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Body of American diver recovered from deep water near Nanaimo's Departure Bay

The body of a second American man killed in a diving accident has been recovered from deep in the ocean at a popular dive site near Nanaimo’s Departure Bay. Commercial divers were called in to help police and the B.C.
xxxVictoria ambulance
The victim was one of three participating in a recreational deep dive off Snake Island.

The body of a second American man killed in a diving accident has been recovered from deep in the ocean at a popular dive site near Nanaimo’s Departure Bay.

Commercial divers were called in to help police and the B.C. Coroners Service retrieve the 38-year-old diver.

He was missing and presumed dead while diving with two friends off Snake Island Friday. Another diver died that day, while a third man survived.

“We were fortunate because we knew basically where he should be, near the wall on Snake Island, and he was,” said Barb McLintock, coroners service spokeswoman.

“He was down at a depth of 265 feet [81 metres], which is very, very, deep. You need people with special skills and equipment to do that.”

In addition to providing closure for the man’s family, the recovery of the body is an important step toward understanding what went wrong, said McLintock.

Three U.S. men were in the water off the island around 3 p.m. Friday when something went wrong.

A 60-year-old man was pronounced dead after surfacing. A 47-year-old survived. The 38-year-old diver was not found for almost two days.

Recovering all the gear from the divers can help determine what happened, said McLintock. “In every scuba death we seize all the equipment and dive computer,” she said. “That gives us a lot of information about what went wrong, which is the next question.

“We will work with experts to try and determine what went wrong. This could have been a medical event, an equipment event, something not right with the equipment, we don’t know.”

Sea Dragon Charters, the Vancouver-based company that organized the dive, could not be reached for comment Monday.

Snake Island is a popular site for divers due to its cold, clear water.

Close to one side of the island, divers can explore two old navy destroyers — HMCS Saskatchewan and HMCS Cape Breton — that were scuttled to form artificial reefs in 40 metres of water.

A Nanaimo RCMP officer died while exploring one of the ships during a dive in 2011. An American tourist died at the site in 2008.

In the most recent tragedy, the two men died on what’s called Snake Island Wall, which is a shallow shelf area that drops to an extremely deep depth.

“We’ve taken thousands of people there over the years,” said Ed Singer, owner of Sundown Divers in Nanaimo, who has more than 25 years experience in the area.

“It’s an excellent dive site. It’s just one of many sites that the water has a range of depths. You can have novice divers at that site to very advanced divers. It’s not like the site is dangerous, it just has areas of deeper water that [require] proper training.”

Map-Snake Island.jpg

Recreational divers in Canada can only dive to a depth of 40 metres, or 130 feet. However, many people now seek to be certified as technical divers, so they can dive at depths closer to 90 metres using helium mixtures, said Singer.

Generally, there’s only one or two diving deaths a year on the West Coast, said Singer.

“You realistically look at the numbers and there’s more death in bowling than there is in diving,” he said.

Still, the deaths will serve as a wake-up call to the diving community, said Singer.

“In some senses it helps people be aware how strong mother nature actually is,” he said.

“Diving is a very, very, safe sport, but there are rules you have to follow. Even if you follow everything, something could still happen.”

ceharnett@timescolonist.com

rshaw@timescolonist.com