Diving deaths in The Red Sea?

Andy M

Sounds familar. I was involved in a similar current change episode 10 years ago. One thing about the Elphinstone, the currents are unpredictable and you MUST stay close to the reef. The same applies for all offshore reefs in the red sea.

The egyptian boats do not track divers closely enough and that is unsafe. They make assumptions about where you might appear and dont tend to keep an eye out for bags. We would not do that in the UK.

Many times I have surfaced in the red sea and the boat is nowhere in sight. That very rarely happens in the UK.

Andy

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Know your PO2 at all times

Simon TW

I'm just catching up, to bring the thread back on track......

In Hurghada alone there are over 70 deaths a year. Some are diving accidents some are divers hit by boats but most are due to diver fitness. Heart attack is a poular one, people come on holiday and they are certified divers or learning to dive and the medical form is completed and then you find out that that in some cases not all that truthfully. Yesterday a friend had to get a guy out of the pool and to the hospital. Blood pressure 90/190 but he really wanted to learn to dive.

I know quite a bit about the missing divers. Remember that not all dives on Elphinstone are done from a Livaboard or Day Boat. Rhibs are not driven by experienced Captains with licences. Aparently these guys were dropped in the wrong place to start with. The Russian survivor swam for 5 hours to reach shore and the others didn't want to try so his own survival instinct took over.

Booking on the "voted best livaboard" certainly doesn't insure that the guide on the boat won't take the time get himself changed in some dry clothing before taking your lifeless body ashore for someone to perform CPR.

Diving in the Red Sea is the same as diving anywhere else it's YOUR responsibility to ensure that the safety equipment is in place before you enter the water. I had a boat charterd with a few friends this week, before it left the Harbour we checked the boats equipment. The O2 kit wasn't present and the boat didn't leave the harbour untill we had a working O2 kit with a plentyfull supply of gas.

I nearly checked out once and I'm now so much more carefull on where and what I dive, I never rely on an anyone else. If Pipin had checked the gas in the pony Audry would be here. If you are willing to take someones word for the mix in your cylinders and not test it yourself would you really breathe it?

Lets face it Diving is dangerous we have to do all we can to minimse that danger.

Ok, I'm off the soapbox.

caveseeker7

Someone over on Scubaboard posted links to the tale of the sole survivor and translated the two part story (pretty well, too, easy to read in that respect). As it's his post and translation and I don't have permisson to post it on Rebreather World here are the links to his posts:

ScubaBoard - View Single Post - Divers missing near Marsa Alam?
ScubaBoard - View Single Post - Divers missing near Marsa Alam?

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Cheers
Stefan



"Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority,
and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media,
which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.!"

Andy M

Map from the livejournal - http://monfornot.livejournal.com/22443.html#cutid1

Thats a loooooong drift and swim

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Know your PO2 at all times

Simon TW

It's trasnslated on a Russian forum here. Help! 4 divers disappeared without a trace! Red sea. Egypt. 06.01.07

iDiveChick

As to the Russian diver who died, his instructor who was with him wrote a first hand account in Russian.

There is a Russian to English translation by Tek_Divr that can be read here

Gobfish1

the cave

ÏÎÐÒÀË ÒÅÕÍÈ×ÅÑÊÎÃÎ ÄÀÉÂÈÍÃÀ Àíäðåÿ ×èñòÿêîâà

http://www.diverclub.ru/home/cyprezz...36c3bd68f32fa5

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Steve G

Apparently not the only gay diver in the village

http://drinkingliberally.org/blogs/o...nzee-glock.gif

http://www.scubatunes.com/audio/vol01/mp3/HiTech.mp3

Ahmed Adly

Hi,

The saftey regulations in the Red Sea are simply disgusting!
There is something called the Red Sea Assocciation for Diving & Water Sports who are headed by Karim Helal who own Divers Lodge that has the highest rate of diving fatalities IN THE WORLD!!!!!!!!!!!
If I was to start going on about how many things are filthy in that dive center I would sound paranoid! I suppose it is a whole attitude that makes them so uniquly deadly. Their main drive is selling helium, no matter what the cost of life!

Ultimatley, you need to choose where you dive based on your common sense of course and don't be fooled by big signs.

Faceless

Strange to read this. Divers Lodge is one of well known places on Red Sea with very high amount of visitors per year, specialized in tecdiving.
I've dived with Divers Lodge several times as was pleased with level of service.
Death rate is usually derived from number of fatalities per total amount of dives. So, if it's not a false claim, I'd like to know where these numbers are coming from.

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Peoples risk perception is almost always focused on the most dramatic rather than the most probable. (c) Gordon Smith

Louda

if you dive rebreather, then safety is in your own rebreather. u decide it.

diving center only file your tanks & you can check the mix.

If you have your own buddy who understands how to help when you have rebreather related accident, then the diving center is not really affecting you.

if you are a beginner, then you need help assemble your rebreather & you need good guide to help you in case of hypoxia, oxygen toxicity, etc...

in this case, you options in Egypt are few.

Will continue later.

Thanks