Last Breath (2019) - full transcript
A deep sea diver is stranded on the seabed with 5 minutes of oxygen and no hope of rescue. With access to amazing archive this is the story of one man's impossible fight for survival.
[bubbling]
-[man 1] You got this.
-[man 2] We have lost comms for diver two.
[radio static]
[man 2] We're losing
one of my divers here.
[man 1] Come over. We have one more.
[static stops]
[radio static]
[man 3] Where is he at now?
-[man 1] Drop the fourth.
-[man 2] We're running out of time--
[man 1] But I can't move it.
I can't move it.
-[man 1] I've got this.
-[man 3] We can't give you any slack.
-[man 1] Setback. Pass setback.
-[device ringing]
[man 2] Hang in there, buddy.
-[man 1] It won't move.
-[man 2] Bridge.
-You've gotta get us back over there.
-[radio static]
[waves crashing]
-[radio static]
-[marine control] Topaz. Topaz. Topaz.
Aberdeen Marine Control.
What's your position? Over.
[man] Aberdeen Control,
we are 64 miles northeast of you.
Heading for old field block 22/14-B. Over.
[radio static]
[marine control] Thank you, Topaz.
Update one on job. Over.
[indistinct chatter]
[Chris] Ah, four in.
-Hiya, Rob. How you doing, sir?
-How you doing, Chris?
-Yeah, yeah. Good, mate, yeah. Hi, Ally.
-All right?
-Hey, Chris, you all right, mate?
-[Chris] Good, thanks, yeah.
-Yeah. Yeah, sorry. [laughs]
-As long as you have got that.
[Chris] It's, uh, yeah,
Morag wanted a bit of a tour of the ship.
Good day. Yeah, good morning.
[Chris] Mustard's always worth having.
See if we can get in,
what have we got there?
Oh, it's Jimmy Kyle
from the Black Isle. [chuckles]
Might have to edit this one out. [laughs]
So, I know I like to make out that, uh,
life on board's pretty Spartan.
Uh, so what I'm about to show you, uh,
is obviously gonna
dispel that, unfortunately.
Because behind me...
is a bona fide, uh, sauna.
Behind door number two,
believe it or not...
sunbed.
[cow moos]
[Morag] When Christopher went off-shore,
we enjoyed sending videos to one another.
We've got a new calf on the croft today,
isn't it beautiful?
That is the big news, big news from home.
Hi, guys.
It gave us a little part of each other,
we could share in each other’s lives,
while we were apart.
And it reassured us
that we were both happy.
[all] ♪ We wish you a merry Christmas ♪
♪ We wish you a merry Christmas ♪
♪ We wish you a merry Christmas ♪
♪ And a happy New Year ♪
Merry Christmas, Lemons. [blows kisses]
[giggles]
It was a really,
really exciting time in our life.
Did you get the little sign?
It's gorgeous.
We were due to be married
in April that year.
We were building a house
at that time, too.
[Chris] Enjoying that?
[Chris blows raspberry, laughs]
-Beep, beep.
-[both laughing]
And I had started
a new job as the head teacher
of the local primary school.
We had so many plans for the future.
It was wonderful.
[Chris] Okay, I think I'm running.
Hi, Morag.
Six lads living in there, but looks like
the lights are all off in there.
What you can actually see
on the outside there
is, uh, the little camera
they use to monitor us.
That's pointing into the toilet,
so they can watch us have a shower.
Think what you will.
[Morag] I had a good understanding
of Christopher's work.
All of these tunnels,
gases and depths.
Christopher often described it
as going into space, but under water.
[Chris laughs] Nice to see ya.
-Yes. See you in 28 days.
-Yeah, thanks, mate, yeah. [chuckles]
So, uh, this is the moment of truth
when we get on board, when we, uh,
check the board to see who
we're gonna be in sat with,
'cause that can pretty much
make or break your trip.
And that's the two other people
you're gonna be spending
the next month
locked in a tin can with, so...
And if you can see it
at the same time as me.
Yeah, team three, Chris Lemons,
Dave Yuasa, Duncan Allcock, okay.
-[man 1] David Yuasa interview.
-[man 2] B cam, mark.
-[interviewer] Hi, Dave.
-[Dave] Hi.
Uh, there are some people
that you get on great with.
Other people
that you don't get on well with,
and no one wants to be in with a knob.
Duncan I knew very well.
I'd worked with him
over the years quite a few times.
He's got a very good reputation
on the boat.
[Duncan] You do have to be a certain breed
to work in an RC.
Slightly unhinged, um,
a little bit abnormal.
They don't have problems,
they have solutions.
Certainly, the guys that I've worked with
are one of a kind.
Dave's a very cool guy.
Uh, he... He doesn't get stressed.
He doesn't get anxious.
Very, very logical.
Who keeps himself to himself.
I'm not famed at work for, um,
being a particularly,
uh, emotional person.
I think, uh, "Vulcan" is how a few people
have described me.
Chris was relatively new,
I'd not dived with him.
But I think he dived with Duncan
quite a few times
and, um, Duncan was his, uh,
his sat daddy.
[laughs] That sounds weird
now I've said it out loud, eh?
I was there for Chris' first sat.
And then we did four sats
in a row after that, together.
The bond you get with that is massive.
I got to know him very, very well.
He was a very amiable guy.
[Dave] I had a little word with Duncan
and said, "What is this Chris guy like?"
And, uh, I got a thumbs up,
and I was happy to go in with him.
[man on radio] Captain Strong,
we're six hours away from the job.
[grunts]
[man] This is all we're currently
suffering from aches and pains, bruising,
joint discomfort,
skin numbness sensations.
[clattering]
[indistinct chatter]
[Chris] Hi, boys.
Uh, as you can see
there's not a huge deal of space.
Probably only half a foot or so
between the bunks down here.
Dunc's in there, uh, getting his ready.
And then this is the living end,
got, sort of, benches and, uh,
a bit of a table.
One of the very few port holes we've got,
so that's pretty much the only sight
of the outside world that you have.
So, I got to crawl
through these little tunnels
to get from place to place.
And down this way
is what we call the "wet pot."
So, I just push that door open.
Basically, the toilet and the shower room,
so various ablutions, that kind of thing.
Yeah, if I stand at my full height,
there's absolutely everything
I can knock my head on.
It's a real pain for me,
that's why I've always
got gashes all over me.
And the magic of it is, once you've done
the full circuit, you're back to...
You're back to where you started
and a cup of tea. And a cup of tea. Yeah.
-[Duncan] Mind me chocolate stash.
-[Chris laughs]
That's ridiculous, Duncan,
how much you got...
How much have you got in there?
-[Duncan] Just a bar for every day.
-[Chris] A bar for every day. [chuckles]
I've only started just to check them out.
-Yeah.
-[Chris laughs] Glad I'm in with you.
Okay, lads, if everyone's ready,
we'll go for blowdown.
[locks clicking]
[gas hissing]
[hissing continues]
Okay, lads,
we'll stop and check for leaks.
[spraying]
[Dave] On this particular job,
we were working at 100 meters.
So, they pump into the chamber,
the equivalent pressure of 100 meters
of water in heliox.
Which is a mix of helium and oxygen.
And then we are effectively
at an equal pressure to the seabed.
[man on radio] That's a seal confirmed.
I'll continue with the blowdown.
-[static]
-[Duncan speaking in squeaky voice]
As soon as you get a breath of helium gas,
you start speaking with a squeaky voice.
[continues speaking in squeaky voice]
-[man] Okay. Cheers, lads.
-[Duncan] Yeah, mate.
The first 30 seconds
is always quite humorous.
After that, the novelty wears off.
[gas hissing]
[hissing stops]
[man] Okay, lads,
we've reached depth. Blowdown over.
[man speaking indistinctly on radio]
[Duncan] Thank you.
[Dave] Sat is a very odd environment
to live in.
There's very little privacy.
Your whole world seems to shrink
to the size of the system.
[Duncan] Living in sat
is extremely intense.
I think everybody
copes with it differently.
[Dave taking deep breaths]
[Dave] Most divers have got two personas.
They've got their work persona
and their home persona.
At home, I'm David, a father of three.
And Dave is a professional diver.
He, um...
He's responsible only for the job in hand.
[Dave taking labored breaths]
[Duncan] Chris was definitely
a little more anxious.
Not been sat diving long.
Trying to make sure that he is, uh,
keeping up with everybody else,
that he has got all the right equipment,
that he's not gonna embarrass himself.
But very conscious
that people are watching his every move.
Quite a lot of pressure.
He wanted to look good for everybody.
He wanted to be a good diver.
The best diver.
[Dave] Before I got into sat diving,
I always, kind of,
looked out at the North Sea
as the... The premiership of diving.
There's a lot of DSPs there.
There's a lot of diving going on there.
And this particular job,
the field we were working at
was about 12 hours steam
away from Aberdeen.
So that... That puts you pretty much
in the middle of the North Sea.
The North Sea can be unpredictable,
and the weather wasn't very good
at the time.
The boat was moving around a fair bit.
[Duncan] The North Sea is definitely
one of the most dangerous
environments in the world.
The water temperature's four degrees
on the seabed,
which is a killer.
[Morag] I realize there's dangers
on the job. I realized that.
But Chris had reassured me continually
that he would be safe.
That he wasn't in harm’s way.
I thought that he was happy
in his saturation tank.
