00:00.81 David Howe Welcome back to episode one fifty one of a lifenerds podcast I'm here with Carlton Gover connna John and myself and we're going to talk to carlton more about ah his upcoming trip to the dominican republic Carlton that's where you are going correct. 00:12.77 alifeinruins I that is corrected would I so while I'm there for this I leave Thursday I get back Sunday there's gonna be two days in the water and it's just a site survey of for the outcoming. 00:15.32 David Howe What will you be doing there specifically. 00:30.42 alifeinruins Field schools sore basically just gonna check on the 3 site locations as well as get things prepped because the field school will begin. Basically yeah, next month so we fly in may seventh so we're just meeting up with the dive shop that we work with and working with the local. Partners. So when we go down the field school itself is only two weeks um and then the students will leave and then I will stay with the other project pis and graduate students and we're gonna be doing some more advanced stuff which I'm not quite sure what that means yet for an additional week. Um, but Charlie has curated such good relationships. Um, one of the sites that they excavated made into underwater a maritime museum a living museum in the sea is in the boundaries of a resorts ah property. Line in the water they own part of the ocean and so he helped create this and it's a major tourist attraction and place to dive like many of the sites are and so when it's just the pi time we're staying at a resort for free and like they're the. When the place that we're staying with field school is somewhere similar It's not a resort but it is a local like hotel that has food and stuff. So like we're taking full advantage of that. But there's not going to be much time to ah there are no days off like it is just straight work for twenty one days um basically 02:01.30 alifeinruins Have breakfast at the hotel or the resort we get on the boat. We drive out to site or sail out to site. We don't sail. It's driving um because it's a like dinghy and then ah in the water for a couple hours come out, go to lunch and then write reports and object object. Ah. 02:19.53 connor So these are these are previously known sites. You guys aren't doing survey for new things as part of this or. 02:19.78 alifeinruins Curation like. 02:28.40 alifeinruins No, um, we're basically going to a couple spots. Um that has been. They're doing ongoing work so part of the interdisciplinary nature of this is is creating these living museums in the sea and these are a way to protect the cultural heritage. And the ah biological ah environments and so that's why we go down there with ah geologists and um marine biologists is many endangered corals really like iron. And so you can like refound coral colonies with iron objects. So so 1 thing that we also do they do in the project is oftentimes like part of these living museums as they're creating these heritage sites where they get plaques to get on the national register and they become major dive spots is they'll like. Buy cannons and like objects that are the same age as the ship and then like bring them out to the site and like part of the plaque is like these cannons are not part of the actual ship and they'll like make a little ring of cannons like around the area. Um, and so not. 03:36.81 David Howe So you're taking the the little idol off the thing in the temple of Indiana Jones and replacing it with a little bag. Essentially. 03:47.00 alifeinruins No, so they're the cannons that like are that were picked up by ah you know like looters and pirates and they try to sell them at a dive shop. So we're like reintroducing them back in so you'd be like yeah replacing the Indiana Jones bag of sand with the monkey. So bring it back home. 04:01.60 David Howe Okay, so reverse yeah cool. 04:04.86 alifeinruins Yes, that reverse in pardon. 04:05.90 connor But but ah and that's part and part of that's experimentation right? like the the ecologists and geologists like do that for experimentation and like preservation at the same point is my assumption. 04:16.45 alifeinruins Yes, so yeah because these shipwrecks are like major marine habitats so a couple years ago they had sunk purposely sunk a us ship off the course coast of Florida. There's a video of it. Apparently it was a shit show because it didn't go down properly so it lipped it capsized and then went down which was not what it was supposed to do and then they tried to lift it up and that didn't go very well either. So they like tried to tie these giant air balloons. To one side in hopes that it would like raise and flip the ship. Um the video on Youtube is is hilarious. You just see Charlie's just sitting there like this is never going to work and then but eventually a swell came in and the tides flipped the ship and it and it settled where it was supposed to um because the purpose is. And addition to curating maintaining and advancing these maritime ecosystems recording the cultural heritage. It also creates tourism which is really what the dominicans want so it also stimulates local economy and that has become interesting for some of the. Projects so one of the things that's often talked about um that we're I'm in prep for is that these sites are still active. Recreational diving spots. So as will be working and as they've worked in the past there will be randoms that will show up diving and interrupt your work. 05:50.70 alifeinruins And so that has included. Um, there's ah 1 of the students has a funny story of where they're doing photogrammetry and they still have to have targets on the ground because some of those sand beds are extensive right? and we talked about earlier with photogrammetry that you need at least 60% coverage overlap between photos and one of the best ways to stitch those together is to put targets down. And some fucking scuba divver just like came down like picked up 1 of the targets and was swimming off and like the students had to like chase him and like grab him by the fins and like point like that's fucking ours. Give that back you know and just like goof lay and they're and they're confused because sometimes you know the the dive