Brooke Pyke

It doesn’t seem so long ago that I rolled into Key Largo, Florida, with a Nikonos II camera and a darkroom sink in the back of my Chevy van to figure out how to make a living as an underwater photographer. Things have changed since 1978, and underwater photography is not the novelty it was when I started.

Schooling fish steal the show as a hammerhead shark swims over the white sand in the depths of the Galápagos Islands.

Sea Turtle Summer

The Anna Maria Island Turtle Watch (AMITW) had an exceptional summer in 2024. By July 31, AMITW patrollers had documented 683 nests on 9.6 miles (15.4 kilometers) of beach on Anna Maria Island, Florida.

baby sea turtle

A Brief on Briefings

There is a magic art to keeping divers’ attention long enough to impart safety-critical information. Talking about the cool things you will see is easy, but briefings also contain vital information that will keep your divers safe.

JoAnn Perry briefing scuba divers

Environmental Stewardship

Dive sites are vulnerable to a variety of threats, including air and water pollution, invasive species such as zebra mussels and lionfish, destructive fishing practices like blast fishing, and even sunscreen.

Aquatic Adaptability

Recreational diving is a fun and relaxing sport meant to be enjoyed. But what happens when things don’t go as planned: Your mask comes off, your regulator gets knocked out, or someone in your group runs out of air?

All courses at the NDSTC are rigorous

Gulf of Maine

The drive to Eastport from my home in southern Maine would typically take about four and a half hours, but I was towing my boat so I prepared for more than six hours on the road.

gray seal

Questions To Ask a New Dive Buddy 

You check in at the dive shop, sign your waivers, get your gear on the boat, and set up your BCD on your first tank for the day. The divemaster introduces you to your dive buddy for this trip — a total stranger from another part of the world who is here for the same things you are: great diving and returning home safely. 

Divers communicate with each other

A Tale of Two Passes

This is Fakarava — a remote atoll in French Polynesia that feels more like a gateway to another world than a dive destination. Nestled in the remote Tuamotu Archipelago, this UNESCO biosphere reserve is where discriminating divers come to leave the ordinary behind.

The Tumakohua Pass of South Fakarava

Decompression Bubbles, Cardiac Health, and Dive Safety

In 2021 Peter Buzzacott, PhD, of  Curtin University in Perth, Australia, received DAN’s Alfred Bove Research Grant for Cardiac Health in Scuba Diving. What began with a simple proposal has since developed into a training network for the next generation of scientists and led to a research network between Curtin University and Fiona Stanley Hospital in Western Australia. 

The Curtin University and Fiona Stanley Hospital hyperbaric dive research team includes Dr. Neil Banham, Beth Jones, Aren Leishman, Kagan Ducker, Frauke Tillmans, and Luke Haseler.

Thailand’s Surin Islands

The Kingdom of Thailand, a sprawling Southeast Asian country slightly larger than California, shares land borders with four countries and neighbors a fifth by sea.

A pair of cleaner wrasses remove parasites from a longfin batfish