Don Shirley

It's a drill that we practice many, many times, but I've never put oxygen in at 250 meters.

The display on the handset jumped up to 2.6 bar pressure of oxygen, which is really unhealthy.

The first thing you do when you go open circuit is look at the gauge to see how much gas you've got.

Now, when you look at the gauge, just like a second hand on a watch, with every breath, it clicks back, like a second hand going backwards.

So I knew that I didn't have many breaths.

At that depth, I'm 26 bar pressure.

So 26 bar pressure is every breath is multiplied by 26.

So that gas is not going to last too long.

So I know I've got to get off this open circuit.

Now I know there's absolutely no way that I can go down to Dave.

And Dave's not moving.

So this is, in priming terms, this is where you'd cut the rope.

So now I must leave.

But all the time I'm thinking, Dave is not dead to me.

Maybe something will happen.

Maybe he'll come out.

Maybe I'll be able to follow the line.

But I've actually got to come up now.

I've got divers waiting at 150 meters, but I knew they wouldn't be there.

And when I got there, because they can only stay so long.