The Lure of Pearls Divers Face Great Danger

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1010, 28 June 1930, Page 18

The Lure of Pearls Divers Face Great Danger

The pearl-diver starts his work. ACH year pearl shell to the value of £250,000 is Ashed from Australian //f«gS\rl waters by Japanese divers, and the discovSiE&ISSAj ery of new beds in the Gulf of Carpentaria has added fresh impetus to the industry. In their eagerness to outdo one another, the Japanese divers, encased in rubber suits and leaden helmets and boots, daily risk their lives at depths sometimes more than 40 fathoms.

where the pressure is so great that it sometimes bursts their suits. Sometimes a diver is hauled to the deck of the lugger with blood pouring from his ears, nose and mouth. His eyes are glassy, and his limbs are stricken with paralysis. Helpless, he is again encased in the suit, and sent down to the depths once more, in the hope that the pressure will relax his limbs. If it does not, his fate, if not death, is something worse —paralysis for life. Caught in Propeller But the Japanese is philosophical. He knows the risk he takes, and is prepared to take it in the feverish search for the treasure of the oceanbeds. The second death this season was reported to the police at Thursday Island when a lugger brought in the body of Ranzo Maramoto, who was asphyxiated when his air-pipe to the lugger, 30 fathoms above, became entangled in the propeller and broke. Owing to the enormous pressure of water, there was no time to haul the victim to the surface before his oxygen supply failed.