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The Starfish Enterprise team was founded
in 1990 by Polly and Simon Tapson, a London based couple who
learned to dive while on their honeymoon back in 1986. In
the early 90s diving in the UK was dominated by the BSAC and
very much revolved around training new divers. Polly -undoubtedly
the leader of the group in the early days -decided that the
team should try to break away from this and only accept experienced
divers who wanted to push themselves in diving terms. At the
time this generally involved wearing twin sets of air and
diving on wrecks around the 50-60 metre mark; earning themselves
a somewhat “maverick” reputation.
Above: Polly
and Simon Tapson
During 1992 Polly had heard about the deep
and adventurous reputation surrounding the Kingston BSAC branch
and decided to check the club out. After several visits the
Tapsons met up with Dave Wilkins -Dave had been diving since
the 1970's and was one of the leading wreck divers in the
UK. The Kingston club deep diving section invited Polly, Christina,
Lin Broadbridge and Simon on some of their deep dives with
skipper Andy Smith and later that year Christina and the Tapsons
decided to take things a step further and completed a Tech
Nitrox course with Rob Palmer - this was the first Tech Nitrox
course to be taught in the UK.
Throughout 1992 and 1993 the team advanced
their skills and knowledge in technical diving, using alternative
breathing mediums for decompression as well as devising a
complete decompression station for long hangs in tidal waters
-the Starfish Deco Station was a modification of the Andy
Smith's original idea and has been copied by many other groups
since.
Tragically, in June 1993, Lin Broadbridge
died whilst diving on the Merchant Royal off Weymouth
with Christina. Although its not known for sure, it is believed
that Lin died because she had breathed from her 02 cylinder
at depth and passed out. The loss of Lin was a major set back
for the team and a personal tragedy for Christina, Polly and
Simon. Although its always too late after the event, safety
procedures were ramped up by the team and happily there have
been no other diving deaths in the team since.
During the summer of 1993 Polly came up with
the idea that the team make an attempt to dive the famous
ocean liner RMS Lusitania sunk in deep water south of Ireland.
Thinking originally that the wreck was in 70m diving on air
was briefly considered. However, after discovering it might
be as deep as 90 metres it was decided to make the attempt
using mixed gas (trimix). At the time, trimix diving was practically
unheard of in the UK and with no instructors available the
team had to teach themselves.
Just prior the Lusitania training period,
Simon Tapson came across the Michael Menduno publication "Aquacorps".
This magazine was like a Bible to the Group, and showed them
that there were divers on the East Coast of the States, doing
deep diving of the sort the Group aspired to, and most importantly
with the same adventurous mindset. Many of the Aquacorps articles
at the time, gave insight into how to rig stage cylinders,
how to mix gas and so on, which were invaluable aids to the
group. Simon was in contact with the US deep wreck diver Gary
Gentile in order to purchase his published material on wreck
diving, which again was not available within the UK.
Gary was invited to join the team over in
Ireland accompanied by US divers John Chatterton, John Yurga
and Barb Lander. The team were helped a great deal by the
expertise that Chatterton & Yurga. The Lusitania 1994
expedition was a huge success and the safety techniques used
set down a firm foundation for all subsequent expeditions
and by the end of 1994 'Starfish Enterprise' had become internationally
respected through the diving community.
Above: The Lusitania
94 Expedition Team:
(Standing) John Yurga (US), Polly Tapson (UK), Gary Gentile
(US),
Christina Campbell (UK), Rob Royle (UK), Nick Hope (UK)
(Middle row) Paul Owen (UK), Dave Wilkins (UK), Barb Lander
(US),
Richard Tully (UK), John Chatterton (US)
(Front row) Jamie Powell (UK), Simon Tapson (UK)
During 94-98 the group mainly dived in the
UK. Some of the highlights were the first 100 metre wreck
dive conducted in the Hurd Deep of Weymouth and an expedition
to the King Edward wreck in 115 metres off the North coast
of Scotland. A great deal was learned from these expeditions,
especially in terms of gas management and decompression profiles
– all work that would go into making Britannic 98 a
success.
After the Lusitania 94 expedition Nick Hope
decided that the next major Starfish expedition would be on
a deeper and bigger wreck than the Lusitania. The Britannic,
sister to the Titanic, which sunk in 400ft of water
off south of Athens was the target. Simon had obtained a video
of Cousteau's 1976 expedition to the wreck and begun to figure
out exactly how the team would approach such a venture. Little
did he and Nick know that to attain the correct permissions
to explore the wreck and mount such a large scale project
would take another four years of work, with the Britannic
expedition not going ahead until 1998.