So, no, I didn't ever worry.
[radio static]
[man] Aberdeen Control,
Aberdeen Control. This is Topaz. Over.
[marine control] Go ahead, Topaz. Over.
[man] We are on live oil field.
Block 22/14-B.
Holding, we have to start work
immediately. Over and out.
-[man 1] Ready?
-[man 2] Yeah, I'm ready.
[man 1] Okay, everything is on zero.
One, four, five, six running.
[man 2] Okay, that's all thrusters
in DP mode.
[man 1] I have two GPSs selected
for reference systems.
[man 2] Yeah.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[man 1] Okay, Captain, we are on DP now.
[Craig] Okay, boys, five minutes' notice
to getting in the bell.
Well, the divers are my puppets,
I'm the, uh...
The conductor of a small band,
they are, uh, my hands and my feet.
And they, uh, essentially do
what I ask them to do.
When the diver's in the water,
I am the most important person
on the vessel.
And everyone will defer to me.
Okay, first man entering the bell.
-[metal clanking]
-[Duncan breathing heavily]
[Craig] Duncan was the bellman,
he wouldn't be diving that night.
He'd be in the bell
looking after the divers.
Dave Yuasa was diver one.
And Chris Lemons was diver two.
Bridge, that's bell
off the system at 2013.
[Michal] 2013 off system.
[Craig] Okay, boys, taking you down now.
[whirring]
[Michal] Bridge,
that's bell at surface at 2021.
[Craig] Thank you, ROV.
Coming through now.
[man] Reached working depths of 90 meters.
[Duncan] When you're lifting the helmet
onto the diver's head,
you're looking at their eyes.
You can then see if the diver's happy
or frightened out of his wits,
because you can see more white than eyes.
[Chris breathing heavily
through respirator]
At no point that evening
was Chris anxious.
-[breathing heavily through respirator]
-He was raring to go.
He wanted to prove that he was
as good as everybody else.
[all speaking in squeaky voice]
[heavy breathing continues]
[Duncan] Chris, here's the lights.
[man in normal voice]
Here's the lights, Chris.
[Craig] Bridge, that's diver two
in the water at 2037.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[heavy breathing continues]
That's you on onboard graph, Chris.
Duncan, tend to diver two's umbilical.
[Dave] When the diver is out of the bell,
he is completely reliant on his umbilical.
It gives him his hot water
which he needs to keep him warm.
Gives him gas to breathe and also lighting
and communication with the surface.
[indistinct radio chatter]
It is literally your lifeline.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig in normal voice] Diver two,
that's you clear to drop off the bell.
[Dave] Dropping off the bell
is one of my favorite parts of diving.
I love the feeling of weightlessness.
You're effectively flying down
to the seabed.
If your visibility is bad,
you really don't know
what you're dropping into.
Or when you're gonna be landing.
[radio static crackling]
It's a dark and confusing place to be,
on the seabed.
It can be extremely easy to get lost.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig in normal voice]
Diver two, the job should be
30 meters to your northwest.
[Dave] The umbilical
is your physical tether to the boat.
And if you ever need to get back
to the bell
you will follow your umbilical.
That's your route back to safety.
[Craig] In the dark it's almost harder
to get to the job than to do the job.
The seabed plays tricks on you.
The first ten minutes
is quite a stressful time.
I notice it in their breathing.
[Chris breathing heavily]
[Craig] Bridge,
both divers on the job at 2049.
[Dave] The structure we're working on
is called a manifold.
[metal rattling, creaking]
Inside there,
you've got a number of, uh, wells.
The oil will come up out of the ground
and from there it gets piped off
to a platform.
The job in hand was gonna be
to remove, uh, a piece of pipe work.
And we were gonna float in a new piece
into its place.
[metal creaking]
When you're working with divers
you are almost reaching through the screen
and turning the knobs for them.
You do get emotionally involved with them.
You feel their successes and failures
in the water.
[Chris speaking indistinctly]
And basically, you see A and B.
We're opening and closing them
in a sequence.
And then doing a pressure test.
[heavy breathing continues]
[Duncan] Once you've got your divers
on the job,
as bellman, you can relax a bit more.
See what I've got in me sandwiches
for half-time.
There's never a day I go to work
and don't enjoy it.
[indistinct radio chatter]
Me first inspirations for diving,
were definitely from watching
Jacques Cousteau on the TV
and thinking, "That is exactly
what I would like to do."
Visiting coral reefs,
swimming along with all the animals.
It just looked absolutely superb.
It was a dream for me to be a diver
and go under the sea.
[Craig] And, uh... Dave,
you keep working on it, all right?
Go ahead, shut it.
[Craig] Roger that.
[Morag] Christopher came to diving
a little bit later in life.
-He was looking for direction.
-[Craig] Normal reading.
No leaks.
[Morag] Diving was something that he was
extremely passionate about.
I would never have considered
asking Christopher
to take a different career path.
Never.
That's what he wanted to do,
that's what he was passionate about.
If I was as passionate
about a job like that as Christopher was
then I wouldn't want anyone to stop me,
so I definitely wouldn't stop him.
[waves crashing]
[Craig] That night the weather
was not good.
There was an 18-foot swell,
35 knots of wind.
We were on the limits of diving.
But it wasn't undiveable.
[Michal] Weather was rough.
But in the North Sea, nothing special.
[metal walls creaking]
It was perfectly safe.
If you can call this job safe, it's not...
Come on, it's not safe job, yeah, so...
I was in charge
for controlling DP computer.
Keeping vessel in, uh, exact position,
so divers can be safe in the water.
This moment, vessel was steady.
And then it started.
[alarm blaring]
I saw alarm, which I never seen before.
Immediately, after this alarm,
more faults coming one by one.
We have really big, uh, big problem,
because we are losing control of the...
Of the vessel.
We are losing position.
[Craig] The bridge gave me an amber light.
Its suddenness and the immediacy
of his voice told me
that, uh, this wasn't
a normal amber light.
Leave everything there,
leave everything there, Chris.
So, I wanted my divers back on the bell
as quickly as possible.
[Craig] Get out of the structure, boys.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig] Yeah.
He's here at the bell, Duncan,
come up on diver one,
diver two, back when you can.
Stand by to come up
on diver one and diver two.
Roger that. No problem.
In a series of seconds,
we had a red light.
I've never had a red light.
The bridge had lost control of the vessel
and its navigational systems,
so it will drift with the weather.
And as soon as we got to that stage
it was a sailboat.
[indistinct radio chatter]
I was surprised
at how quickly the ship moved.
It rapidly picked up speed.
'Cause we had no control over the ship,
we had no control
of what was happening on the bottom.
[Michal] Divers were still connected
to the, um, bell
and bell connected to the vessel.
So, basically, we can track diver.
It's... It's the worst scenario
which, uh, DP on diving support vessel
can... Can expect.
[Craig] Go back underneath the bell.
[Dave] When we came out of the structure,
I was expecting the bell to be
basically in front of me over here.
[Dave exclaims indistinctly]
I could tell from the root
of my umbilical
that in fact, it was now behind me
and the manifold itself
is in between me and the bell.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig] They have to climb
their umbilicals
up the side of the structure,
traverse across the top and climb
their umbilicals back to the bell
to their safe haven.
But the, um, structure was the obstacle
that they had to clear.
[Craig] Hop up onto the structure, boys.
[Dave] When I was nearly at the top,
I noticed that Chris didn't seem
to be going any further.
I could tell something was wrong.
[Craig] Chris had a loop of umbilical
wrapped around this outcrop.
He was trapped.
[in squeaky voice]
[Chris breathing rapidly]
[Craig]
It started to get tighter and tighter.
I've never seen an umbilical this tight.
[Craig] Chris could see the tension in it.
He was asking for slack out of the bell.
He couldn't get the slack out of the bell
because the ship kept moving away.
[Craig] Chris, we cannot
give you any slack.
We've got an enormous ship,
120 meters long by 20 meters wide,
being pushed by 35 knots of wind.
And Chris was our anchor on the other end.
I didn't see a scenario
where he was gonna get out of this.
[Chris breathing heavily]
[in squeaky voice]
[Duncan] Chris' umbilical went so tight,
that it actually started pulling
his stainless steel umbilical
right off the wall.
I was shitting myself.
I was literally waiting
for the inevitable, it...
Just to all go through the hole
in the floor.
And if I got between it and the hole,
I would be going out with it.
[Craig] Chris, you... You gotta clear
that umbilical yourself.
[Dave] I'm trying to make my way
back to Chris to help him.
[Dave grunts]
[grunts]
We're, maybe, less than two meters apart,
the visibility is good enough that we...
We can look into each other’s faces.
I can see that he's in trouble.
[Dave breathing heavily]
But that's now me at the end
of my umbilical.
And I can't get to him.
[metal creaking]
His umbilical is getting thinner.
I can hear it creaking.
It's the noise that something makes
before it breaks.
[grunts]
[Chris breathing rapidly]
-[indistinct radio chatter]
-[snapping]
-Lost comm to the diver two.
-[Chris] Help.
[Dave] As I was getting pulled away
from Chris,
it was almost like watching a film.
And that was the last I saw of him.
[Dave groans]
And I could hear his umbilical ripping...
as the strands in the umbilical broke
one by one.
