The Ministry of Labour has laid charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act following a yearlong investigation into the death of a diver here.
Ministry spokesperson William Lin said ODS Marine of Ottawa, the diver's employer, was charged with two counts of failing to ensure that measures and procedures outlined in the Act were carried out an a diving operation in connection with a drowning death one year ago on the Trent River. The charges were laid Sept. 24.
Lin said an unnamed supervisor working at the job site is facing two charges for failing ensure that protective devices, measures and procedures are in place at a dive operation as required under the Act.
The charges against both the individual manager and company state they failed to ensure that before a dive began, any water flow that was a potential hazard to a diver was identified and controlled in a manner that ensured that the water flow posed no safety hazard to the diver.
The diver was killed Oct. 6, 2009 when he became trapped in about four metres of water at Dam 1 on the Trent Severn Waterway, just north of Trenton.
A ministry spokesperson at the time, said the diver was conducting a video inspection of the dam structure to determine the extent of future repairs. During the course of the inspection of a hole in the structure, the diver became pinned to the wall of the dam as a result of upstream water pressure from the hole.
Other workers at the site called for help around 9:20 a.m. that morning when the diver did not surface.
It would be more than two hours before his body was recovered and resuscitation efforts were called off.
Quinte West fire department dive team members and emergency medical services personnel pulled the trapped diver out of the water after an underwater camera was used to locate the man.
Attempts by emergency crews to keep the diver alive by supplying him with air failed. The diver was taken to Trenton Memorial Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
The company and supervisor will appear in Ontario Court of Justice Nov. 2 in Belleville.
