[KHTS] – Santa Clarita residents gathered at the Santa Clarita Aquatics Center Saturday evening for the eighth annual Underwater Pumpkin Carving Contest and Spooky Family Fair.

The carving contest featured 15 SCUBA-certified dive teams of two who competed to create the best jack-o-lantern in 30 minutes while 13 feet under the surface of the Aquatics Center diving pool.

Alone Cohn and Lourdes Isaacson with their jailhouse pumpkin.

The Spooky Family Fair was also held in addition to the Underwater Pumpkin Carving Contest which featured games, crafts, trick-or-treating around the pool and a costume contest.

“It’s a free event that we put on to celebrate the fall season,” said Santa Clarita Aquatics Program Specialist Taryn Flatt. “A lot of residents come out and enjoy the Aquatics Center.”

Many of the teams in the Underwater Pumpkin Carving Contest already had an idea of what they were going to carve in their pumpkin before the contest started.

“You get pretty cool designs. You’d be surprised about what somebody could whip out in 30 minutes underwater,” said Connor Vanleeuwen, a senior lifeguard at the Santa Clarita Aquatics Center. “If we just had a regular pumpkin carving contest it’d still be fun, but it is the Aquatics Center, so making it underwater definitely ups the ante.”

Mark Gibson with his flaming skull pumpkin.

Kelly Court and Seeloong Young were one of the teams that participated in Saturday’s contest.

Court and Young had the idea to carve a Minion from the “Despicable Me” series in their pumpkin.

“(The design is) familiar to all of the kids,” said Young. “Hopefully we get a lot of votes.”

Attendees were able to watch the contest from an underwater camera that was projected on a large screen.

After the 30 minutes were up, the pumpkins were judged, mostly on craftsmanship and creativity, said Vanleeuwen.

Mark Gibson came in first place with his flaming skull pumpkin and Alone Cohn and Lourdes Isaacson came in second place with their jailhouse pumpkin.