[snapping]
[metal creaks]
[metal thud]
[radio static]
[Craig] Bridge,
we have lost all eyes on the job.
[Dave breathing heavily]
[Dave] There was nothing I could do now
to help Chris.
There was no way of getting back to him
at that point.
[heavy breathing continues]
Uh, I turn around
and start climbing back to the bell.
There's a lot of resistance.
It felt like I was climbing back
through a river.
I don't think I was thinking too hard
about the tragedy that was unfolding.
At that point, my priority
was to get back to the bell
and look after my own safety.
[heavy breathing continues]
[metal creaking]
I'm worried that maybe
I'm going to get pulled in
to another structure down there.
And I knew that if I got
caught up in one of them,
it would've made a...
A very, very bad situation a lot worse.
[Duncan] I was hoping
I was pulling Chris in.
But in my heart of hearts I knew I wasn't.
Um... [sighs] I knew
there was nothing on the end.
Hot water hose came in first.
Broken and tattered at the end.
And I had another couple of wraps
of umbilical to pull in
before the broken end
of his gas hose came in.
Now, that is making a...
Quite an immense noise.
[gas hissing]
I put my hand on the regulator
to turn it off.
[hissing continues]
You never ever turn a diver's gas off
when he's in the water.
It's tantamount to killing him.
[gas hissing]
[water gurgling]
[hissing stops]
I did feel as though
I was letting Chris down.
That was the end of his lifeline
to the bell.
I, um...
I could've cried at that point.
I didn't know whether to be sick, cry,
whatever, I just shouted.
"I've lost me diver, I've lost me diver."
[breathing heavily]
And, uh...
[voice breaking] I didn't know
what was happening to Dave, so...
I had to be sensible
and pull myself back together.
[Dave breathing heavily
through respirator]
[Dave] I got back onto the stage,
underneath the bell,
and I waited there.
That's when I had a little bit more time
to think about what had happened
and... And what was going to happen.
In air diving, you've always got
the option of, um,
of being able to swim up to the surface,
but in sat diving,
the only place you can go,
literally, the only place you can go...
is the bell.
Normally, you're connected to the bell
by your umbilical,
but he's got no umbilical,
so the bell isn't anywhere near him.
He's got no options at all.
[Duncan] I knew he was out there
on his own.
And all he had
was his two bailout bottles.
[Dave] If we lost our main supply
in an emergency,
we would have enough gas in the bottle
on our back to get back to the bell.
It's not designed to keep you
on the seabed for any length of time.
[Duncan] There's no other gas
he can get to.
He's limited
to what's in his bailout bottles.
And they're not that big.
It is literally five minutes.
[ticking]
[alarm blaring]
[Craig] We had a time critical window
till we get back and recover Chris.
So, I got everybody up.
We need every mind focused
in case we miss anything.
[alarm continues]
[indistinct chatter on radio]
[Stuart] I was in the next team
that was supposed to go diving.
And the life support supervisor
came on the comms, quite serious,
and he said, "Stu, I've got a problem."
I said, "Well, does that make it
my problem or is it just your problem?"
And he came back with,
"We've left a diver on the manifold.
We're going to set in the medical gear,
you're the diver medic,
just go and get ready."
There's always several diver medics
in saturation.
You have to have one in each team.
Usually it's... It's cuts, it's grazes.
I was scared, because...
this was something that was
so out of our normal working routine.
You don't want to have to be involved
in something like that.
That's not gonna end well.
[Craig] The situation was desperate,
and we're still out of control,
drifting away from Chris.
Computers that control
the dynamic positioning
weren't operational, they were redundant,
all three of them.
[beeping]
Computer that was running the DP...
it failed.
The backup which ghosts it all the time...
it failed.
And the master computer,
it failed as well.
So, you have a situation
where the impossible has happened.
The vessel could not be controlled
using the computers.
[Michal] So, we are just drifting.
We have to try to...
To get back control.
Captain decides to take computer
out of the loop
and use fully manual system.
This system is designed to use in a harbor
when you don't have waves,
wind is not too much.
The bridge crew had to learn
how to control the ship with, uh,
four thruster handles.
Problem is that they are installed
on two, uh... Two consoles.
One man doesn't have four hands.
No one ever anticipated having to do this.
[Michal] I never saw a captain
and chief officer doing this before.
[indistinct radio chatter]
Sometimes it was going very well.
And then, was coming one, uh, big wave.
It was changing our heading again.
[Craig] Bridge, you've gotta get us
back over there.
[Michal] They want us to be there quickly,
but, uh, we are doing what we can do.
[engine revs]
[Stuart] In saturation, you start
to get a bit of a sixth sense
for your particular vessel,
the sounds it makes.
The engines were thrusting really heavily.
[engine revs]
[Dave] The boat was moving around
in quite an erratic way,
it was moving from side to side.
And that was quite a rough ride
on the bell.
[Duncan] I was constantly trying
to calm myself down.
I knew Chris, I knew Morag,
I... I was wondering...
how we're gonna explain it to, uh, her.
"We went on a dive
and he never came back."
[clicks tongue] Um...
Yeah, I was struggling to contain myself.
[waves crashing]
[Craig] Even though I could work out
that he's run out of gas,
I had to believe that Chris
was still alive and recoverable.
First, we had to find him.
And the ROV was the only tool I had
at the time that was functioning.
ROV, can you try
and find my diver, please?
Now, the ROV can swim in the water
maybe 150, 200 meters away from the ship
without too much problem.
So, we headed to the structure.
It was the most logical place
to find Chris.
[indistinct radio chatter]
But we didn't know whether or not
Chris was on top of the structure
or beside it, on the seabed below.
It was very long feeling
when the ROV was flying, flying, flying.
It was explained to me
that it was an idea to give
Chris, uh, some sign
that we are coming back.
So, um, he can find extra energy power,
um, to stay alive.
[Craig] It was getting closer and closer
and I remember staring at the ROV screen,
black and white,
asking, "Can anyone see anything?"
[indistinct radio chatter]
[chatter continues]
We willed that structure to appear.
Then, it appeared.
[Craig] The ROV technician said,
"Craig, he's all right."
I said, "How do you know that?"
And he said, "Well, he's...
He's waving at us."
Before we arrive with ROV,
I was sure that we recover him,
after this, I didn't know.
You have to remember that that's
not just... Just some person.
That's the human you know,
who was sitting, uh, next to you...
passing on the corridors.
[Chris] One hand for the ship
at all times.
There we go, health and safety.
[Michal] He was coming
to the bridge sometimes.
-Hey, Chris. How are you?
-[Chris] Very well, thanks.
-How are you?
-Not bad, thanks.
[Michal] Now you can see him
absolutely alone.
[Craig] A lot of people were shocked
at the image.
But I took a massive boost out of that.
Well, for one,
he was on top of the structure,
which was crucial for his recovery.
And he was twitching.
He was still alive.
[clock ticking]
We were still some distance away
from where we needed to be.
And we still didn't have DP control
of the vessel.
We were moving back
to the structure manually...
which was very difficult.
The ship didn't seem to be making
the progress as quickly as we thought
and everything was slowing down in time.
[clock ticking]
Slowly, but surely the twitching...
it stopped.
And in my mind's eye,
that was a final phase for Chris.
Some couldn't face the reality of it,
they didn't want to be involved
in a situation that would, uh...
Would be a very dark time.
I think all those thoughts were starting
to run through people's minds,
"What happens next?"
[Stuart] After 25 minutes,
uh, we... We couldn't
really find anything to grasp.
We were sure that he was...
It was going to be a body recovery.
[Dave] It was odd being on the bell,
thinking about what had happened.
I don't remember being particularly upset
about Chris, um...
Shit happens, he was a...
He wasn't my best mate,
he wasn't one of my kids
and, um, it was a diving job,
and it had gone wrong.
[breathing deeply]
I started praying as hard as I could.
Um, I'm not a religious person at all,
but, uh...
In moments like that...
But at no point did I lower myself
to think that we weren't
gonna get him back.
Definitely not.
There was no way where...
[clicks tongue] I was going to go home
[voice breaking] and explain to Morag
that Chris wasn't coming back.
[Michal] We try everything
to get DP system back online.
We never had first options
and last options.
We never had checklist,
what to do, step by step,
in case of problem like this.
It was more like brainstorm and, uh,
trying everything what we can try.
[machine whirring]
One of the last options
was to do hard reset.
-[beeping]
-[whirring slows]
There was nothing else what we can do.
And we wait.
[Craig] We've gotta get a good card soon.
You know, we've pulled
all the bad cards out,
we've gotta start getting some luck now.
-[beeping]
-[machine whirs]
[Michal] Lucky for us,
the system get back online.
Oh, it was amazing, good, uh, good news.
It was massive relief for me
and everyone on the bridge.
As soon as DP was back online
and we put vessel in, uh, auto mode,
we can move straight back to Chris.
But maybe we are too late.
[Craig] Now we were making real progress.
We were getting closer and closer.
[Dave] My adrenaline's still flowing.
I wanna get it done.
I kept asking, "Are we nearly there yet?"
[Craig] Dave was keen to go.
I... I remember holding him back.
Duncan, take up all of Dave's slack.
[Duncan] It's like
having a dog on a leash.
Until I give him some slack,
he can't go anywhere.
[metal creaks]
[Dave breathing heavily
through respirator]
[Dave] Craig was telling me the distance.
