Kelly Foss

After 35 years with the Ocean Science Centre’s field services unit, diver Robert (Bob) O’Donnell has hung up his dry suit for the last time.

The dive shop, now maintained by dive technicians Andrew Perry and George Bishop, first opened at Memorial in the early 70s. Mr. O’Donnell joined the team in 1978 and estimates he has spent about 6,000 hours in the water since that time.

The crew collaborates mainly with faculty in Ocean Sciences and Biology who require particular specimens for research and teaching. They also collect coastal marine invertebrates for the Ocean Sciences Centre’s public education program, which sees an outdoor touch tank on display to the public from June to September at the Logy Bay facility.

Most of their time away from the dive shop is spent divided between the university’s 26ft. Boston whaler, the team’s smaller rubber zodiac or the dive truck they use to travel all over the island and Labrador. 

“Every May for the past 10 years, we’ve been spending a week at the Bonne Bay Marine Station in Gros Morne to do general collections for their teaching and research, as well as their public aquarium and touch tanks,” said Mr. O’Donnell.

“This year we’re going to bring them species collected here on the Avalon they can’t get over there, to add a bit of variety to their tanks,” added Mr. Perry.

The most common items they are asked to gather are urchins, sea cucumbers, whelk, rock and hermit crabs and different varieties of kelp – basically anything found along the shoreline. What’s the hardest critter for them to find? It’s the usually unloved and unwanted sculpin.

“As kids you could catch them from the wharf, they’d be everywhere,” said Mr. O’Donnell. “Now we have a job to find them. When there was a food fishery and plants were operating they’d congregate close to shore, but now they’ve moved offshore.”

“We go to fishermen and ask when they are pulling their cod nets if we can have their sculpins,” added Mr. Perry. “It’s easier to get them that way then it is to dive for them.”

The team will also occasionally do contract work for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, annually spending a month in Marystown, off and on, doing surveys and collecting samples of invasive species.

Over the many years since it was created, Mr. O’Donnell says the dive team has evolved from a group of commercial divers to a unit that emphasizes research diving.

“We’re trained in how to properly collect data, as opposed to just going out and doing an underwater job,” he said. “Memorial is one of few universities to have a full time dedicated research diving team. Others have divers in different departments who might come together occasionally to do a major dive, but we work together every day.”

Mr. Perry, a former research assistant with a background in oceanography and experience working offshore, joined the team in 2010. Mr. Bishop is the newest member, and has only been diving with the team for the past year. He had been employeed upstairs in the workshop and trained as a back up diver, taking on the job full-time when an opening became available.

The three have formed a close bond, not only from all the hours spent on the road, but also from regularly putting their lives in the hands of the other members of the team.

“I rely on Andrew and George and they rely on me,” said Mr. O’Donnell. “If you have a bad day you can't just go in your cubicle and hide. You can't be at odds with the guy that might have to save your life, it just doesn't work for good relations.”

And just as inevitable as one wave follows another, there’s a new diver trained and ready to move into the space left by Mr. O’Donnell’s retirement. The dive shop, much like the sea, just keeps rolling on.