Simon and I are both well.  We’ve both been working and we’re still trying to finish off the Junkyard expansion which has taken slightly longer than expected.  The center piece of the expansion which was created by ‘The Art Rising’ has been a real headache due to the shear size & weight of it.  This group first contacted me back in Feb 2018  where at that time they were building a playground in a Burmese refugee camp which I though was cool and thought it would be great to have them build an underwater structure that we could work in with all of our pyramids.  We did ask multiple times for a modular structure, something that would be easy to deploy, we talked about what materials would be best to use and that our deployment resources would be limited to lift bags, barrels and a longtail boat  ..and this is what they made 😀   

It’s incredible and once it’s down we’ll be able to breath again but it’s been and still is a complete logistical nightmare  ..I’d say it’s got to be one and a quater tons .  Si has been a superstar.  Poles attached to the base for support , it took 90 flotation devices hand tied by Simon and a slightly higher tide to get this monster to float and then when we finally towed her to Junkyard and tried slowly to sink her,  removing barrels 1 at a time, she flipped over and sank onto her chest and now we have to go out again and manoeuver her onto her back.  It’s been a headache to be honest, especially for Simon.  He’s been so patient.  I LOVE SIMON!!

So we’ve finally finished all of the coral pyramids for our ‘Artificial Coral Reef Expansion’ and have deployed them by means of longtail, lift bags ..by which was no mean feat.
Next coral transplants and lots of them! 😀
Recap – Junkyard is our artificial reef which is about 400 meters from Crystal Dive

In 2009, Eco Koh Tao created an artificial dive site from trash that was intended for landfill. Instead of metal and other substances ending up dumped, burnt or buried, we recycled it, make it ocean friendly and created structures for coral transplants and fish aggregation.

9 years later, an incredible amount of divers enjoying the marine life and the coral nurseries that we have developed and maintained since its inception.

However, since the dive site has become so popular, we needed to expand by creating new coral transplant structures. To raise the necessary funds, Simon set up a fund-raising campaign on Generosity back in January. Our target was 3000 USD which we’ve now passed as well as getting donations from various dive schools that use Junkyard on a regular basis.

5 months down the line, we have only just finished (by the way it was mostly Simon that did most of the work) the immense job of building, welding cutting and deploying all or our 36 Coral Pyramids, each one holding minimum of 80 coral transplants! That doesn’t include the hundreds that we will be able to transplant on the connecting beams.

These structures will serve many uses, such as research of coral growth, attracting marine life to them for protection also provide an entertaining and educational experience for scuba divers. Taking pressure from divers on the natural reef enabling it to grow easier with less diver impacts and help in the fight against climate change and coral bleaching.

Birdseye view of what it will look like. The center piece is being done by The Art Rising who contacted me months ago wanting to make a underwater structure in exchange for their Open Water Course, so we thought, why not?!

I don’t know whether or not we’ve told you but we reached our Fundraiser Campaign target of 3000USD.!!
With our artificial reef expansion fundraiser to expand ‘Junkyard’ work has calmed down a little after weeks of continuous welding, cutting and Simon working on a daily  basis with the help of a few people to complete all the metal pyramids and struts read