A Diver's Escape

1899

The diver's greatest danger, says a writer in Chambers's Journal, is the possible entangling and choking of the air-pipe on which he depends for a supply of oxygen. The writer gives an experience of his own, which he styles the "closest shave" he ever had. The gates of a lock had been repaired, and he had gone down to see that all was finished satisfactorily. With twenty feet of dirty dock water above him, he felt the great gates, each many tons in weight, which were to be shut while he was down, in order that he might see whether all worked well. He says:

When ready I sent up the signal, and in a few moments felt the gate upon which my hand rested begin slowly to move. It was not long before I realized that I had made a serious mistake.

As soon as the huge masses were in motion I was gently lifted off my feet by the swirl of water in the narrow lock, and irresistibly sucked toward the meeting point of the gates. I made vigorous efforts, by clutching at and pressing against the gate surface, to save myself from being carried along, for once between the gates I must be crushed to death. On I went, however, into the rapidly narrowing gap, but fortunately I went through it, although the gates were so nearly closed that, as I passed through, I felt a leg knock against the end of each gate.

Once on the other side I was pulled up by the air-pipe tightening against the end of one of the gates, and was just congratulating myself on my escape when I suddenly realized that the pipe was still between the closing masses. A death hardly less horrible, and certainly more drawn out, than the one I had just escaped now threatened me, for with the pipe crushed flat I should be a prisoner until smothered for lack of air.

I had no knife or I could have cut the pipe, slipped off my weights, and trusted to the chance of a shoot upward.

At the very last moment, when the gates were almost closed, an inspiration came to me. I had a hammer slung to my waist by a lanyard tied to the handle. It was the work of an instant to thrust this between the meeting gate-ends.

Almost immediately I felt the jar upon it as it took the strain, and I found that there was no diminution of the rush of air into the helmet. My frail connection with the world above was uninjured.

Before I could make up my mind what to do next I felt the hammer loosen in its position, and the gates begin to open again. As they opened I was again carried through by the current, and placed on the other side — the right one for me. I hurriedly gave the signal to be hauled up, and was thankful enough to be at the surface. — Youth's Companion.