Divers urged to save shipwrecks by holding onto statues of people instead

How doyou protect deteriorating underwater shipwrecks from divers?By giving the divers life-sized concrete statues of people to hang onto instead, of course.

Fifteen concrete peoplealready standon the bed of the St. Lawrence River near Brockville, Ont., and the ThousandIslands region chapter of Save Ontario Shipwrecks is adding another sixto itsexisting underwater divingpark.

They'replaced there tohelp protect 25 knownunderwater wreck sitesin the area, some of which date back to the War of 1812.

"It's a lot easier and [causes] less damage when you're holding onto a cement sculpture or an aluminum frame than it is on 200-year-old wood on a shipwreck that has historical significance and that we want to maintain," says Tom Scott, chair of theThousand Islands chapter ofSave Ontario Shipwrecks.