Saturday, 16 February 2008

The Blue Hole 26 January 2008

On Saturday, Mark dived two deeper sites, north of Dahab. The Canyon is an eerie experience as you descend into the gloom, going down to 30m. You can turn and look up to see the shafts of light above you. Ahead the Canyon slopes away down to 50m. You swim back up a chimney to exit through the Fishbowl.





The second dive entry is via the Bells - a chimney, open to the sea, down to 30m. You emerge out onto a wall that descends to over 300m.

You swim along the wall to reach the entry to the Blue Hole over a lip at 7m. You can swim directly across, in which case you can find yourself apparently suspended in the blue. Looking down you can't see the bottom, at about 120m, and it feels like an abyss. Alternatively you can swim round the side and view the coral.


After lunch, we were roused from our lazy sunbathing by cries for help. At first we thought it was just a training exercise but then we realised it was a real emergency. A diver had surfaced unconscious and was being towed ashore by a snorkeller. I grabbed our oxygen cylinder and we ran down to where he was being man-handled onto the floating jetty.

Hendrik, our Divemaster, organised a pickup to take him to Dahab for recompression. I held his drysuit neck-seal open so that he had a clear airway for us to administer oxygen. We got a knife and cut the neck-seal to relieve the pressure on his airway.

Later we heard that he had survived. He'd been at 102m and had come to the surface without dong any of the three decompression stops required.

I was relieved that when a real emergence arose I was able to apply the training and help save his life.

No comments: