Your Worst Nightmare!
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| Students with ADAS National Director Paul Butler |
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On 27th October 2005 a dive team set up for work in a gravel pit near Albury, NSW. They use a five man team with two divers in the water, an attendant, a stand-by diver and a supervisor. The divers are on surface controlled equipment with one using a Kirby Morgan Superlite 17 and the other a DSI 18 band mask. The task is underwater cutting using a Boroko ultra thermic lance with diver two videoing the process with a closed circuit video, with surface monitor. The depth was only seven metres.
The job progressed normally with the usual "make it hot" and "make it cold" commands until, about twenty-five minutes into the dive, the supervisor notices the video picture is showing a close up of the bottom. The supervisor calls up diver two and gets no response. He calls up diver one to get him to check diver two however the slurred mumble he gets back over the voice comms is unintelligible. The supervisor immediately jumps the stand-by diver and changes the supply air from the portable compressor to the high pressure bottle bank. The standby diver finds diver two first, and he is apparently unconscious and is unresponsive. After checking that his bail out cylinder is turned on, the standby diver opens the helmet reserve valve and flushes the helmet then inflates the diver’s buoyancy compensator and recovers the diver to the surface where the surface crew quickly pull them both into the shore. The standby diver is immediately despatched to recover diver one while the supervisor, who is dressed in his normal street clothes, wades into the water to assist the attendant and they frantically remove the divers gear and commence CPR as diver two is not breathing and has no pulse. By the time they have the gear off the standby diver is back on the surface with diver one. He is unconscious but breathing.
This is your worst nightmare. Two divers down.  | | Your worst nightmare – two divers down |  |
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The three fit members left in the team are now in overdrive. The standby is struggling out of his gear so that he can assist. The attendant is maintaining CPR on diver two while the supervisor starts to get diver one out of his Superlite. As soon as the standby is able to assist he and the supervisor drag diver one out of the water and put him in the recovery position. While the standby monitors the patient the supervisor sets up the oxygen kit for use on both patients and finally gets time to ring the ambulance.
About now the ADAS assessor stops the training exercise and de-briefs the dive team. Then the supervisor is taken aside and grilled further. What do you think caused the problem? What are you going to do now? Did you record the time the incident occurred? How will you proceed with an accident investigation? Who must receive the accident report? What will you do to make sure this doesn’t happen again? What aspects of employee welfare need to be addressed in the coming hours or days?  | | The team commence CPR with oxygen management | |
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This has all been part of a very intensive Australian Diver Accreditation Scheme (ADAS) commercial diving supervisor’s course held at Descend Underwater Training Centre in October 2005.
The impending release of the revised ASNZS2299.1 Australian standard titled "Occupational Diving Operations" means that in future, in Australia, Supervisors will be required to be qualified, trained and accredited by ADAS, an occupational diver training establishment or the relevant regulatory authority. The students on this course are a bit ahead of the game and getting their qualifications in place before the rush that will inevitably come when divers realise they are breaking the law by supervising without a certification.
Descend tried something new on this course by combining the supervisors’ practical assessments with a commercial diving course. There were benefits to both groups of students. Firstly the supervisors got to work with real divers rather than instructors pretending to be working divers. The divers were in there last two days of a level two course so they are realistic of the calibre of new divers found on occupational dive sites. In addition the supervisors were not required to get in the water or deal with instructors play-acting. They also found that the tasks were realistic and they had much more time available to supervise actual work dives as they had two complete dive teams in the water. The tasks included ultra thermic cutting, welding, dredging and jetting with each task run until completion. Previous courses, run up until now saw staff divers in the water for five or ten minutes before simulating an emergency. Descend’s course, using real divers and real work tasks was found to be much more realistic and challenging.  | | Diver two gets the same treatment | |
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From the divers perspective they got all the dives and tasks they required to complete their course, got extra emergency practice and in addition saw a range of different styles of supervision which would be typical of the workplace. The interaction was quite interesting to watch and the groups even had a night out together. Business cards were exchanged and I overheard a number of the supervisors inviting the divers to submit their résumé’s at the end of course. I would say it was a win win for all concerned.  | | Supervisor Tim Johnson at the panel | |
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The Supervisors course is not just about emergency management and setting up and running work dives. The first eight days concentrated on diving physics, physiology, diving maladies, decompression management, leadership, communication, dispute resolution, dive planning, standards and regulations and included four written examinations. It is an intense and rewarding programme.
If you are in the market for a commercial divers ADAS Supervisors certificate of competency call Descend Underwater Training Centre, at Shop1, 826 David Street, Albury. NSW. 2640. Ph 0260411405. or Email dive@descend.com.au or check the web site at www.descend.com.au
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