"You've got 50 meters to run."
[Duncan panting]
[Dave] "Thirty meters to run.
Twenty meters to run."
-[panting]
-[metal creaking]
[Dave] I could see the lights of the ROV.
I could see Chris.
[Craig] Okay, Dave, you're clear to go.
[Dave] I wasn't surprised by what I saw.
A dead guy on the roof of the manifold.
I knew that it was gonna be hard
to get back to the bell.
The dead weight of Chris was very heavy.
The boat was moving up and down.
But I'm there to do my job
and do what I'm told to do.
I wasn't thinking, "This is Chris Lemons.
This is the guy who's building a house.
This is the guy who's engaged
to be married."
He's a thing that needs to be taken
from one place to another.
[Duncan pants]
[Duncan] I tried not to think
Chris was dead.
Possibly deep down...
I had a thought he might have been.
[Duncan exhales]
I gave him two deep breaths.
[Duncan exhales]
I am just hoping with everything I've got
that I can bring him round.
That I am gonna make him breathe again.
[sighs]
[both chuckle]
[Chris] It's very hard
to communicate to people
quite what I went through and what I felt.
It's a time that I reflect on quite a lot.
I often try and put myself
back in that position.
To jog my own memory,
or to try and recreate what happened,
because I have the same questions.
-Thanks very much. Thank you, Cheryl.
-[indistinct radio chatter]
[Craig] Chris,
we cannot give you any slack.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[overlapping, echoing conversations]
[Chris] There was this very,
very violent bang.
And then there was instant silence.
[breathing through respirator]
It's very disorientating
when it's so, so dark.
It's the most absolute blackness
I think I've ever seen.
[breathing continues]
All my efforts at that point
were focused on finding my structure.
Getting to the top.
That was to make it easier
for them to rescue me.
But, uh, I didn't know where I was.
I couldn't see anything at all.
I was panicking.
There was a real danger of walking out
in the wrong direction
to, effectively, no man's land...
and never be able to find your way back.
But I had to make a decision.
I... I couldn't just stand there.
I had to choose a direction.
It came down, essentially,
to pot luck from there on.
[heavy breathing continues]
[metal thudding]
Then I bumped straight into the structure.
It was 11 meters above me,
the platform that I needed to be on.
[heavy breathing continues]
I'm expecting to see the lights
of the diving bell above me.
There was nothing.
I was completely alone.
[breathing continues]
I've probably got five or six minutes
in this bailout.
I must've used it for two or three minutes
getting myself up here to the top.
Even if the diving bell
had been directly above me,
it would've taken the remainder of the gas
that I had left on my back
just to get back there, if I was lucky.
So, at that point,
once you've calmed and done the maths,
you realize that your chances of...
Of getting out of this
are almost non-existent.
[heavy breathing continues]
The cold is something
I don't have any recollection of feeling.
It doesn't make much sense, really,
because I know that I would've been
very cold, very quickly.
I feel as though I can recount everything
from that night,
but the fact that I don't remember
being cold.
I begin to question
how lucid I actually was.
If it didn't last all the time
I thought it did.
Maybe I fell unconscious straight away.
I'm so sorry.
I'm so sorry, Morag.
I... I was explicitly aware
of what I was about to lose.
Uh, I have very vivid memories
of thinking precisely that,
thinking I'm not gonna see...
I'm not gonna see the...
The house I'm halfway
through building, finished,
which we'd put so much into.
I'm not gonna see...
[voice breaking] I'm not...
I'm not gonna...
I'm not gonna see my wife on the...
On the day we get married, and...
It's, uh...
Why am I, a little boy from Cambridge,
in the blackness, about to die?
[heavy breathing continues]
There's nothing to hide behind, you know.
That's the moment you're going.
[birds chirping]
What sort of person are you?
Were you scared or are you just telling
yourself that you weren't?
Were you calm?
'Cause I'm not so sure.
[heavy breathing continues]
My thoughts drifted away
to the damage I was gonna do.
[children chattering]
Our hopes and dreams.
-All these plans we had for the future...
-[boy] Yeah.
...about to be dashed.
[Morag chuckles]
[breathing weakens]
I... I can remember
it becoming harder to breathe.
Harder to suck down the air that you want.
I remember feeling it was coming.
And then... And then nothing.
[Chris gasps]
[inaudible]
[Duncan] I knew we'd got him.
He was gonna live.
I was just so elated.
At that point, I didn't know
if he had any brain damage,
I didn't know if he'd be the same Chris.
I didn't know if he'd ever speak again,
but I knew he was breathing. He was alive.
And he got stronger with every breath.
[Chris] I can remember flashing lights.
Something wasn't quite as it should be.
It was very reassuring to see Duncan.
He's been a bit of a father figure
to me in many ways throughout my career.
It's very comforting
to see a friendly face.
[Dave] I'd decided that he was
more than likely dead.
I think I'd started to come to terms
with the fact that he was dead
and that we'd recovered a body.
[Craig] Camera's back...
[Dave] I... I got into the bell.
I could see Chris sat down there.
And, um, he was definitely not dead.
That was very confusing.
[Craig] I mean, I remember asking...
Chris, you all right, buddy?
And he said, "Yeah."
[stuttering] He seemed fine.
It was an extraordinary moment.
A lot of people were relieved.
Obviously, for Chris's sake...
but also
for their own personal well-being.
They didn't wanna be involved
in a diving fatality,
and now they weren't.
[Dave] I remember almost feeling
a little bit pissed off with him.
In the same way that when you've...
If you have a child that wanders off
when they're not meant to,
and you're frantically looking for them,
when you do find them,
as well as the relief you've got,
you've also got a little bit of anger.
'Cause they've put you
through something...
that's been quite traumatic.
[whirring]
[Craig] That's the bell on the surface.
[radio static]
[Dave] It wasn't until I went
and had a shower
that I realized how exerted
I must have been.
I remember trying to wash my hair,
um, in the shower and my hands
were cramping up,
and my hands were like claws.
My fingers were stuck.
And that's when I thought,
"I've, um... I've worked hard today."
[Craig] Down at the bottom door.
All right. Dave, I'll come and talk
to you later. Thanks for your help.
-[Dave] Okay.
-[Craig] Yup.
I couldn't have felt more proud
of, uh, myself and Dave that day
for what we achieved in that bell.
[indistinct chatter]
[Craig] I did my job.
And I would expect nothing less,
and the divers did their jobs,
and the bridge crew did their jobs.
Everyone did their jobs,
so, you know, you don't pat yourself
on the back for that.
You turned up that day
and that's what you get paid for.
[indistinct talking]
[Craig] Last man leaving the bell.
[indistinct chatter]
[Stuart] Dave and Duncs,
they'd done enough.
It was our job to look after him
from that point on.
I, for one, couldn't believe
we'd got away with it.
I couldn't believe
that he was just gonna...
We're gonna warm him up,
put a tea cozy on his head,
and he's gonna be good to go.
That... That was incredible to me.
I can remember,
after everything had calmed down,
we were doing hourly checks,
and I thought he was kind of just...
not dozing, quite, but he was relaxing.
And, uh... And... The only...
[chuckles] I'll have to do that one again.
Sorry. Yeah.
Hmm. Yeah.
The only time I ever... [clicks tongue]
felt serious, um...
I was just halfway
through taking his pulse,
and he just kinda looked over at me,
he said, "Stu, do you know it's okay?"
I said, "Uh, yeah,
I know you're okay. Yeah."
He said, "No, no, it's okay. I was just...
I was just drifting off
to sleep, you know,
I was kinda sad for a bit, but then...
I was cold, and I got a bit numb,
but it was, like, falling asleep.
It's not that bad."
That was the only time that, uh,
anything really got emotional for me,
and that point was... It kinda hit home
that he had basically...
[exhales, sniffles]
He decided he was gonna die.
He's, uh... [chuckles]
trying to tell me that dying's okay.
And that really... That really got to me.
[machine whirring]
How I survived
is a very good question. [laughs]
I... I don't think
I will ever really know.
[waves crashing]
I always assumed that the lowering
of my body temperature
effectively shut me down
and allowed me to survive
on what minimal oxygen
remained in my system.
Also, I'm fairly certain
that the high levels of oxygen
which we carry, you know,
emergency breathing gas,
saturated my tissues
effectively with oxygen
and allowed
my organs to keep functioning
even though I had nothing left to breathe.
These are all theories, though.
Beyond that, um,
I'm... I'm still waiting
for someone to... [chuckles]
To give me the right answer. I...
I'm not sure I'll ever know.
[seagulls cawing]
[Morag] I received that phone call
that everyone dreads.
Your whole world falls apart.
Just kept picturing him
lying there on the...
The bottom of the ocean, helpless.
[sniffles]
That's always, you know,
when it happens to...
Something like that happens
to someone that you love...
I couldn't get that image out of my head.
It didn't matter that he was speaking
to me and telling me that he had survived.
I needed to physically touch him
and see him.
[Chris] It dawned on me
that we're going to be okay,
we were going to be able
to realize those hopes and dreams,
and live our life together.
[applause]
[Chris] ...there's one person in the room
in here who's definitely gonna hate this.
He's probably one of only two men
in this room who's given me
-a decent kiss on the lips.
-[crowd laughs]
[inaudible]
[breathing through respirator]
[Craig] There's diver two
in the water at 91 meters.
