[And]

Hi

Saw this on another forum. It just beggars belief!


"A couple of days ago Dahab's Blue Hole saw its latest fatality. Like most of the the Blue Hole's victims, this person was attempting an extremely deep dive on air, and to top it off, with a single 11.3 liter aluminium cylinder. Furthermore, he was diving solo.

There were three divers in the water, one Egyptian guide and two Russians. All three divers were equipped with standard recreational gear. The guide and one of the Russians dived to 60m, as is unfortunately very common in the Blue Hole, while the second Russian attempted a solo dive to 100 meters.

10 years ago, when technical diving practices were almost unknown in the Red Sea, I might not have viewed such accidents with the contempt that I do now. The fact is that today, There are dive centers all over Egypt where one can receive the training, equipment, and services necessary to dive at those depths with an acceptable degree of risk. So there is no excuse, even for adrenalin seekers, to attempt such folly.

While there are always people who will show up at dive resorts and express a desire to do these dives, it is up to the dive center staff to either prevent such dives from happening, or to use the opportunity to offer technical dive training to the individual (assuming that the person has a genuine interest in deep diving and is not simply suicidal or has other mental issues).

Too many divers have died in the Blue Hole, usually under similar circumstances to those described above. I wish that Dive Centers and local authorities in Dahab would take responsibility and begin taking steps to restrict deep air diving at this site."

Andy