About 13 years ago, I led a trip to Chuuk (Truk Lagoon) so that we could dive the shipwrecks and learn from the best. Not only was Jim Church on that trip, before he died, but so was Stan Waterman. It was great, diving with two of the film legends of our time and learning from them both. It was not my first trip to Truk and we stayed on the Aggressor, but that�s another story.

Myself and another person from my group traveled to Hong Kong to meet my wife and tour China and Macao (before China took it over). I had been hearing about shark fining for years and I walked out of numerous restaurants in Hong Kong that week, after I saw the menu, because they were serving shark fin soup. I had no desire to put money in the pockets of the people who are needlessly murdering thousands of sharks every year. It�s tantamount to killing elephants for their ivory tusks.

There is a must-see movie showing in Tulsa this week, about the devastation of sharks. I think it�s important enough that you go see it, at Southroads 20. It will be gone next week.

Shark fin soup is considered a delicacy and a status symbol that has the unfortunate effect of helping to deplete the world�s shark population. When Rob Stewart, the filmmaker responsible for this ecological documentary came to Tulsa last week, he said the shark population has been depleted by 90%. That statistic can�t be verified, because we know so little about sharks. However, Sharkwater is a stunningly photographed film.

The cacophony of fish balls and schools of fish seen in the movie are reminiscent of many of my trips to Papau New Guinea, the Galapagos and Palau. The underwater footage is stunning and the message is clear. Stewart himself is a very upfront and all-round nice guy. When he hooks up with Captain Paul Watson, who left Greenpeace because they became too conservative, the drama begins to unfold. Both Stewart and Watson are very passionate about what they do and the million$ of dollar$ made off shark fins has never before been brought so clearly to the general public.

The imagery of pirates and renegade�s in the Galapagos, Costa Rica and surrounding countries, making millions off of the sleazy, high-profit business of slicing off shark fins and then dumping their bloody bodies back into the ocean to die is disturbing to say the least. If you didn�t know, the oceans supply most of the oxygen that we breathe. Man�s destruction of the top of the food chain of the oceans, could have dire results for this ecosystem. Even though Stewart claims that the Earth has 6 times the population it can presently support, he has no answer as to how to achieve ZPG (zero population growth), but that�s another issue.

I have videoed numerous shark feeds all over the world and have never had anyone get into a shark suit like Rob does in the movie. All you have to do is leave an opening for the sharks to depart after they eat. It has always been an adrenaline high, but never dangerous. I even flipped a nurse shark over and put it in some kind of hypnotic trance in Belize one time. Those sharks are docile and they surrounded our group. It sure got others in the group excited though.

This movie brings home something that has been troubling me for decades and I for one applaud Rob Stewart for bringing it to light. I also would liked to have seen the movie narrated by someone other than Stewart. His message is true, his passion is real, but he doesn�t have the acting or speaking skill to do parts of this movie justice.