Hey, Chris. Don't fuck it up this time.
[in squeaky voice]
[heavy breathing continues]
-[man 1] You got this.
-[man 2] We have lost comms for diver two.
[radio static]
[man 2] We're losing
one of my divers here.
[man 1] Come over. We have one more.
[static stops]
[radio static]
[man 3] Where is he at now?
-[man 1] Drop the fourth.
-[man 2] We're running out of time--
[man 1] But I can't move it.
I can't move it.
-[man 1] I've got this.
-[man 3] We can't give you any slack.
-[man 1] Setback. Pass setback.
-[device ringing]
[man 2] Hang in there, buddy.
-[man 1] It won't move.
-[man 2] Bridge.
-You've gotta get us back over there.
-[radio static]
[waves crashing]
-[radio static]
-[marine control] Topaz. Topaz. Topaz.
Aberdeen Marine Control.
What's your position? Over.
[man] Aberdeen Control,
we are 64 miles northeast of you.
Heading for old field block 22/14-B. Over.
[radio static]
[marine control] Thank you, Topaz.
Update one on job. Over.
[indistinct chatter]
[Chris] Ah, four in.
-Hiya, Rob. How you doing, sir?
-How you doing, Chris?
-Yeah, yeah. Good, mate, yeah. Hi, Ally.
-All right?
-Hey, Chris, you all right, mate?
-[Chris] Good, thanks, yeah.
-Yeah. Yeah, sorry. [laughs]
-As long as you have got that.
[Chris] It's, uh, yeah,
Morag wanted a bit of a tour of the ship.
Good day. Yeah, good morning.
[Chris] Mustard's always worth having.
See if we can get in,
what have we got there?
Oh, it's Jimmy Kyle
from the Black Isle. [chuckles]
Might have to edit this one out. [laughs]
So, I know I like to make out that, uh,
life on board's pretty Spartan.
Uh, so what I'm about to show you, uh,
is obviously gonna
dispel that, unfortunately.
Because behind me...
is a bona fide, uh, sauna.
Behind door number two,
believe it or not...
sunbed.
[cow moos]
[Morag] When Christopher went off-shore,
we enjoyed sending videos to one another.
We've got a new calf on the croft today,
isn't it beautiful?
That is the big news, big news from home.
Hi, guys.
It gave us a little part of each other,
we could share in each other’s lives,
while we were apart.
And it reassured us
that we were both happy.
[all] ♪ We wish you a merry Christmas ♪
♪ We wish you a merry Christmas ♪
♪ We wish you a merry Christmas ♪
♪ And a happy New Year ♪
Merry Christmas, Lemons. [blows kisses]
[giggles]
It was a really,
really exciting time in our life.
Did you get the little sign?
It's gorgeous.
We were due to be married
in April that year.
We were building a house
at that time, too.
[Chris] Enjoying that?
[Chris blows raspberry, laughs]
-Beep, beep.
-[both laughing]
And I had started
a new job as the head teacher
of the local primary school.
We had so many plans for the future.
It was wonderful.
[Chris] Okay, I think I'm running.
Hi, Morag.
Six lads living in there, but looks like
the lights are all off in there.
What you can actually see
on the outside there
is, uh, the little camera
they use to monitor us.
That's pointing into the toilet,
so they can watch us have a shower.
Think what you will.
[Morag] I had a good understanding
of Christopher's work.
All of these tunnels,
gases and depths.
Christopher often described it
as going into space, but under water.
[Chris laughs] Nice to see ya.
-Yes. See you in 28 days.
-Yeah, thanks, mate, yeah. [chuckles]
So, uh, this is the moment of truth
when we get on board, when we, uh,
check the board to see who
we're gonna be in sat with,
'cause that can pretty much
make or break your trip.
And that's the two other people
you're gonna be spending
the next month
locked in a tin can with, so...
And if you can see it
at the same time as me.
Yeah, team three, Chris Lemons,
Dave Yuasa, Duncan Allcock, okay.
-[man 1] David Yuasa interview.
-[man 2] B cam, mark.
-[interviewer] Hi, Dave.
-[Dave] Hi.
Uh, there are some people
that you get on great with.
Other people
that you don't get on well with,
and no one wants to be in with a knob.
Duncan I knew very well.
I'd worked with him
over the years quite a few times.
He's got a very good reputation
on the boat.
[Duncan] You do have to be a certain breed
to work in an RC.
Slightly unhinged, um,
a little bit abnormal.
They don't have problems,
they have solutions.
Certainly, the guys that I've worked with
are one of a kind.
Dave's a very cool guy.
Uh, he... He doesn't get stressed.
He doesn't get anxious.
Very, very logical.
Who keeps himself to himself.
I'm not famed at work for, um,
being a particularly,
uh, emotional person.
I think, uh, "Vulcan" is how a few people
have described me.
Chris was relatively new,
I'd not dived with him.
But I think he dived with Duncan
quite a few times
and, um, Duncan was his, uh,
his sat daddy.
[laughs] That sounds weird
now I've said it out loud, eh?
I was there for Chris' first sat.
And then we did four sats
in a row after that, together.
The bond you get with that is massive.
I got to know him very, very well.
He was a very amiable guy.
[Dave] I had a little word with Duncan
and said, "What is this Chris guy like?"
And, uh, I got a thumbs up,
and I was happy to go in with him.
[man on radio] Captain Strong,
we're six hours away from the job.
[grunts]
[man] This is all we're currently
suffering from aches and pains, bruising,
joint discomfort,
skin numbness sensations.
[clattering]
[indistinct chatter]
[Chris] Hi, boys.
Uh, as you can see
there's not a huge deal of space.
Probably only half a foot or so
between the bunks down here.
Dunc's in there, uh, getting his ready.
And then this is the living end,
got, sort of, benches and, uh,
a bit of a table.
One of the very few port holes we've got,
so that's pretty much the only sight
of the outside world that you have.
So, I got to crawl
through these little tunnels
to get from place to place.
And down this way
is what we call the "wet pot."
So, I just push that door open.
Basically, the toilet and the shower room,
so various ablutions, that kind of thing.
Yeah, if I stand at my full height,
there's absolutely everything
I can knock my head on.
It's a real pain for me,
that's why I've always
got gashes all over me.
And the magic of it is, once you've done
the full circuit, you're back to...
You're back to where you started
and a cup of tea. And a cup of tea. Yeah.
-[Duncan] Mind me chocolate stash.
-[Chris laughs]
That's ridiculous, Duncan,
how much you got...
How much have you got in there?
-[Duncan] Just a bar for every day.
-[Chris] A bar for every day. [chuckles]
I've only started just to check them out.
-Yeah.
-[Chris laughs] Glad I'm in with you.
Okay, lads, if everyone's ready,
we'll go for blowdown.
[locks clicking]
[gas hissing]
[hissing continues]
Okay, lads,
we'll stop and check for leaks.
[spraying]
[Dave] On this particular job,
we were working at 100 meters.
So, they pump into the chamber,
the equivalent pressure of 100 meters
of water in heliox.
Which is a mix of helium and oxygen.
And then we are effectively
at an equal pressure to the seabed.
[man on radio] That's a seal confirmed.
I'll continue with the blowdown.
-[static]
-[Duncan speaking in squeaky voice]
As soon as you get a breath of helium gas,
you start speaking with a squeaky voice.
[continues speaking in squeaky voice]
-[man] Okay. Cheers, lads.
-[Duncan] Yeah, mate.
The first 30 seconds
is always quite humorous.
After that, the novelty wears off.
[gas hissing]
[hissing stops]
[man] Okay, lads,
we've reached depth. Blowdown over.
[man speaking indistinctly on radio]
[Duncan] Thank you.
[Dave] Sat is a very odd environment
to live in.
There's very little privacy.
Your whole world seems to shrink
to the size of the system.
[Duncan] Living in sat
is extremely intense.
I think everybody
copes with it differently.
[Dave taking deep breaths]
[Dave] Most divers have got two personas.
They've got their work persona
and their home persona.
At home, I'm David, a father of three.
And Dave is a professional diver.
He, um...
He's responsible only for the job in hand.
[Dave taking labored breaths]
[Duncan] Chris was definitely
a little more anxious.
Not been sat diving long.
Trying to make sure that he is, uh,
keeping up with everybody else,
that he has got all the right equipment,
that he's not gonna embarrass himself.
But very conscious
that people are watching his every move.
Quite a lot of pressure.
He wanted to look good for everybody.
He wanted to be a good diver.
The best diver.
[Dave] Before I got into sat diving,
I always, kind of,
looked out at the North Sea
as the... The premiership of diving.
There's a lot of DSPs there.
There's a lot of diving going on there.
And this particular job,
the field we were working at
was about 12 hours steam
away from Aberdeen.
So that... That puts you pretty much
in the middle of the North Sea.
The North Sea can be unpredictable,
and the weather wasn't very good
at the time.
The boat was moving around a fair bit.
[Duncan] The North Sea is definitely
one of the most dangerous
environments in the world.
The water temperature's four degrees
on the seabed,
which is a killer.
[Morag] I realize there's dangers
on the job. I realized that.
But Chris had reassured me continually
that he would be safe.
That he wasn't in harm’s way.
I thought that he was happy
in his saturation tank.
So, no, I didn't ever worry.
[radio static]
[man] Aberdeen Control,
Aberdeen Control. This is Topaz. Over.
