All,
My apologies for the late announcement regarding the upcoming February meeting but it took a while to work out all of the logistics as the meeting will be at new venue.
February's meeting will be this coming Wednesday, February 26th at the new Chicago Maritime Museum location, 1200 West 35th Street, Suite OE5010, Chicago, IL 60609. Free parking is available adjacent to or near the facility. One of the logistical issues was seating, the museum is not set up yet and they have not yet received the new chairs that have been ordered. I do anticipate having about 30 folding chairs available which may not be sufficient. To safeguard against a shortfall, I'm asking our members to consider bringing a chair or two with them if possible on Wednesday.
Our Speaker will be Harry Zych. Mr. Zych is a well known commercial marine salvager, hydographer, and contractor as well as the 2013 Our World-Underwater Middle Coast Award winner. His diving career began in the 1960's when he trained as a hard hat diver in the US Military. Upon leaving the military he worked internationally as a commercial diver doing deep commercial work on saturation/dive bell projects in the US and abroad. Mr. Zych returned to Chicago in the early 1970's and founded the American Salvage Company on the Great Lakes. Over his 40 year career Mr. Zych has maintained a keen interest in Great Lakes maritime history and has spent countless hours collecting information and research on historic shipwrecks across the Great Lakes. He has located or helped locate many of Chicago's shipwrecks during the 1970's and has continued to actively search for historic Great Lakes shipwrecks using state of the art sidescan sonar, multi-beam sonar, sub-bottom profilers, m
agnetometers, and commercial quality Remote Operated Vehicles (ROVS).
Rather than presenting a specific program, Mr. Zych will be taking question from the audience regarding his career, wreck experiences, changes to the industry and search technology etc. Please come with some questions for Mr. Zych.
I hope to see you at the meeting; non-members are always welcome, come and see what UASC is all about.
Bob Rushman
President UASC