Today began at 8am in the classroom, where our plan was to review the interns’ Week 1 Video Diary together. But just as we were about to start, the power went out! Our planned schedule today involved us all in the classroom, writing up data from the previous week. A power cut today would be very bad timing!

We wondered what to do, and Andy phoned a few people trying to find somewhere that still had electricity. But the power was off throughout the whole town. Eventually we decided to pack up all our things, and travel to the other end of town where we might find somewhere with a generator.

Just as we were about to walk out the door, the electricity cam back on. We all breathed a sigh of relief and sat down to watch our video.

Watching the Video Diary

After watching the video, everyone gave feedback, including Andy, the mentors and even the interns. It was very useful to discuss and review the video together. We listed some ideas that could improve the video, and our homework is to make these changes.

Andy Shows His Video

Next we opened our MantaWatch logbooks and discussed the species we had recorded over the past week of survey dives. Our task today was to record all our encounters on MantaWatch Online.

Report an Encounter

After we had all finished our reports, our next task was to visit and introduce the interns to many of the dive operators in Komodo that we would be collaborating with over the coming weeks. Bajo Dive Club, Blue Marlin Dive, Dive Komodo, Divine Diving, Komodo Dive Center, Ora Dive, Manta Rhei Dive Center, Uber SCUBA, and Wicked Diving.

Visiting Dive Operators

Finally, we returned to the classroom, planned our activities for the following day, and practiced our manta briefings. And then time to sleep, to recharge our energy for the next day.