[marine control] Go ahead, Topaz. Over.
[man] We are on live oil field.
Block 22/14-B.
Holding, we have to start work
immediately. Over and out.
-[man 1] Ready?
-[man 2] Yeah, I'm ready.
[man 1] Okay, everything is on zero.
One, four, five, six running.
[man 2] Okay, that's all thrusters
in DP mode.
[man 1] I have two GPSs selected
for reference systems.
[man 2] Yeah.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[man 1] Okay, Captain, we are on DP now.
[Craig] Okay, boys, five minutes' notice
to getting in the bell.
Well, the divers are my puppets,
I'm the, uh...
The conductor of a small band,
they are, uh, my hands and my feet.
And they, uh, essentially do
what I ask them to do.
When the diver's in the water,
I am the most important person
on the vessel.
And everyone will defer to me.
Okay, first man entering the bell.
-[metal clanking]
-[Duncan breathing heavily]
[Craig] Duncan was the bellman,
he wouldn't be diving that night.
He'd be in the bell
looking after the divers.
Dave Yuasa was diver one.
And Chris Lemons was diver two.
Bridge, that's bell
off the system at 2013.
[Michal] 2013 off system.
[Craig] Okay, boys, taking you down now.
[whirring]
[Michal] Bridge,
that's bell at surface at 2021.
[Craig] Thank you, ROV.
Coming through now.
[man] Reached working depths of 90 meters.
[Duncan] When you're lifting the helmet
onto the diver's head,
you're looking at their eyes.
You can then see if the diver's happy
or frightened out of his wits,
because you can see more white than eyes.
[Chris breathing heavily
through respirator]
At no point that evening
was Chris anxious.
-[breathing heavily through respirator]
-He was raring to go.
He wanted to prove that he was
as good as everybody else.
[all speaking in squeaky voice]
[heavy breathing continues]
[Duncan] Chris, here's the lights.
[man in normal voice]
Here's the lights, Chris.
[Craig] Bridge, that's diver two
in the water at 2037.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[heavy breathing continues]
That's you on onboard graph, Chris.
Duncan, tend to diver two's umbilical.
[Dave] When the diver is out of the bell,
he is completely reliant on his umbilical.
It gives him his hot water
which he needs to keep him warm.
Gives him gas to breathe and also lighting
and communication with the surface.
[indistinct radio chatter]
It is literally your lifeline.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig in normal voice] Diver two,
that's you clear to drop off the bell.
[Dave] Dropping off the bell
is one of my favorite parts of diving.
I love the feeling of weightlessness.
You're effectively flying down
to the seabed.
If your visibility is bad,
you really don't know
what you're dropping into.
Or when you're gonna be landing.
[radio static crackling]
It's a dark and confusing place to be,
on the seabed.
It can be extremely easy to get lost.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig in normal voice]
Diver two, the job should be
30 meters to your northwest.
[Dave] The umbilical
is your physical tether to the boat.
And if you ever need to get back
to the bell
you will follow your umbilical.
That's your route back to safety.
[Craig] In the dark it's almost harder
to get to the job than to do the job.
The seabed plays tricks on you.
The first ten minutes
is quite a stressful time.
I notice it in their breathing.
[Chris breathing heavily]
[Craig] Bridge,
both divers on the job at 2049.
[Dave] The structure we're working on
is called a manifold.
[metal rattling, creaking]
Inside there,
you've got a number of, uh, wells.
The oil will come up out of the ground
and from there it gets piped off
to a platform.
The job in hand was gonna be
to remove, uh, a piece of pipe work.
And we were gonna float in a new piece
into its place.
[metal creaking]
When you're working with divers
you are almost reaching through the screen
and turning the knobs for them.
You do get emotionally involved with them.
You feel their successes and failures
in the water.
[Chris speaking indistinctly]
And basically, you see A and B.
We're opening and closing them
in a sequence.
And then doing a pressure test.
[heavy breathing continues]
[Duncan] Once you've got your divers
on the job,
as bellman, you can relax a bit more.
See what I've got in me sandwiches
for half-time.
There's never a day I go to work
and don't enjoy it.
[indistinct radio chatter]
Me first inspirations for diving,
were definitely from watching
Jacques Cousteau on the TV
and thinking, "That is exactly
what I would like to do."
Visiting coral reefs,
swimming along with all the animals.
It just looked absolutely superb.
It was a dream for me to be a diver
and go under the sea.
[Craig] And, uh... Dave,
you keep working on it, all right?
Go ahead, shut it.
[Craig] Roger that.
[Morag] Christopher came to diving
a little bit later in life.
-He was looking for direction.
-[Craig] Normal reading.
No leaks.
[Morag] Diving was something that he was
extremely passionate about.
I would never have considered
asking Christopher
to take a different career path.
Never.
That's what he wanted to do,
that's what he was passionate about.
If I was as passionate
about a job like that as Christopher was
then I wouldn't want anyone to stop me,
so I definitely wouldn't stop him.
[waves crashing]
[Craig] That night the weather
was not good.
There was an 18-foot swell,
35 knots of wind.
We were on the limits of diving.
But it wasn't undiveable.
[Michal] Weather was rough.
But in the North Sea, nothing special.
[metal walls creaking]
It was perfectly safe.
If you can call this job safe, it's not...
Come on, it's not safe job, yeah, so...
I was in charge
for controlling DP computer.
Keeping vessel in, uh, exact position,
so divers can be safe in the water.
This moment, vessel was steady.
And then it started.
[alarm blaring]
I saw alarm, which I never seen before.
Immediately, after this alarm,
more faults coming one by one.
We have really big, uh, big problem,
because we are losing control of the...
Of the vessel.
We are losing position.
[Craig] The bridge gave me an amber light.
Its suddenness and the immediacy
of his voice told me
that, uh, this wasn't
a normal amber light.
Leave everything there,
leave everything there, Chris.
So, I wanted my divers back on the bell
as quickly as possible.
[Craig] Get out of the structure, boys.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig] Yeah.
He's here at the bell, Duncan,
come up on diver one,
diver two, back when you can.
Stand by to come up
on diver one and diver two.
Roger that. No problem.
In a series of seconds,
we had a red light.
I've never had a red light.
The bridge had lost control of the vessel
and its navigational systems,
so it will drift with the weather.
And as soon as we got to that stage
it was a sailboat.
[indistinct radio chatter]
I was surprised
at how quickly the ship moved.
It rapidly picked up speed.
'Cause we had no control over the ship,
we had no control
of what was happening on the bottom.
[Michal] Divers were still connected
to the, um, bell
and bell connected to the vessel.
So, basically, we can track diver.
It's... It's the worst scenario
which, uh, DP on diving support vessel
can... Can expect.
[Craig] Go back underneath the bell.
[Dave] When we came out of the structure,
I was expecting the bell to be
basically in front of me over here.
[Dave exclaims indistinctly]
I could tell from the root
of my umbilical
that in fact, it was now behind me
and the manifold itself
is in between me and the bell.
[in squeaky voice]
[Craig] They have to climb
their umbilicals
up the side of the structure,
traverse across the top and climb
their umbilicals back to the bell
to their safe haven.
But the, um, structure was the obstacle
that they had to clear.
[Craig] Hop up onto the structure, boys.
[Dave] When I was nearly at the top,
I noticed that Chris didn't seem
to be going any further.
I could tell something was wrong.
[Craig] Chris had a loop of umbilical
wrapped around this outcrop.
He was trapped.
[in squeaky voice]
[Chris breathing rapidly]
[Craig]
It started to get tighter and tighter.
I've never seen an umbilical this tight.
[Craig] Chris could see the tension in it.
He was asking for slack out of the bell.
He couldn't get the slack out of the bell
because the ship kept moving away.
[Craig] Chris, we cannot
give you any slack.
We've got an enormous ship,
120 meters long by 20 meters wide,
being pushed by 35 knots of wind.
And Chris was our anchor on the other end.
I didn't see a scenario
where he was gonna get out of this.
[Chris breathing heavily]
[in squeaky voice]
[Duncan] Chris' umbilical went so tight,
that it actually started pulling
his stainless steel umbilical
right off the wall.
I was shitting myself.
I was literally waiting
for the inevitable, it...
Just to all go through the hole
in the floor.
And if I got between it and the hole,
I would be going out with it.
[Craig] Chris, you... You gotta clear
that umbilical yourself.
[Dave] I'm trying to make my way
back to Chris to help him.
[Dave grunts]
[grunts]
We're, maybe, less than two meters apart,
the visibility is good enough that we...
We can look into each other’s faces.
I can see that he's in trouble.
[Dave breathing heavily]
But that's now me at the end
of my umbilical.
And I can't get to him.
[metal creaking]
His umbilical is getting thinner.
I can hear it creaking.
It's the noise that something makes
before it breaks.
[grunts]
[Chris breathing rapidly]
-[indistinct radio chatter]
-[snapping]
-Lost comm to the diver two.
-[Chris] Help.
[Dave] As I was getting pulled away
from Chris,
it was almost like watching a film.
And that was the last I saw of him.
[Dave groans]
And I could hear his umbilical ripping...
as the strands in the umbilical broke
one by one.
[snapping]
[metal creaks]
[metal thud]
[radio static]
[Craig] Bridge,
we have lost all eyes on the job.
