Wise equipping saves diver

The male diver was out with a group on the evening of Wednesday, 12 August when he failed to resurface at the dive boat.

An emergency call was put out but dusk was falling as searches were launched in the Tees Bay area by two lifeboats from Redcar, another two lifeboats from Hartlepool and an RAF Sea King helicopter.

Well after dark it was, however, the bridge lookout aboard a passing ship, the Norsky, who spotted the diver’s flashing strobe. The ship made contact with the emergency services.

Soon after, one of the Hartlepool lifeboats also made visual contact with the diver and was able to retrieve him, after he had drifted under night conditions, fortunately for just half an hour or so. 

“It could well have been a different outcome,” Dave Cocks, of Redcar RNLI, told local press. The diver had carried “the right emergency equipment” and this, coupled with the “particularly vigilant” ship’s crew and the “very prompt turn-out by the RNLI lifeboats” had led to a swift, efficient rescue.

It made good news after a fortnight in which three people have lost their lives off the North East.

Days before the drift rescue, 52-year-old Colin Bell, from Scarborough, died after getting into difficulties while diving a reported 11 miles off Hartlepool.

On 3 August, Stephen Bailey, 49, from Filey and Malcolm Exley, 52, from Scarborough died after getting into difficulties on a reported 40-50m wreck dive eight miles off Filey.