Divers missing in Zanzibar

[sbloomer]

This appeared in our local paper

Does anyone have any more details?

Four divers missing in Zanzibar

July 18 2005 at 11:15AM

Dar es Salaam - Four Danish tourists and their Canadian diving instructor are missing in the Zanzibar islands off the East African coast, police said on Monday.

The five left for a scuba course on Friday from Pemba island and have not been seen since.

"So far, all the information we have is that four tourists from Denmark and their Canadian instructor have been reported missing by a divers' club," Ramadhani Kinyogo, a police spokesperson in Zanzibar, said.

"A search is going on by divers from different parts of the country but so far, nothing has been reported."

Pemba and Unguja, the twin islands that make up Tanzania's famous Zanzibar archipelago, are a magnet for tourists seeking white sand beaches, unspoiled coral reefs and a rich culture.

 

[H2Andy]

terrible news...

 

[pilot fish]

That many divers on the same dive? Very unusual. Sounds like very screwed signals on the dive boat, or a shore dive gone totally out of control? Scary.

 

[stefo2]

pilot fish - what is so unusual about 4 divers and an istructor on the same dive??

I was there, diving with a different diveshop from the neighbouring village and yesterday I spoke to two people who were on the same diveboat as the missing divers, so I do have more details.

First of all, as of this morning, unfortunately the divers have not been found. They found a BCD and a regulator the day before yesterday, which raised some hope that they had made it to an island since you would not really take the BCD off while in the water, but no signs of the divers.

This is what happened: The four Danes (who, contrary to the article above, were all certified divers, but at least one of them had just completed her OWC the week before and these were her first dives) and their instructor set off on a boat from Pemba island together with some snorkellers and two other divers, who were a lot more experienced (one was an istructor as well). The dives were to be drift dives at Misali, a small offshore island, in view of the main island, but quite a distance out. As far as I know they did the first dive as one group (without the snorkellers, of course), and for the second dives the two more experienced divers were given permission to do a slightly deeper profile and do their own dive (don't know if there was another DM with them or not), rather than going with the main group. Bad idea, since there was only one marker buoy on board, which was given to the two divers, while the instructor and his group went without. I don't know if the dive leader had any surface signalling devices, but he definetely did not have a buoy for the boat to follow during the dive. The water wasn't particularly choppy that day, but rough enough to make it very hard for the boat crew to follow bubbles. Also, there can be strong currents in the Pemba channel and around the small islands. Anyway - the two divers surfaced as expected, the other group either didn't surface or surfaced in an unexpected location and were not found by the boat.

After searching for a while the dive centre contacted the navy and various other people and quite a big search including 9 boats and a plane was carried out the following two days.

Pemba is a very remote location in a very poor country, so the search and rescue facilities, communication etc. are not as developed as in other places - the boats would have mainly been local wooden boats with small engines - but I believe the dive centre tried there best to find those people.

That's all the information I have. I spoke to the dive centre I had been diving with this morning - no news, and I think after three days, even if they made it to an island (there is no fresh water on these small islands) and were not seen by the plane, the chances aren't great to find them alive, but stranger things have happened.

 

[sbloomer]

Stefo

I think pilot fish was referring to the fact that so many divers missing at the same time was unusual

Which dive centre were they "based" at? I was at Manta in January, but the island you were referring to (Misali) isn't familiar to me? I presume it's at the southern end of the island?

 

[pilot fish]

Stefo

I think pilot fish was referring to the fact that so many divers missing at the same time was unusual

Which dive centre were they "based" at? I was at Manta in January, but the island you were referring to (Misali) isn't familiar to me? I presume it's at the southern end of the island?

Thanks, sbloomer, that is what I meant.

Hope this has a good ending.

 

[stefo2]

sbloomer, they were diving from Chake Chake, which is more to the south. Misali is pretty much straight out from Chake, but it is further out than those other islands up north (Fundo, Njao) that you probably dived from Manta Reef.

 

[Aqua Buoy]

Two groups, 1 marker buoy...ouch!!! the non-marked group had students... ouch!!! What was that instructor thinking, or the boat driver or the first group?

As Pilot Fish says, I hope this has a good ending!

 

[sbloomer]

Two groups, 1 marker buoy...ouch!!! the non-marked group had students... ouch!!! What was that instructor thinking, or the boat driver or the first group?

As Pilot Fish says, I hope this has a good ending!

Which is why I always carry my own SMB.

When we dived in Pemba in January we had a situation where we couldn't drift with markers because of the risk of entanglement with the reef (the gentle prevailing current was sort of diagonally up and over the reef), The skipper knew the conditions well and guided the boat in the direction the DM told him we were headed. When we terminated the dive the boat was about 300m away - a long way in all but the flattest seas. Took about 15 minutes for the boat to spot us, but all 4 of us had our own SMB's.

The bottom line for me is don't rely on the dive operator to have al the equipment you need....

 

[stefo2]

Two groups, 1 marker buoy...ouch!!! the non-marked group had students... ouch!!! What was that instructor thinking, or the boat driver or the first group?

As Pilot Fish says, I hope this has a good ending!

The "non-marked" group were all certified (but inexperienced) divers. Doesn't really make much difference, though, they should have had a marker buoy.

What was the boat driver thinking? Don't know, but when my friend from the other diveshop spoke to him the other day, he seemed pretty upset, of course. I think the problem here and at that diveshop in particular is that while most of the DMs and instructors are Westerners, the boat crew are usually local people with limited English. This particular diveshop, from my impression from diving with them 2 years ago, had a way of treating the local staff in the diveshop and their hotel very condescendingly, "we'll tell you what you do because we know what is best for you" kind of way. I'm only guessing here, but even if the captain had his doubts, I don't think he would have had much say in the decision making.

What was the other group thinking? Well, I don't know what they were thinking at the time, maybe not much because they thought the instructor / dive leader would have everything he needed. But when I spoke to them two days ago, they said they couldn't help feeling responsible, after all, it had been them who asked for the group to be split so that they could do a deeper dive. According to an official from the diveshop the split had been planned before the boat set out - why on earth did they not take a second marker buoy then???

No news from the search yet, they were not found yesterday. I think they are continuing the search today, but with decreasing hope, I guess.