Three new divers joined the Group in 97–
Geraint Ffoulkes-Jones, Chris Hutchison, one of the most experienced
divers based on the South Coast, and Leigh Bishop (who left
the team in 2003). Other divers involved with the team who
also attended the Britannic 98 expedition were Innes McCartney,
Bob Hughes, Greg Buxton and Kevin Emans – all of whom
stayed in the team a short time.
Britannic 98 was an extremely successful
expedition and every diver got 5-6 dives on the wreck using
a day on / day off safety rotation. Nick Hope managed the
whole Expedition putting in a huge amount of work with the
logistics, planned months in advance with contingencies for
every eventuality.
Above: The
Britannic 1998 team
During 1999 Polly Tapson became very ill,
and in the summer of 2000 she tragically died. Her funeral
marked a sad occasion in the history of the team and Polly's
firm leadership will always be missed.
During 1999/2000 Alex Vassallo, Kevin Pickering
and Teresa Telus joined the team. Alex -the owner of Custom
Divers -had been friendly and supportive of the team for many
years and now wanted to expand his own personal diving. Kevin
would quickly prove himself an expert videographer.
In 2002 the team then travelled to Malta
for a type of go-see Expedition to dive on other wrecks and
“check out” the possibility of diving the WW1
Battle Cruiser HMS Russell. Although not possible in 2002,
the Team finally returned in 2003 under the leadership of
Teresa Telus and using the tried and tested Starfish safety
techniques, conducted a number of dives on the Russell to
120 metres -the first time this wreck had been surveyed.
Above: members
of the Starfish team preparing kit on M/Y Princess Duda during
the 2003 HMS Russell Expedition
Meanwhile Chris Hutchison organised a number
of key Expeditions for the Group. Working closely with Steve
Wright, skipper of the Loyal Watcher, Chris organised Expeditions
to Juland in 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2003. These were tough Expeditions
and not for the faint hearted. Although the wrecks are not
deep (40 metres to 60 metres) the water is very cold and much
of the expedition has to be conducted off-shore, living on
a boat, and bouncing around in rough weather 24 hours a day.
Working with Steve Wright and local fishermen, the Starfish
team have amassed an enviable amount of video footage. The
Starfish team relocated HMS Defence, the Indefatigable, the
bow section of the Queen Mary, The Frauenlob, and a number
of others smaller wrecks.
Chris also organised an Expedition to dive
on the Cunard liner SS Egypt which sank in the Bay of Biscay
in 125 metres in 2001. Again working with Steve Wright, the
team located the wreck (from the charted position!), and did
several dives on it. The Team felt that this dive was particularly
challenging, as it was the deepest dive the team had done,
allied to the fact that the wreck is smaller than say the
Britannic, so is not visible until beyond 100 metres. There
is always the possibility of the weather blowing up to extremes
while operating in an area such as Biscay.
The Team also ran a number of Expeditions
to the Northern Ireland wrecks of the Justicia, Audacious
and Empire Heritage, in 2000-2002, again amassing a great
deal of video footage and stills of these wrecks.
In 2003 several new members joined the team
– Paul Dixon, Gavin Haywood, Nick Gilbert, Adina Ochert
and Des Murray. We also officially asked Robin Benford to
become a member; he had been diving with the team for some
years, notably joining in on the Egypt Expedition, where he
was first down to the wreck. Paul, Gav, Nick, Adina and Des
had all been diving with the team for some years, all taking
part in both the 2002 and 2003 Russell Expeditions. In 2003
Nick Gilbert & Adina Ochert led a Starfish Expedition
to dive HMs/m Vandal, a submarine sunk in 100 metres in the
Clyde -very challenging dive and a great success for the team.
Above: members
of the Starfish Enterprise team preparing kit onboard MV Spinaway
Isle during the HMS Vandal Expedition
So what about Starfish Enterprise today?
Since the late 1990's technical diving has made some dramatic
leaps forward, due in part to commercially available rebreathers.
The once flimsy inflatables and recycled fishing vessels have
evolved into custom-designed dive platforms with kitting-up
areas, diver lifts and state of the art wreck-finding technology.
Of course decpmpression procedures have advanced with the
use of real-time decompression software too, making previously
inaccesible depths more safely achievable.
This change has made technical diving more
accessible to thousands of enthusiasts around the world. Groups
of technical divers can now find each other based on common
diving interests, and diving opportunities can arise through
internet sites.
Ironically though, the impact of change on
Starfish Enterprise has resulted in a gradual dissolution
of the team where many members have begun to look further
afield, collaborating with other groups on a variety of different
and exciting projects. This is by no means an unhealthy situation.
Instead, it is a logical progression from the necessity of
the self contained and somewhat insular team of a decade ago
to the more cosmopolitan environment of today's 'next generation'
of technical diver.
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