SWIMMING WITH THE POD

Ocean swimming... and wave power

Dr. Mark Hemer is a Principal Research Scientist leading the Sea-Level, Waves and Coastal Extremes team within CSIRO's Ocean and Atmosphere Climate Science Centre. Mark has researched offshore renewable energy for the past 10 years, exploring the potential of Australia's renewable offshore resources. We chatted about offshore energy, and among many things, whether you can swim around wave farms.
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Ocean Wave, Power of Ocean - Shyinka
Tides - Chuckee
Tides - Chris Kogos
Tides - Switch
Power! - Andrew Dude
Power - Andrew Shift
Sapphire - Tobu
Image from David Dixon

Ocean swimming... and tsunamis

What is the likelihood of a tsunami hitting your favourite beach? Dr. Hannah Power, from University of Newcastle's School of Environmental and Life Sciences, conducts research on ocean waves, and recently published on the likelihood and consequences of a tsunami hitting Sydney Harbour. She has also developed the risk forecast for the Figure Eight Pool in Sydney's Royal National Park. This forecast examines the likelihood of being struck by large waves on your journey across the rock shelf.
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Tsunami - Cyclotone
Symphonic Tsunami - Le MaNiTeK
The Great Tsunami - These Loose Ends
Tsunami Biter - cj2thed
Sapphire - Tobu
 Image from Canterbury Maps

Ocean swimming... in poo

Have you ever had the visibility in a swim drop to a few centimeters? Has it ever gone a bit brown? Perhaps you've ended up swimming through sewage!
This happened to Dr. Ian Wright in the 90s, and is likely to have happened to any ocean swimmer who was swimming off the coast of Sydney in that period. Ian is a keen ocean swimmer and a senior lecturer in the School of Science and Health at Western Sydney University, whose research interests include freshwater ecology, water chemistry and water pollution. We chatted about the poo problem at Sydney's beaches.
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Plume - Kubbi
Pipeline - CyberSDF
Water - The Kyoto Connection
Water - Stimwise
Flush - If I had a Hi Fi
The early poo gets the flush - Masterpoo
Sapphire - Tobu
Image from eutrophication&hypoxia
There's also a quick Kath and Kim clip in there at the end #lookatmeme

Ocean swimming... with whales (part 2)

Scott Portelli is an acclaimed wildlife and underwater photographer, and has swum with whales and other magnificent creatures of the deep in some of the world's most exotic locations, like Antarctica, Tonga, the Falkland Islands and Norway. Among many other awards, Scott was awarded Wildlife Photographer of the Year in 2016, and he runs tours that you can join up with around the world to swim with whales. 
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Message from the whales - Ulrik Grahn-Olsen
Whales of the north - Hydrosphere
Orca - Skinny Lags
Orca - Ani Onix
Sapphire - Tobu
Image from Scott Portelli on Instagram

Ocean swimming... with whales (part 1)

During winter, you're probably familiar with human snot, but are you familiar with whale snot? Dr. Vanessa Pirotta is!
Vanessa is a marine biologist, naturalist and science communicator, and has been collecting snot from whale spouts using bespoke drones in order to understand whale health. She's collected viruses, bacteria and DNA from the snot, in a much less invasive way than other methods. She's also run whale watching tours, swum with whales in Tonga and observed them in Antarctica.
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Whales - Matt Matic
Hipster whales - Jamophone
Luminous Snot - Sober Spring
Sapphire - Tobu
Image from Scott Portelli on Instagram

Ocean swimming... and the box jellyfish antidote

Last time we talked about stingers, we learnt some valuable insights - don't wee on them! Turns out, there may be some better solutions on the horizon. Associate Professor Greg Neely, from the School of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Sydney, has discovered an antidote to the sting of the most venomous creature on Earth -  the Australian box jellyfish.
Greg's antidote, discovered using CRISPR genome editing technology, blocks the symptoms within 15 minutes, and overlaps interestingly with research conducted into cholesterol. This means that the drug development may already be out there and we could see something in the hands of life-savers sooner rather than later.
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Jellyfish - Fidser
Jellyfish in space - Kevin MacLeod
Sapphire - Tobu
Image from Will Fisher

Ocean swimming... and oceanswims.com

Whether you are an experienced or aspiring ocean swimmer, if you are in Australia or New Zealand, you will visit oceanswims.com. Oceanswims.com handles the entries for the majority of organised swims in this part of the world, as well as being home to commentary, photos, witty banter, results and competitions.
Paul Ellercamp and Suanne Hunt are the ocean swimming doyens who run oceanswims.com and Ocean Swim Safaris, and we talked rather pleasantly over tea and macaroons about all things ocean swimming, including how the sport has grown over the last 20 years, technology changes, drafting, some of the characters of the sport, swimming around the world, and Paul's starring roll, with a former Prime Minister (another great Bob Hawke story), in the classic Australian TV soap A Country Practice.
See if you can hear the puppy sleeping in the background on Suanne's lap!
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Whale Film - James Ellercamp Music
Ocean - KV
Ocean - Lilat
Ocean - Unfinite
Ocean - hanimaltos
Ocean - Andreas Bu
Sapphire - Tobu
Image from Paul on twitter

Ocean swimming... and sand

Dr Gary Greenberg is a scientist, author, teacher and photographer who combines his passion for art and science by exploring the hidden small-scale dimensions of nature. Gary has invented multiple high-definition, three-dimensional light microscopes (for which he has multiple US patents) and nowadays focuses his microscopes on common objects, such as grains of sand, flowers, and food. He's looked at sand from all round the Earth, but the funkiest sand he has examined is from the Moon. He's hoping he can get some Mars sand! You can identify a beach (or heavenly body) from its sand, which depends on the temperature, surf and erosion conditions and marine environment. 
You can see Gary's sand photography for yourself at sandgrains.com. And you might like to do some searching for the in vitro human pancreatic cancer cells he turned into the planet Kyrpton in the first Superman movie - the nuclei of the cells look like impact craters!
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Sand - Viasol
Sand - Adrian Rivas
Sand Planet - JubyPhonic
Laid in the sand beside the sea - Seasidetrip 90
Sand - Sean Tierney
Sapphire - Tobu
 The image is from sandgrains.com and is of sand from Maui.

Ocean swimming... and ocean pools

Ocean pools are a delight. I love swimming in them, and they are also quite often simply beautiful places to be. Dr. Marie-Louise McDermott has written a PhD on ocean pools (Wet, wild and convivial: past, present and future contributions of Australia’s ocean pools to surf, beach, pool and body cultures and recreational coasts) and runs a fantastic website dedicated to ocean pools, All into ocean pools inc.
I had a wonderful chat with Marie-Louise about her love of ocean pools, why Australia (and Sydney in particular) has such a rich tradition of them, and their influence on Australian life.
Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License:
Ocean - THBD
Ocean - Frederick
Ocean - Santamaria
Pool - Veronica Judin
Pool - Hirnlego
Sapphire - Tobu
Image: Mona Vale Beach By Gab Scanu