DIVING FOR PEARL SHELL

Evening Star, Issue 19839, 12 April 1928, Page 14

DIVING FOR PEARL SHELL

A DANGEROUS CALLING RISKS LESSENED BY MODERN METHODS How many people, looking at a display of pearls in a jeweller's window, think of, or even know anything about, the dangers that hav;p to be faced when men dive to the bottom of the sea in order to secure the oysters from which the gems are extracted?. In Wellington at present is Mr W, Lingford, of Broome, West Australia, who as a member of a pearl fishing company has a wide knowledge of the dangers and the pleasures of pearling. Speaking to a ‘ Dominion ’ representative, Mr Lingford stated that the main part of the industry,in West Australia is the diving for the mother of pearl shell, which is a far more paying proposition than diving for- _ pearls alone. The cost per ton to raise the shells is about £l5O, and a bout from which one diver operates has a haul of about live tons a year. Larger boats, from which two divers operate, account for about twelve tons a year, the record being eighteen tons. The work of pearling is done mostly by Japanese, Malays, and Chinese, who are indented from Singapore and the Dutch Islands for periods ranging from two to three years. The best divers, said Mr Lingford, are the Japanese, who earn very good money at their work. The diver is paid a largo percentage of what he expects to earn before ho starts work for the season. This, of course, adds to the risks taken by the owners of the pearl fleets, who niay pay a considerable sum down to a man who may die or meet with an accident after working only for a short tipio. Fortunately, the risks taken are fa? less at the present time than they were in the early days when the death rate among the divers \yas very high. Nowadays, the divers work under the most modern conditions, with the result that deaths are few. Two kinds of boats arc used for the divers to work from. One is equipped with a hand pump and the other with an engine pump for the supply of air to those below the water. From the latter type two divers can bo sent down at a time, while only one can operate from tlio former. The most up-to-date diver’s uniforms are used. While the men are beneath the surface the boats are allowed to drift about, the drivers being slowly towed along. Tho depths to which these seekers of the pearl oyster descend vary, some ; going down to a great depth. _ i In the early days of the industry | many of the drivers succumbed to tho effects of paralysis, brought about through coming up to the surface too quickly. Fortunately the men are more experienced now, and have learned to come up with less haste. Even so, a fair number of them find thcriiselves afflicted. .There are two methods of overcoming the paralysis. The first is to take the unfortunate man to the compression chamber at Broome. Hero be is put into a machine which resembles a torpedo tube. vStill clad in his diver’? suit, lie is shut up in the machine and air is pumped in at Uie pressure at which he was working at the bottom of tho sea. This pressure is gradually reduced, until it is back to normal. The danger of sending a man to Broome, however, is that lie might die on mute, for the town is some distance from the pearling grounds. Tho. most common method of overcoming then-paralysis, is by what is known ns f‘ singeing.’* The diver, who does not feel the paralysis until >o reaches the surface, is immediately lowered to the bottom of tho sea and is allowed to conic up very slowly, and thus gets used to each different pressure. So efficient is tin’s method that there is hardly a death through paralysis now. Mr Lingford mentioned one Chinese diver who was “ staged ” for eighteen hours, hut without effect. The Chinese, lie added, are fatalists, and are harder to bring round than are the Japanese, who, "though fatalists themselves, always put up a good fight first. _ 1 Strangely enough, said Mr Lingford, sharks are not looked on as a great danger.-for they can be frightened away by letting loose some air bubbles. "Whales', on the other band, are regarded as a menace,- for thqv have a habit of getting around the life-line and breaking it. Occasionally, a stingray attacks a diver, often with a disastrous results. Mr Lingford mentioned one case in which the sword went right through a man’s thigh. Tho sting being poisonous, it has to he removed with the maximum amount of care Where pearl fishing is carried on among coral reefs, whore most nf the pearls are found, tho divers have to he most careful not to get the air pipes caught in the sharp edges of the coral, for if tho line is broken the diver has to rise to tho surface nnickly, thus running the risk of the dreaded paralysis setting in. Unexpected holes and caverns in tho reefs are also a danger.