teams won't they don't tell the people or they're not. 06:21.38 connor That's fucking wild. 06:28.90 alifeinruins Aren't notified that the archaeologists are like the scientists are there so there's like you know about two dozen scientists underwater like working on the site trying to ah do all of the various tasks. So like while we're sitting there measuring artifacts and everything the biologists are down there. They're doing um species samples and species counts and identifying the plants and corals. Um, you have someone doing photogrammetry of the entire site to enkeplulate all of that then you have the geologists down there and trying to do their own stuff and like so it gets pretty busy like the videos that they do down. There are just like really cool. And like makes me feel safe like this I shouldn't an announcedun this I'm not a huge fan of open water but I like to be able to see the bottom as long as I could see the bottom I'm fine. So the caribbeans great I'm trepidacious when it comes like with David saying like oh just go to the ausian islands and just like. 07:13.60 connor Ah. 07:15.13 David Howe Yeah I. 07:23.34 alifeinruins No one. There's great whites and Greenland Sharks and there and and orcas I've seen blackfish and salmon sharks and but like also the visibility is super low and you can't see the bottom and it's like that's terrifying caribbean like we're only working like thirty forty feet yeah you can see the bottoms there. 07:25.34 connor Same same salmon sharks too. 07:33.92 David Howe And squid and octopi and stuff all up there. Yeah. 07:40.82 alifeinruins Like I should be fine and like with a larger group of people like you're 1 of 6 seals for a great white shark like you know your chances of surviving are 15% 07:48.50 connor Just don't be the slowest swimmer as they say or. 07:52.75 alifeinruins But I like I'm like worried this week. We're just like me and 1 student and we're going out there survey it like me and her and like she could outs swim me really quick and I'm definitely the fatter seal out of the bunchch. It's like knowing me, it's gonna be like jaws three jaws is revenge where there's gonna be some random great white down there prow in the seven cs. 08:11.34 connor We're going to clip that for when Carlton doesn't come back I was just thinking about like the terrestrial version of that is that's like coming someone coming onto your site and like pulling out like corner pins or things in the ground I mean which is I think is easier. 08:21.34 alifeinruins Yeah. 08:26.65 connor To do on land because you can talk to people and be like hey hey but how do you communicate that down below. You can't right, you just. 08:31.58 alifeinruins You don't you have to? yeah you have to rely on people up top so there will be people watching the boats. There are dive buos up above on the surface of the water letting people know that that's um, one there's divers in the water but 2 all these living museums in the sea have these marker buoys and there are plaques underwater that they place. Um, but 1 of the kind of funnier things is like they have photographs of like they're moving these cannons into place. Well the deeper you go the lighter things become so there's this amazing amazing photograph of like Charlie Sam and a couple other students these 4 adults like moving this giant fucking £1200 cannon over their shoulders like. Fins off like walking on the seabed like place it where it needs to go. 09:13.71 connor Is that like Jack Sparrow walking underneath the with the with the ship over his. 09:16.35 alifeinruins Pretty much you know pretty much. So yeah, the whole thing. That's what I'm excited to do because it's It's mostly for me as I'm doing this class I'm like thinking of like okay this is how I do it on land and prepping for when I get in the water and there's that added. Um, having to watch your oxygen your buoyancy has been problematic for me because I can take such big breaths that I'll just rise especially with the vaping habit right? take deep breaths Naturally I'll just do and I'll just fucking start floating. Let it go and start dropping So I'm like trying to manage my breathing while I'm down there at the same time. 09:46.91 connor Who. 09:54.29 alifeinruins And but the craziest part is just how fucking quiet it is is like you're in there and there's there's no music. There's no talking aren't any whales in the background to listen to you're just you're just there. Yeah, so. 09:58.90 David Howe Just your respirator and stuff. 10:04.20 connor Stuck with your own thoughts. Oh. 10:09.64 David Howe Um, yeah I like a water all are like the water all around long Island is just like brown or green. It's just not good looking water. 10:13.75 alifeinruins Yeah, all 3 of us got real quiet after that. Ah. 10:17.74 connor Um. 10:26.52 David Howe And like that's what I always like knew is water I went to Jamaica when I was like four so I don't I don't remember what the caribbean looks like but I imagine that water is a little more inviting but currently the air I have seen the pacific too which reflects blue but it's kind of dark when you go in it. So at least in California. So. 10:40.35 connor Yeah. 10:46.36 David Howe I'm not a fan open water myself even in a lake. 10:46.56 connor We see and I've I've done I've done like stuff in the keys I've gone like snorkeling and whatnot and you can see like to an edge to a certain point but I could see the the ground but there is always that like is there something lurking in the the background that I'm missing. 10:51.91 David Howe Purpose. 11:01.65 David Howe Yeah, that miss me with that. 11:03.85 connor Kind of thing that it. Yeah, it's gonna be a no for me dog now I'm just ki I I would love to do that and Carlton and I are gonna start a company doing that a life below water. 11:06.37 alifeinruins Yeah. 11:12.76 alifeinruins Yeah, it's not it's not difficult it's yeah it's not super it's it's challenging in a different way but like very much like historic archeology. Once you're in the component that you know you're at you know there's nothing above or below it generally. Right? So like once you've found the ship you just need to map where the objects are and then get them out and that's the dominican republic it's a fifty fifty split so the the rules down there are fucking crazy. So like there's still like a rampant problem with um treasure hunters. 