where the seafloor is desolate ordamaged by storms or human activity.We are using steel and concreteonly as materials for the wreck. We’veadded rebar (steel) structures ontothe boat, which is itself steel, andwe believe that, with the amount ofwelding we did prior to sinking, theboat will hold enough of a low-voltagecharge of electricity that electrolysiswill immediately begin and increasecalcification. The other material we useis concrete, which is one of the bestmaterials for creating an artificial reefbecause its composition is close tonatural coral limestone.It’s hard to gauge exactly, but wemay start seeing some calcificationwithin the first year; it will then increaseyear by year after that. In, say, 150 years’time, the Willy T will start to blend inwith the natural environment, but youwill still be able to see that it’s there.It sounds like a huge project.Q Did you have a lot of help?There’s a huge amount of expertisein the Beyond The Reef team. We areguided by an underwater engineer, anoceanographer and an environmentalfilmmaker, and were lucky to be ableto employ numerous welders,commercial divers, and barge and craneoperators who all brought togetherunique knowledge to get the projectdone successfully. Our co-founder,Chris Juredin, also owns the localcompanies Commercial Dive Servicesand We Be Divin, which donated time,experience, heavy machinery andmaterials, without which it would havebeen nearly impossible to get thisproject done.Chris and Commercial Dive Serviceswere also heavily involved in the 2017sinking of the Kodiak Queen ship tocreate an artificial reef, and we wereable to bring back and collaborate withseveral of the brilliant minds from thatproject, including lead welders andartists Drew Shook and Josh Wilson,as well as Aydika James from SecretSamurai Productions for fundraisinghelp and art direction.We also had help from EarthEcho3International, Philippe Cousteau’s USbasednonprofit, which has a similarmission to empower youth in marinescience. Philippe had visited the BVIwhile filming a show called CaribbeanPirate Treasure in 2017 (a few monthsbefore the hurricane), and loved theWilly T and the diving here. When Itold him about the good that couldcome from recycling it and convertingit into an artificial reef to increase divetourism and fund teaching children howto swim, he wanted to be involved.What’s next? We have furtherQ expanded the art-reef with thethree planes-come-sharks. The planesare going back into an already amazingdive spot called the Coral Gardens offAbove:The process ofsinking the Willy Twas a tricky job– but now it’s onthe seabed in KeyBay, Peter Island,it provides a funplayground for scubadivers at all levelsRight:What might you spyunderwater in thewarm, clear seas ofthe BVI? WWW.1BEYONDTHEREEF.COM;@1BEYONDTHEREEFGreat Dog Island. They will sit about 40-45feet deep in beautiful, gin-clear water withscattered coral heads and a good amountof marine life – a perfect spot for new orhighly experienced divers alike.Before the storm, there were alreadyairplanes there. We wanted to replacethem so that people could continueto enjoy this awesome dive spot, butwhen given the opportunity to startfrom scratch with new (hurricanedamaged)airplanes, we had the crazythought that they have a similar shapeto sharks, so could be easily convertedto become half-shark half-airplanes!They are already being referred toas ‘sharkplaneos’. Beyond The Reef’smission also includes raising awarenessof threatened species across the globe,and we hope that creating somethingfun and silly like the shark airplanes cancommunicate a message encouragingpeople to be enthusiastic about sharksand their conservation.We have spent several monthsworking to prepare the airplanes, whichhas included removing and relocatingthem from the airport, stripping themof all environmental hazards andfinally working to complete the sharkconversion. We hope to sink all three inthe first week of December [after thismagazine went to press] during the BVI’sWreck Week, a week-long annual eventremembering the old and celebrating thenew shipwrecks of the BVI. ●76 | ZiNG CARIBBEAN www.liat.com | January - February 2020
CREATIVE CONSERVATION