and from a commercial fishing point of view and most recreational divers, people do not tend to devote the time necessary to prevent deaths due to equipment failure.
2. The stealth capability of the gear would make it far too easy to approach fish or lie in wait for a shot at a targeted fish, thus increasing the risk of localized stock depletion.
3. The greatly extended bottom time allowed would also result in the problems cited in #2.
At the time we also received a written endorsement for our request from one of the most respected underwater cameramen in the world who works exclusively with rebreathers in his job, that being Bob Cranston.
In the years since there have been a number of deaths with rebreathers, mostly due to the nature of the beast. I do know that one death occurred off Broward County when collector was illegally collecting Bank Butterflies on a deep wreck off of Pompano. There was a potential shark attack involved but I haven't heard whether all the bites found on the recovered body were post-mortem or not. More recently another rebreather diver died while illegally spearrfishing in southeast Florida. Either way, if the they hadn't been breaking the law they wouldn't have died.
Biminibill
Rebreathers are NOT legal for spearfishing in Federal Waters in the South Atlantic EEZ. I read an earlier post that says they're still legal un the Gulf but this surprises me since it was at the time of regulation, supposed to be banned in both. Back in the beginning of the modern movement toward recreational rebreathers we (yes, Denny and Rich, that would be me, Jay Jeffries and a couple of others) went to the Feds and the State of Florida and successfully got them to ban rebreathers for spearfishing. Further, the State banned them for ANY harvesting of living resource without an SAL. They are also illegal to use to collect tropical fish and invertebrate species in Federal waters adjacent to the State of Florida since the state manages marine life for both state and Federal waters off the Florida coast. The reasons were quite simple to understand.
1. Safe use of these units requires much more attention to maintenance, cleaning etc and from a commercial fishing point of view and most recreational divers, people do not tend to devote the time necessary to prevent deaths due to equipment failure.
2. The stealth capability of the gear would make it far too easy to approach fish or lie in wait for a shot at a targeted fish, thus increasing the risk of localized stock depletion.
3. The greatly extended bottom time allowed would also result in the problems cited in #2.
At the time we also received a written endorsement for our request from one of the most respected underwater cameramen in the world who works exclusively with rebreathers in his job, that being Bob Cranston.
In the years since there have been a number of deaths with rebreathers, mostly due to the nature of the beast. I do know that one death occurred off Broward County when collector was illegally collecting Bank Butterflies on a deep wreck off of Pompano. There was a potential shark attack involved but I haven't heard whether all the bites found on the recovered body were post-mortem or not. More recently another rebreather diver died while illegally spearrfishing in southeast Florida. Either way, if the they hadn't been breaking the law they wouldn't have died.
Biminibill
(among other things) before we can ever be sophisticated enough to form a valid opinion based on facts.This applies in a lot more areas than just diet.