11:38.34 connor Oh so see. Don't remove everything. 11:49.94 alifeinruins And they're like very much into the local economy. So um, yeah, still still pretty bad and um, like there's interesting articles online of these treasure hunters like going after Charlie in his work and trying to discredit him because like Charlie doesn't take anything. 11:52.76 David Howe Treasure Hunters in the Caribbean You wouldn't say. 11:57.70 connor Pirates. 12:07.99 alifeinruins Like he gives the fifty to the museum and it takes 50 back to I u to be curated and then go back to the drr there is an issue in the drr though where like objects have a knack of disappearing and so that's problematic and then also once these sites are found. There are there are some rather wealthy individuals around the world that are really interested in taino archaeology and you know the local indigenous folks of the dominican and haiti as well as like age of sale. And they pay big bucks to pay some of the dive shops or like some people around to go and like loot these sites and so like the cultural heritage preservation is such an issue and it's like 1 of those weird. There's an added layer to it where there's a unesco um charter. That's. 12:50.27 connor Ah. 13:01.11 alifeinruins That that what they're trying to do so like France and Spain and England have signed onto that that any of their shipwrecks have to go like all of it go back but then like all the countries in Americas like fuck you. That's our gold like no, no, no no the ships are yours but the shit on them the the precious things that you want do not actually belong to you. 13:16.88 connor Yeah. 13:18.99 alifeinruins And the United States is trying to stay out of this because there's like you know there's a bunch of shipwrecks off of Florida um, and there are some really weird maritime laws where like for a long time. There's the abandoned shipwreck act or the abandoned boat act. Basically if like you left your boat and someone found it that person that's now their boat. And that was used in the 60 s and seventy s like these treasure hunters would go into a dive site and be like the boats abandon. This is now my boat and then like lay claim to it and but this is my boat. Yeah no, they fucking do this and like it happened like people would do that and they would take all the treasur and shit like it's crazy. 13:44.18 connor So like like two hundred fifty years later 13:56.27 alifeinruins Like the laws that are are in the way of a lot of this stuff and that like trying to do this. This work is is interesting because it's still not going back to the indigenous you know the home countries at all. Um, but that's where this difference in the living museums in the sea is like getting them recognized making them Protected. Um. And getting photogrammetry and counting all the objects and then each object gets an Id it gets a tag and if it ends up on on land like it's Flagged. It's supposed to be flagged, but there's that whole layer of trying like just cultural preservation to it. 14:31.27 connor Um, it. 14:33.78 connor And and and and it's one of those things where my guess is that you you obviously don't take everything out. You might take some important pieces and elements of it because I assume that the curation crisis or the the lack of facilities also applies to underwater stuff in general. 14:34.62 alifeinruins Um. 14:51.92 alifeinruins Not the drr don't not the Dr. Ah, no well a lot of these um shipwrecks Mostly what's left is like maybe the keel and iron objects and like all the good stuff has been looted a long time ago. So there's like. 14:52.70 David Howe Oh. 14:56.00 connor Ah, they got space for days. 15:06.23 David Howe Ah, okay. 15:07.44 alifeinruins Ah, ballast weights that you can figure out the position that are in the holes of these ships So like a lot of ships would have like 20 fucking anchors in them like 2 that you might actually use and like your bottom of your ship is basically just filled with trash as ballast. So a lot of metal. And so you end up like shipwrecks Now you'll find maybe the keel like 15 anchors in a square some like ballast balls some like cannonballs like and you like you build the the Skeleton of the ship just based on the position of these ballasts like the the iron material that's left like anything that has like ship identifiers like plaques. Bells Those are gone So It's basically stuff people couldn't pull out um or are not seen as valuable but there are projects like the captain kidship that was identified by Iu. That was a big one The ah the name was like the the Kuta merchant. 15:49.54 connor So you get. 16:00.90 connor Yeah. 16:02.37 alifeinruins And that one's really interesting because the ship itself. Um, so they found it. They found the upper hole of the structure and many of the the cargo hold had a bunch of stuff but 1 of the big parts of it. Um I believe. I'll have to double check. But there's a ship that they recovered um that was built by like 1 specific indian shipyard that was still operating building ships. The way they used to up until like ten years ago when they stopped but it's the way they like. 16:36.14 alifeinruins Merged The planks together was highly specific. Um I made for very tight seal. Um, and I believe it was captain kids and it was yeah and it was lost but I might be totally wrong, but the reason why I was lost is look at wrecked. 16:47.75 David Howe Know that name. 16:55.41 alifeinruins And the crew was like anyone that takes a look at this ship will know it's our ship because though the way they built It was so unique. There was no other ship in the Caribbean that was like that so they like basically set it on fire and threw it downriver to try to get away from it. 17:09.47 connor Jesus. 17:11.22 alifeinruins So they could come up with a different like oh no, we're just rum runners or something you know? um so they might get branded as pirates. 17:19.64 connor Well on that note we will end this segment and we'll talk more about something in the next segment.