FIGHT FOR DIVER’S LIFE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22904, 11 June 1936, Page 10

FIGHT FOR DIVER’S LIFE

CURING PARALYSIS IMMERSION IN 90 FEET OF WATER (From Our Own Correspondent.) SYDNEY, June 4. All Australia lias been watching a dramatic fight, away up at Darwin, to save the life of a young white poanshel] diver who was stricken with diver’s paralysis last Thursday. Hoy Williams, 24, became paralysed while diving for pearlsheli in deep water on the Bathurst Island pearling grounds. He has spent his days since then suspended in diving dross in Darwin Harbour, where he is being •‘staged” under the supervision of Dr \V. 15. Kirkland.

The paralysis is caused by the formation of air bubbles iu the blood, and is known as the “ bends.” Darwin has no decompression chamber in which diver's paralysis is treated, and the “ staging ” Ik done as the only possible treatment. It is immersion for long periods in a diving dress, at a gradually decreasing depth. At night Williams is taken front the water and rested on the higher which is tending him. Each day there has been a slight improvement in his condition, and Dr Kirkland is hopeful of Williams’s complete recovery. The treatment started at 9(1 feet, and Williams is brought to the surface eaeli night by slow stages. Williams is playing an important part in the dramatic tight to expel the pain of paralysis from his limbs by properly regulating the (low of escaping air from his helmet.

Although some divers afflicted by the paralysis recover many are permanently crippled. There is in Darwin an old Japanese diver who can scarcely walk ashore, but who can still work under water.