DIVER’S FIGHT FOR LIFE

Taranaki Daily News, 1 August 1931, Page 9

DIVER’S FIGHT FOR LIFE

STRUGGLE FOR SEVEN HOURS.

AN EXTRAORDINARY RESCUE.

A remarkable rescue of a man from one of the most horrible forms of death imaginable—slow suffocation under 15ft. of mud—was achieved at Dagenham, Essex, on Friday, June 19. For seven hours, William Milton, a diver working on the construction of a new jetty in the Thames at the Ford factory at Dagenham, was imprisoned, lying on his side, unable to move. Mr. Milton’s “life-lines’ ■ —the name for a time seemed ironic—were jammed beneath a wall of steel and were pinning him beneath the deadly mixture of slime and oozing mud which is the bed of the Thames and the diver’s nightmare. The story of how the accident happened, as told by the Daily. Telegraph, is a simple one, but it is none the less amazing that it did not end tragically. An important part of the work in connection .with. building - the jetty, from which-the finished motor-cars', are to be sent abroad,'is the.sinking of a numbdi' of enormous steel cylinders. or caissons into the.-'bed of the.- river.’. They .are about. 30ft. high, and'.’lOft./'in diameter. Their Tower edges'- are extremely - sharp,and cut into the as they are lowered. When finally in place they-, are filled with concrete.

On Thursday.it was noticed that something was wrong with one of these caissons. It was still in its hollow state, and at low tide the level of the water in it was seen not to be falling as it did outside in the river. It was, clear that the bottom, was blocked up with mud, and that this was presenting the water from escaping.

Mr. Milton was. sent down inside the caisson to dig away the mud and allow the. water to escape.

Within a few minutes the men on the jetty saw the level of tlie water in the caisson abruptly sink, and at the same time they felt a sharp tug at Milton’s safety rope. For a moment they did not realise what had happened, and it was not until another diver, named Davis, who was working in the next caisson, had descended into Mr. Milton’s cylinder that the full horror of the situation was grasped. He had hacked away the mud at the bottom so successfully that the water rushed out beneath the steel wall. But the outrush was so terrific that it carried the' unfortunate diver with it. . , 1 Mr. Milton was sucked under the edge of the cylinder and remained—lying oil one side in tho filthy mud—With- his rope and air-tube tightly jammed under the wall of the caisson so that he could not move,

The task of rescuing; him -seemed at first almost hopeless. But noble efforts were made from all sides, arid assist--ance was rushed to the scene from far and near. But all these tremendous efforts from afar were not, as eventsproved, as useful as the efforts of the solitary diver, William Davis, who--was working away all this time to rescue his imprisoned mate. His story is best told in his own words, as he recounted it on the jetty a few minutes after the rescue. “It was a frightful job,” Mr. Davis' said. “I went down inside the cylinder first of all to find but what, the c matter was. My first task, was to free-his rope and air-tube from within, I could see nothing all the time, as it is not possible to look out of the front of the kind of diver’s heliriet we wear. In any case, Thames water is so dirty that it is never possible to work with your eyes. The whole thing has to be done by touch. . ■. i After Mr. Davis had freed the rope it was possible for Mr. Milton to work his way into an upright position.

But now another source of fear became apparent to the workers. Mr. Milton’s air-tube went down inside the cylinder, and if he were to be hauled up again outside it would need to be. twice the length normally required; Was it long enough? Mercifully, it was. Mr. Davis reascended, and then went down again on the oiiteide of the caisson, bearing with him a machine, known as a blower. With this ho proceeded to “blow” away tho mud beneath which Mr. ifilton was imprisoned; working his way. through the 16 feet, tortuously, slowly, but-ever surely. • “It must have been about midday when I touched him,” said Mr. Davis. “Once we had got that far, I was fairly sure he was safe.” He went on working and working at the mud, and by this time Milton was slowly rising to an upright position. As the mud was hacked away be began to feel himself being slowly lifted in the water by means of an additional rope which Mr. Davis had brought down with him. He was half-way out. of the mud when another horror seemed possible.

A number of wooden “twelve by four” beams forming underwater staging for the jetty, blocked his way to freedom, and it seemed possible that the wretched man might be jammed again. But fate was on his side, ably assisted by Mr. Davis, who gently and firmly guided his helpless workmate up between the beams to safety. One of his first requests was for a bottle of beer, which he enjoyed immensely.