Mrs. Buchanan, the E.L.A teacher on team 7C, has been deep sea diving around the world since age 12. She had a longing to learn how to dive and her dad helped her achieve this goal.

 “I was in Korea with my dad, he took me out and I got certified. I started diving then, and I’ve been diving ever since.” She said. 

Mrs. Buchanan is a master diver which means that she is at A high level of scuba diving, She also is certified in teaching diving, deep-sea diving, and open water. ”…which means I can jump out of helicopters to rescue people, which is kinda cool.” Mrs. Buchanan said. On one occasion she did in fact rescue people from a capsized sailboat in the Atlantic Ocean. 

Some amazing places that Mrs. Buchanan has been to are the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, one of the largest coral reefs in the world, and the 100-feet deep Billy’s Blue Hole in the Bahamas. Her favorite place to dive and explore is the Looe Key Reef in Key West and the 210-foot Adolphus Busch cargo ship that was intentionally sunk. When asked about having ever encountered a shark she recalls the first time visiting the shipwreck. “The first time when I was in the wreck at the Adolphus Busch, that’s the first time I ever came face to face with the hammerhead shark, which scared me to death.” After her encounter with the shark, she tells how she immediately went back to the boat and didn’t dive the rest of the day. 

“I thought it was like a six-foot shark and everybody was laughing at me because it turned out to be just a baby. It was only about two or three feet long.” Mrs. Buchanan recalled. Other sea creatures that she enjoys swimming with are turtles and squid. “The Octopus those are really cool, I like diving with octopus, they’ll stick on you. If they’re little they just stick to you the big ones they can do some damage to your wetsuit or your tanks.”  

Mrs. Buchanan teaches diving during the summer months of June and July at Sea Base, North America’s only living coral reef in Florida. “It’s a boy scout camp. I teach down there… I didn’t go last year because of course because of the pandemic.”