SPICER -- Area scuba divers are ready to raise the flag -- the international orange ''diver below'' flag, that is -- on behalf of Green Lake.
Plans to hold an underwater clean-up of the popular Kandiyohi County lake are attracting interest from divers, said Mike Roe, who is organizing the divers for the June 13 event.
Let's Go Fishing with Seniors of Minnesota is organizing the first-of-its-kind event here as a way to give back, according to Joe Holm, president of Let's Go Fishing. Green Lake hosts many of the organization's fishing and boating excursions for seniors, he explained.
Plans call for pontoon boats with teams of scuba divers to go to work starting in the Saulsbury Beach area in the morning of June 13. The volunteer divers will clean up all the accumulated junk from the lake bottom. They expect to find everything from beverage containers and tires purposely tossed into the lake, to cell phones, boat motors and fishing poles accidentally lost to the drink.
Scuba divers and anglers with underwater cameras are well aware of the junk that can be found on the bottom of many lakes, and that may explain the interest Roe is hearing. He said divers with the Kandiyohi County Sheriff's office have already committed to volunteering that day. He's also heard from many individual scuba divers, including some who have not been diving but see this as the perfect opportunity to get back into the sport.
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All certified divers are welcome, and needed. Roe said an Alexandria-based scuba shop will be on site that day to provide air, rental tanks and other gear for those wishing to participate in the clean up. Master divers will also be on-site to oversee the diver's activities.
Roe is asking people interested in scuba diving, or helping the scuba divers topside on pontoon boats, to give him a call for planning purposes. He can be reached at 320-894-5975 or by e-mail, mike.roe@ridgewater.edu .
He added that sunny weather is already ordered. At noon Let's Go Fishing will be hosting a whole hog roast at Melvin's on the Lake.
