Three Russian divers missing in Egypt

[MarkUK]

What is it with Russian divers and Elphinstone Reef in the southern Egyptian Red Sea?

At 1.30pm Egyptian time on Thursday 22 November, three Russian divers – two men and one woman – went on a dive off Elphinstone and failed to return. A search was started on Thursday, but called off when darkness fell, and as far as I am aware, picked up again today. To the best of my knowledge, they have not been found yet.

Allegedly, they told a fourth member of their group that they were going to do a dive to 90m! This was the end of a week-long liveaboard on Tiger Lily, so they would be nicely full of residual nitrogen, and according to my sources, they were using single ali cylinders of air! Hate to say it, but if that was the case, can't see them making it back up again...

If you remember, in January, three Russians, a Dutch guy and an Egyptian instructor went missing from Elphinstone. One of the Russians subsequently managed to make it to shore, but the other four have never been found.

Mark

 

[String]

Russians do have a habit of doing missing.

..and entering stereotype mode i can quite believe 90m on a single 12l tank of air as well. That particular group of divers do seem to exhibit some rather kamikaze dive practices.

 

[shurite7]

UnderwaterTimes | Russian Deep-sea Divers Missing In Egypt; 'Safety Rules Were Ignored'

C

 

[String]

Seems odd that everyone is admitting breach of safety rules even before there's an investigation. Suspect the operator could be in trouble for allowing a 90m dive given the 40m hard limit in the red sea.

The usual bad media though.

Diving specialists say the divers were equipped with only one oxygen tank each, which is not enough for these kinds of depths."

Yeah obviously you need more than 1 oxygen tank to go as deep as 90m :roll:

 

[raiqz[ät]scuba.ee]

no - if you have 3 (kamikaze)diver, you always need same amount O2 tanks @surface before going chamber ... yeah, but it's not PADI way. no

 

[MarkUK]

Seems odd that everyone is admitting breach of safety rules even before there's an investigation. Suspect the operator could be in trouble for allowing a 90m dive given the 40m hard limit in the red sea.

The usual bad media though.



Yeah obviously you need more than 1 oxygen tank to go as deep as 90m :roll:

Perhaps they were planning on doing some underwater welding...

Mark

 

[Hillmorton Scubie]

Is this actually a new event, or is it the January 2007 event re released by mistake. ?????

 

[UnderSeaBumbleBee]

Is this actually a new event, or is it the January 2007 event re released by mistake. ?????

If you read the thread from Jan, the details are very differnt. The Jan dive was shallow and they all made it back to the surface. One of them made it back to shore and we have a first hand account of what happened.

This dive it seems was a deep dive and there is no report of a someone making it to shore.

I don't see many comparisions in the two events other than they were divers and some of them were Russian and it was in the Red Sea.

 

[String]

Yep its a different event just as is quite common involves russians.

 

[MarkUK]

If you read the thread from Jan, the details are very differnt. The Jan dive was shallow and they all made it back to the surface. One of them made it back to shore and we have a first hand account of what happened.

This dive it seems was a deep dive and there is no report of a someone making it to shore.

I don't see many comparisions in the two events other than they were divers and some of them were Russian and it was in the Red Sea.

The main connection between the two is that they were both on the exact same reef in Egypt and both involved Russian divers.

And I wouldn't call the January dive shallow – apparently, they'd been down to 50m on single cylinders on that dive, but managed to get to the surface before drifting off, never to be seen again, apart from the one guy who managed to swim to shore.

These latest lot might possibly have made the surface, but 90m... I don't know...

Mark