2023 NEW ADDED CONTENT (Listed by Date Added):
o - 01 May 2024: "The EEL's" ... and adventure interacting with eels!
o - 01 May 2024: "Best of the Marine Life" Roatan 2024
o - 01 May 2024: Coral Restoration - Data Collection, Organization & Storage
o - 12 Sept 2023: URA - Chad & Keith cc dive the Clifton on 09 Sept 2023
o - 05 Sept 2023: Check out Roatan 2023 Highlights & 2022 Diving Russian Frigate!
o - 07 Sept 2023: View eight short dive videos of Roatan dive sites from 2019
o - 08 Sept 2023: The Petoskey Diver's UW Shrine & John Garner Sr plaque placement
o - 07 Sept 2023: Visit to Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum & Daniel J. Morrell exhibit
o - 11 Sept 2023 Mary Pufahl's White Coat Ceremony
o - 12 Sept 2023 Mike visit to Mackinaw Island & Girl Scouts
o - 01 May 2024: "The EEL's" ... and adventure interacting with eels!
o - 01 May 2024: "Best of the Marine Life" Roatan 2024
o - 01 May 2024: Coral Restoration - Data Collection, Organization & Storage
o - 12 Sept 2023: URA - Chad & Keith cc dive the Clifton on 09 Sept 2023
o - 05 Sept 2023: Check out Roatan 2023 Highlights & 2022 Diving Russian Frigate!
o - 07 Sept 2023: View eight short dive videos of Roatan dive sites from 2019
o - 08 Sept 2023: The Petoskey Diver's UW Shrine & John Garner Sr plaque placement
o - 07 Sept 2023: Visit to Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum & Daniel J. Morrell exhibit
o - 11 Sept 2023 Mary Pufahl's White Coat Ceremony
o - 12 Sept 2023 Mike visit to Mackinaw Island & Girl Scouts
Mike Michaels Historic Web Site
![Picture](/uploads/1/0/6/2/106221155/published/death-valley04-racetrack-mike-sliding-rocks.jpg?250)
This is the personal website of Wayne J. "Mike" Michaels ...
The purpose of this website is to capture some of the many passions and hobbies that Mike has been involved in over a number of years.
Hope you enjoy this site and also find it useful ...
The purpose of this website is to capture some of the many passions and hobbies that Mike has been involved in over a number of years.
- At one point this website was used as the official website for Undersea Research Associates (URA) ... a group you can read about in many of this website's pages. Its charter starts back in the mid-1970's, and was formed by it then and current leader, David Trotter. The group of "associates" has changed over the years. I began about seven years ago and am still an active member of Dave's group.
- The group works year around: SPRING: survey the Great Lakes with side scan SONAR looking for extremely old historic shipwrecks.
- SUMMER: we switch the boat over and configure it for deep technical diving (tri-mix) and dive the pristine newly found shipwrecks. We do a lot of basic marine archaeology on these wrecks (e.g. measurement of length, beam, etc., analyze any cargo she may have been carrying, look for other "fingerprints" on the wreck such as type of rigging, number of masts, and other unique features that help us find her history.
- FALL/WINTER: Time to do research on these shipwrecks to document the history of both the ship and the people that sailed (and often perished) while sailing the Great Lakes. We also work frequently with museums and their historic displays. (See the work done on the Daniel J. Morrel page and our work with the Maritime Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point in upper Michigan Daniel J. Morrell (1974)!!!I) Mike loves the historic research on these long past lost shipwrecks. For Mike it is much like being a detective, and slowly pulling small threads of knowledge from here and there to eventually get a shipwreck's ID ... and more importantly, the dramatic stories of the people who sailed them.
- The group is strictly non-profit. Each time we find these new shipwrecks we take terabytes of hi-resolution video and then produce short videos which we share with the public in speaking engagements all around the Great Lakes region.
- I felt it was appropriate to preserve much of the old URA website, as it contains a wealth of information on a number of subjects (many of them my personal interests) ... such as marine archaeology, diving medicine, diving safety, and Great Lakes maritime history (e.g. commerce, etc.). I will try to continue to add new content to the URA portion of this website as long as I continue to participate with the group!!!
- Mike started to SCUBA dive way back in 1954 (yes ... the year is correct). To date I have logged over 3000+ dives and ~> 4000+ hours underwater. This spans a huge variety of diving equipment and many varied diving environments (such as ice diving, wreck diving, caverns and swim-throughs, saturated diving in a underwater habitat, deep diving, coral restoration, and much more.) So many of the pages include information on:
- Underwater medicine
- Underwater safety and emergency diving procedures (divers, dive shops, and dive clubs should check out the resources in this website under the Diver Emergency Forms & Medicine
- etc.
- Somewhere along the line ... way back again ... I gained a passion for history. So a lot of what you will find here is some detailed historic information Marine Archaeology & Ship Lore . Much of it on shipwrecks discovered by URA ... but also some that have yet to be discovered.
- I started out in college on a career path of oceanography. But, after two years of study the USAF got hold of me and redirected my career in nuclear radiochemistry and then later into nuclear engineering, and finally into engineering management. I also had a huge interest in artificial intelligence (and chaired the Northwest Artificial Intelligence Forum for several years in the Seattle area. That passion led to my ending "formal" career with ~15 years at Microsoft campus (Redmond, WA) working with world wide customers on advanced integration of Microsoft technology into their software. This required extensive interfacing with Microsoft's world class research departments deployed world wide.
- But there always remained that old "passion" for oceanography. In the process of getting back into it I discovered the new world of marine archaeology. So much of my "retired" life time is expended in working with a host of marine archaeologist and biologists. I love it!!!! I have even had the opportunity to teach several classes/seminars to new college students.
- I guess you have to add a life long passion to just keep learning new things!!!!!! Retirement is sweet!!! Oh, yes ... I still do a bit of "consulting" to many of the old customers I worked with when employed. But, now they are on MY SCHEDULE and MY TIMELINES! :-)
Hope you enjoy this site and also find it useful ...
SST
![Picture](/uploads/1/0/6/2/106221155/published/sst-logo-business-card.jpg?1630542608)
So ... you ask ... what is SST?
Simulation Systems Technology is a Limited Partnership formed by four young engineers in 1974. All were then working at General Electric's Nuclear Energy Business Group in San Jose, CA. The partnership was formed to be the business front for the four engineers for non-work related consulting services. So we weren't violating our NDA or IP legal restrictions!
The name "Simulation Systems Technology" was so picked as the team, early in its formative years, performed extensive numeric/mathematical "modeling" of various complex systems, using tools like Finite Element Analysis coupled with computer programing and significant AI (Artificial Intelligence). Hence the logo with a boiling water nuclear reactor & equations with computer graphics seemed appropriate.
There were a host of "small" projects that were performed by both individuals and the group as a whole. For example two of us taught computer and software classes at San Jose State University's engineering department for many year during their "early bird" program (classes in the early morning before normal business hours). We also wrote software and consulted with the Electric Power Research Institute in Palo Alto, CA and other organizations.
Some of the most notable accomplishments of SST include:
More recently I've used the partnership for non-profit projects like the bathymetric survey of Island Lake and Loon Lake in Michigan (see images below). Over the years the actual usage has flourished and waned, but has frequently served as a useful business tool. I still use the SST partnership from time to time in my now more limited consulting as well as my "retirement projects".
Simulation Systems Technology is a Limited Partnership formed by four young engineers in 1974. All were then working at General Electric's Nuclear Energy Business Group in San Jose, CA. The partnership was formed to be the business front for the four engineers for non-work related consulting services. So we weren't violating our NDA or IP legal restrictions!
The name "Simulation Systems Technology" was so picked as the team, early in its formative years, performed extensive numeric/mathematical "modeling" of various complex systems, using tools like Finite Element Analysis coupled with computer programing and significant AI (Artificial Intelligence). Hence the logo with a boiling water nuclear reactor & equations with computer graphics seemed appropriate.
There were a host of "small" projects that were performed by both individuals and the group as a whole. For example two of us taught computer and software classes at San Jose State University's engineering department for many year during their "early bird" program (classes in the early morning before normal business hours). We also wrote software and consulted with the Electric Power Research Institute in Palo Alto, CA and other organizations.
Some of the most notable accomplishments of SST include:
- Nuclear core simulator program - both the physics & the thermohydraulic / thermodynamic distributions.
- A program that took ultra sound digital imaging data as input, processed and searched for "peaks" in the scanned data that indicated sub-surface cracks in large scale SS & metal pipes (e.g. steam, water, other fluids in nuclear reactors & other large processing plants. Also used on pipe welds.
- A program that helped "hot lab" analysis of irradiated fuel rods pulled from nuclear reactors. SST was often involved in risk assessment projects and engineering management.
- Perhaps the most significant legacy is a program called Chiron. Chiron input nuclear radionuclide samples (noble gases like Xe-133, Xe-135, Kr-87, Kr-88, etc. and liquid core coolant samples like I-131, I-132, ... I-135, etc.) and used this information to "predict" the number of small failures in nuclear reactor core fuel rods of Zirconium that clad the Uranium and Plutonium fuel. By simulating the way these isotopes progressed (traveled) from the nuclear fuel, through small defects in the Zr clad, to the reactor's offgas and core coolant, it was possible to not only predict the number of small failures, but the size and severity of the failures. Since the sampling was accomplished "periodically" when the power reactor was in operation this was critical information to help predict and plan for the periodic refueling of nuclear BWR power reactors worldwide. Created in early versions as early as the mid 1970's and progressively developed and enhanced until the early 2000's the last I heard this program is still in use today.
More recently I've used the partnership for non-profit projects like the bathymetric survey of Island Lake and Loon Lake in Michigan (see images below). Over the years the actual usage has flourished and waned, but has frequently served as a useful business tool. I still use the SST partnership from time to time in my now more limited consulting as well as my "retirement projects".
Some SST Projects ...
![Picture](/uploads/1/0/6/2/106221155/published/x-img-3028.jpg?1629411471)
"Mike"
August 2020
Port Huron Museum