[Dave breathing heavily]
[Dave] There was nothing I could do now
to help Chris.
There was no way of getting back to him
at that point.
[heavy breathing continues]
Uh, I turn around
and start climbing back to the bell.
There's a lot of resistance.
It felt like I was climbing back
through a river.
I don't think I was thinking too hard
about the tragedy that was unfolding.
At that point, my priority
was to get back to the bell
and look after my own safety.
[heavy breathing continues]
[metal creaking]
I'm worried that maybe
I'm going to get pulled in
to another structure down there.
And I knew that if I got
caught up in one of them,
it would've made a...
A very, very bad situation a lot worse.
[Duncan] I was hoping
I was pulling Chris in.
But in my heart of hearts I knew I wasn't.
Um... [sighs] I knew
there was nothing on the end.
Hot water hose came in first.
Broken and tattered at the end.
And I had another couple of wraps
of umbilical to pull in
before the broken end
of his gas hose came in.
Now, that is making a...
Quite an immense noise.
[gas hissing]
I put my hand on the regulator
to turn it off.
[hissing continues]
You never ever turn a diver's gas off
when he's in the water.
It's tantamount to killing him.
[gas hissing]
[water gurgling]
[hissing stops]
I did feel as though
I was letting Chris down.
That was the end of his lifeline
to the bell.
I, um...
I could've cried at that point.
I didn't know whether to be sick, cry,
whatever, I just shouted.
"I've lost me diver, I've lost me diver."
[breathing heavily]
And, uh...
[voice breaking] I didn't know
what was happening to Dave, so...
I had to be sensible
and pull myself back together.
[Dave breathing heavily
through respirator]
[Dave] I got back onto the stage,
underneath the bell,
and I waited there.
That's when I had a little bit more time
to think about what had happened
and... And what was going to happen.
In air diving, you've always got
the option of, um,
of being able to swim up to the surface,
but in sat diving,
the only place you can go,
literally, the only place you can go...
is the bell.
Normally, you're connected to the bell
by your umbilical,
but he's got no umbilical,
so the bell isn't anywhere near him.
He's got no options at all.
[Duncan] I knew he was out there
on his own.
And all he had
was his two bailout bottles.
[Dave] If we lost our main supply
in an emergency,
we would have enough gas in the bottle
on our back to get back to the bell.
It's not designed to keep you
on the seabed for any length of time.
[Duncan] There's no other gas
he can get to.
He's limited
to what's in his bailout bottles.
And they're not that big.
It is literally five minutes.
[ticking]
[alarm blaring]
[Craig] We had a time critical window
till we get back and recover Chris.
So, I got everybody up.
We need every mind focused
in case we miss anything.
[alarm continues]
[indistinct chatter on radio]
[Stuart] I was in the next team
that was supposed to go diving.
And the life support supervisor
came on the comms, quite serious,
and he said, "Stu, I've got a problem."
I said, "Well, does that make it
my problem or is it just your problem?"
And he came back with,
"We've left a diver on the manifold.
We're going to set in the medical gear,
you're the diver medic,
just go and get ready."
There's always several diver medics
in saturation.
You have to have one in each team.
Usually it's... It's cuts, it's grazes.
I was scared, because...
this was something that was
so out of our normal working routine.
You don't want to have to be involved
in something like that.
That's not gonna end well.
[Craig] The situation was desperate,
and we're still out of control,
drifting away from Chris.
Computers that control
the dynamic positioning
weren't operational, they were redundant,
all three of them.
[beeping]
Computer that was running the DP...
it failed.
The backup which ghosts it all the time...
it failed.
And the master computer,
it failed as well.
So, you have a situation
where the impossible has happened.
The vessel could not be controlled
using the computers.
[Michal] So, we are just drifting.
We have to try to...
To get back control.
Captain decides to take computer
out of the loop
and use fully manual system.
This system is designed to use in a harbor
when you don't have waves,
wind is not too much.
The bridge crew had to learn
how to control the ship with, uh,
four thruster handles.
Problem is that they are installed
on two, uh... Two consoles.
One man doesn't have four hands.
No one ever anticipated having to do this.
[Michal] I never saw a captain
and chief officer doing this before.
[indistinct radio chatter]
Sometimes it was going very well.
And then, was coming one, uh, big wave.
It was changing our heading again.
[Craig] Bridge, you've gotta get us
back over there.
[Michal] They want us to be there quickly,
but, uh, we are doing what we can do.
[engine revs]
[Stuart] In saturation, you start
to get a bit of a sixth sense
for your particular vessel,
the sounds it makes.
The engines were thrusting really heavily.
[engine revs]
[Dave] The boat was moving around
in quite an erratic way,
it was moving from side to side.
And that was quite a rough ride
on the bell.
[Duncan] I was constantly trying
to calm myself down.
I knew Chris, I knew Morag,
I... I was wondering...
how we're gonna explain it to, uh, her.
"We went on a dive
and he never came back."
[clicks tongue] Um...
Yeah, I was struggling to contain myself.
[waves crashing]
[Craig] Even though I could work out
that he's run out of gas,
I had to believe that Chris
was still alive and recoverable.
First, we had to find him.
And the ROV was the only tool I had
at the time that was functioning.
ROV, can you try
and find my diver, please?
Now, the ROV can swim in the water
maybe 150, 200 meters away from the ship
without too much problem.
So, we headed to the structure.
It was the most logical place
to find Chris.
[indistinct radio chatter]
But we didn't know whether or not
Chris was on top of the structure
or beside it, on the seabed below.
It was very long feeling
when the ROV was flying, flying, flying.
It was explained to me
that it was an idea to give
Chris, uh, some sign
that we are coming back.
So, um, he can find extra energy power,
um, to stay alive.
[Craig] It was getting closer and closer
and I remember staring at the ROV screen,
black and white,
asking, "Can anyone see anything?"
[indistinct radio chatter]
[chatter continues]
We willed that structure to appear.
Then, it appeared.
[Craig] The ROV technician said,
"Craig, he's all right."
I said, "How do you know that?"
And he said, "Well, he's...
He's waving at us."
Before we arrive with ROV,
I was sure that we recover him,
after this, I didn't know.
You have to remember that that's
not just... Just some person.
That's the human you know,
who was sitting, uh, next to you...
passing on the corridors.
[Chris] One hand for the ship
at all times.
There we go, health and safety.
[Michal] He was coming
to the bridge sometimes.
-Hey, Chris. How are you?
-[Chris] Very well, thanks.
-How are you?
-Not bad, thanks.
[Michal] Now you can see him
absolutely alone.
[Craig] A lot of people were shocked
at the image.
But I took a massive boost out of that.
Well, for one,
he was on top of the structure,
which was crucial for his recovery.
And he was twitching.
He was still alive.
[clock ticking]
We were still some distance away
from where we needed to be.
And we still didn't have DP control
of the vessel.
We were moving back
to the structure manually...
which was very difficult.
The ship didn't seem to be making
the progress as quickly as we thought
and everything was slowing down in time.
[clock ticking]
Slowly, but surely the twitching...
it stopped.
And in my mind's eye,
that was a final phase for Chris.
Some couldn't face the reality of it,
they didn't want to be involved
in a situation that would, uh...
Would be a very dark time.
I think all those thoughts were starting
to run through people's minds,
"What happens next?"
[Stuart] After 25 minutes,
uh, we... We couldn't
really find anything to grasp.
We were sure that he was...
It was going to be a body recovery.
[Dave] It was odd being on the bell,
thinking about what had happened.
I don't remember being particularly upset
about Chris, um...
Shit happens, he was a...
He wasn't my best mate,
he wasn't one of my kids
and, um, it was a diving job,
and it had gone wrong.
[breathing deeply]
I started praying as hard as I could.
Um, I'm not a religious person at all,
but, uh...
In moments like that...
But at no point did I lower myself
to think that we weren't
gonna get him back.
Definitely not.
There was no way where...
[clicks tongue] I was going to go home
[voice breaking] and explain to Morag
that Chris wasn't coming back.
[Michal] We try everything
to get DP system back online.
We never had first options
and last options.
We never had checklist,
what to do, step by step,
in case of problem like this.
It was more like brainstorm and, uh,
trying everything what we can try.
[machine whirring]
One of the last options
was to do hard reset.
-[beeping]
-[whirring slows]
There was nothing else what we can do.
And we wait.
[Craig] We've gotta get a good card soon.
You know, we've pulled
all the bad cards out,
we've gotta start getting some luck now.
-[beeping]
-[machine whirs]
[Michal] Lucky for us,
the system get back online.
Oh, it was amazing, good, uh, good news.
It was massive relief for me
and everyone on the bridge.
As soon as DP was back online
and we put vessel in, uh, auto mode,
we can move straight back to Chris.
But maybe we are too late.
[Craig] Now we were making real progress.
We were getting closer and closer.
[Dave] My adrenaline's still flowing.
I wanna get it done.
I kept asking, "Are we nearly there yet?"
[Craig] Dave was keen to go.
I... I remember holding him back.
Duncan, take up all of Dave's slack.
[Duncan] It's like
having a dog on a leash.
Until I give him some slack,
he can't go anywhere.
[metal creaks]
[Dave breathing heavily
through respirator]
[Dave] Craig was telling me the distance.
"You've got 50 meters to run."
[Duncan panting]
[Dave] "Thirty meters to run.
Twenty meters to run."
-[panting]
-[metal creaking]
[Dave] I could see the lights of the ROV.
I could see Chris.
[Craig] Okay, Dave, you're clear to go.
[Dave] I wasn't surprised by what I saw.
A dead guy on the roof of the manifold.
I knew that it was gonna be hard
to get back to the bell.
The dead weight of Chris was very heavy.
The boat was moving up and down.
But I'm there to do my job
and do what I'm told to do.
I wasn't thinking, "This is Chris Lemons.
This is the guy who's building a house.
This is the guy who's engaged
to be married."
He's a thing that needs to be taken
from one place to another.
[Duncan pants]
[Duncan] I tried not to think
Chris was dead.
Possibly deep down...
I had a thought he might have been.
[Duncan exhales]
I gave him two deep breaths.
[Duncan exhales]
I am just hoping with everything I've got
that I can bring him round.
That I am gonna make him breathe again.
[sighs]
[both chuckle]
[Chris] It's very hard
to communicate to people
quite what I went through and what I felt.
It's a time that I reflect on quite a lot.
I often try and put myself
back in that position.
To jog my own memory,
or to try and recreate what happened,
because I have the same questions.
-Thanks very much. Thank you, Cheryl.
-[indistinct radio chatter]
[Craig] Chris,
we cannot give you any slack.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[overlapping, echoing conversations]
[Chris] There was this very,
very violent bang.
And then there was instant silence.
[breathing through respirator]
It's very disorientating
when it's so, so dark.
It's the most absolute blackness
I think I've ever seen.
[breathing continues]
All my efforts at that point
were focused on finding my structure.
Getting to the top.
That was to make it easier
for them to rescue me.
But, uh, I didn't know where I was.
I couldn't see anything at all.
I was panicking.
There was a real danger of walking out
in the wrong direction
to, effectively, no man's land...
and never be able to find your way back.
But I had to make a decision.
I... I couldn't just stand there.
I had to choose a direction.
It came down, essentially,
to pot luck from there on.
[heavy breathing continues]
[metal thudding]
Then I bumped straight into the structure.
It was 11 meters above me,
the platform that I needed to be on.
[heavy breathing continues]
I'm expecting to see the lights
of the diving bell above me.
There was nothing.
I was completely alone.
[breathing continues]
I've probably got five or six minutes
in this bailout.
I must've used it for two or three minutes
getting myself up here to the top.
Even if the diving bell
had been directly above me,
it would've taken the remainder of the gas
that I had left on my back
just to get back there, if I was lucky.
So, at that point,
once you've calmed and done the maths,
you realize that your chances of...
Of getting out of this
are almost non-existent.
[heavy breathing continues]
The cold is something
I don't have any recollection of feeling.
It doesn't make much sense, really,
because I know that I would've been
very cold, very quickly.
I feel as though I can recount everything
from that night,
but the fact that I don't remember
being cold.
I begin to question
how lucid I actually was.
If it didn't last all the time
I thought it did.
Maybe I fell unconscious straight away.
I'm so sorry.
I'm so sorry, Morag.
I... I was explicitly aware
of what I was about to lose.
Uh, I have very vivid memories
of thinking precisely that,
thinking I'm not gonna see...
I'm not gonna see the...
The house I'm halfway
through building, finished,
which we'd put so much into.
I'm not gonna see...
[voice breaking] I'm not...
I'm not gonna...
I'm not gonna see my wife on the...
On the day we get married, and...
It's, uh...
Why am I, a little boy from Cambridge,
in the blackness, about to die?
[heavy breathing continues]
There's nothing to hide behind, you know.
That's the moment you're going.
[birds chirping]
What sort of person are you?
Were you scared or are you just telling
yourself that you weren't?
Were you calm?
'Cause I'm not so sure.
[heavy breathing continues]
My thoughts drifted away
to the damage I was gonna do.
[children chattering]
Our hopes and dreams.
-All these plans we had for the future...
-[boy] Yeah.
...about to be dashed.
[Morag chuckles]
[breathing weakens]
I... I can remember
it becoming harder to breathe.
Harder to suck down the air that you want.
I remember feeling it was coming.
And then... And then nothing.
[Chris gasps]
[inaudible]
[Duncan] I knew we'd got him.
He was gonna live.
I was just so elated.
At that point, I didn't know
if he had any brain damage,
I didn't know if he'd be the same Chris.
I didn't know if he'd ever speak again,
but I knew he was breathing. He was alive.
And he got stronger with every breath.
[Chris] I can remember flashing lights.
Something wasn't quite as it should be.
It was very reassuring to see Duncan.
He's been a bit of a father figure
to me in many ways throughout my career.
It's very comforting
to see a friendly face.
[Dave] I'd decided that he was
more than likely dead.
I think I'd started to come to terms
with the fact that he was dead
and that we'd recovered a body.
[Craig] Camera's back...
[Dave] I... I got into the bell.
I could see Chris sat down there.
And, um, he was definitely not dead.
That was very confusing.
[Craig] I mean, I remember asking...
Chris, you all right, buddy?
And he said, "Yeah."
[stuttering] He seemed fine.
It was an extraordinary moment.
A lot of people were relieved.
Obviously, for Chris's sake...
but also
for their own personal well-being.
They didn't wanna be involved
in a diving fatality,
and now they weren't.
[Dave] I remember almost feeling
a little bit pissed off with him.
In the same way that when you've...
If you have a child that wanders off
when they're not meant to,
and you're frantically looking for them,
when you do find them,
as well as the relief you've got,
you've also got a little bit of anger.
'Cause they've put you
through something...
that's been quite traumatic.
[whirring]
[Craig] That's the bell on the surface.
[radio static]
[Dave] It wasn't until I went
and had a shower
that I realized how exerted
I must have been.
I remember trying to wash my hair,
um, in the shower and my hands
were cramping up,
and my hands were like claws.
My fingers were stuck.
And that's when I thought,
"I've, um... I've worked hard today."
[Craig] Down at the bottom door.
All right. Dave, I'll come and talk
to you later. Thanks for your help.
-[Dave] Okay.
-[Craig] Yup.
I couldn't have felt more proud
of, uh, myself and Dave that day
for what we achieved in that bell.
[indistinct chatter]
[Craig] I did my job.
And I would expect nothing less,
and the divers did their jobs,
and the bridge crew did their jobs.
Everyone did their jobs,
so, you know, you don't pat yourself
on the back for that.
You turned up that day
and that's what you get paid for.
[indistinct talking]
[Craig] Last man leaving the bell.
[indistinct chatter]
[Stuart] Dave and Duncs,
they'd done enough.
It was our job to look after him
from that point on.
I, for one, couldn't believe
we'd got away with it.
I couldn't believe
that he was just gonna...
We're gonna warm him up,
put a tea cozy on his head,
and he's gonna be good to go.
That... That was incredible to me.
I can remember,
after everything had calmed down,
we were doing hourly checks,
and I thought he was kind of just...
not dozing, quite, but he was relaxing.
And, uh... And... The only...
[chuckles] I'll have to do that one again.
Sorry. Yeah.
Hmm. Yeah.
The only time I ever... [clicks tongue]
felt serious, um...
I was just halfway
through taking his pulse,
and he just kinda looked over at me,
he said, "Stu, do you know it's okay?"
I said, "Uh, yeah,
I know you're okay. Yeah."
He said, "No, no, it's okay. I was just...
I was just drifting off
to sleep, you know,
I was kinda sad for a bit, but then...
I was cold, and I got a bit numb,
but it was, like, falling asleep.
It's not that bad."
That was the only time that, uh,
anything really got emotional for me,
and that point was... It kinda hit home
that he had basically...
[exhales, sniffles]
He decided he was gonna die.
He's, uh... [chuckles]
trying to tell me that dying's okay.
And that really... That really got to me.
[machine whirring]
How I survived
is a very good question. [laughs]
I... I don't think
I will ever really know.
[waves crashing]
I always assumed that the lowering
of my body temperature
effectively shut me down
and allowed me to survive
on what minimal oxygen
remained in my system.
Also, I'm fairly certain
that the high levels of oxygen
which we carry, you know,
emergency breathing gas,
saturated my tissues
effectively with oxygen
and allowed
my organs to keep functioning
even though I had nothing left to breathe.
These are all theories, though.
Beyond that, um,
I'm... I'm still waiting
for someone to... [chuckles]
To give me the right answer. I...
I'm not sure I'll ever know.
[seagulls cawing]
[Morag] I received that phone call
that everyone dreads.
Your whole world falls apart.
Just kept picturing him
lying there on the...
The bottom of the ocean, helpless.
[sniffles]
That's always, you know,
when it happens to...
Something like that happens
to someone that you love...
I couldn't get that image out of my head.
It didn't matter that he was speaking
to me and telling me that he had survived.
I needed to physically touch him
and see him.
[Chris] It dawned on me
that we're going to be okay,
we were going to be able
to realize those hopes and dreams,
and live our life together.
[applause]
[Chris] ...there's one person in the room
in here who's definitely gonna hate this.
He's probably one of only two men
in this room who's given me
-a decent kiss on the lips.
-[crowd laughs]
[inaudible]
[breathing through respirator]
[Craig] There's diver two
in the water at 91 meters.
Hey, Chris. Don't fuck it up this time.
[in squeaky voice]
[heavy breathing continues]