Diver explains: The Byford Dolphin Disaster
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 ก.ย. 2022
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Thanks for watching.
If you enjoyed this video and would like to watch more videos from this channel without any ads, consider joining our Patreon.
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You can join for free or select a membership with benefits ranging from ad free videos through to early access and live q and a calls.
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Could you please make subtitles for your videos? The auto-generated ones are incomprehensible. They came up with at least four different words to use instead of "diving bell"...
this is a very good video, though "enjoyed" is not quite a word I would use
This is the best, most accurately explained video ive ever seen on this tragedy. You did it with respect and dignity. Thank you. God bless
I searched all over TH-cam trying to find a video that would explain this incident so a layman like myself could understand. Yours is by far the best. I’d say your video is like a 747, while all the rest are camper vans. Cheers.
Brilliant. Thanks for saying so. I'm a scuba instructor so the physics behind it is something I know. I think the science makes all the difference for this story.
I was just about to comment the same thing, i watched 2 3 videos where the guys used the exact same words the exact same skits to explain from wikipedia
Yes I watched some of them that didn’t understand what they were regurgitating. Frustrating
@@waterlinestories another thank you, the only video on here that explains this with proper detail and respect. What I mean is that no one else seems to explain the science or the procedures which created this accident, or are explained poorly (or worse of all focusing on the grotesque death over anything else, like one of the thumbnails literally gives the diver devil eyes?!?) so thank you!!
Thanks for saying so. This was one of the first videos I made about accidents and I made it for that very same reason.
For anyone here from the Titan incident please note: The Titan and the Byford Dolphin incidents are actually not the same physical process it's more like the opposite.
The Byford Dolphin incident was a rapid decompression.
The Titan imploded or you could say it was a "compression" (not decompression).
You can view it like this: The pressure inside the decompression chamber in the Byford Dolphin incident did go extremely rapid from 9 to 1 bar. Everything INSIDE the chamber wanted to go OUTSIDE of it. And alot of stuff inside your body wants to EXPAND.
The pressure inside the titan did go extremely rapid from 1 bar to ~400 bar. Everything OUTSIDE the vessel wanted to go INSIDE. And alot of stuff inside(and outside) your body gets CRUSHED.
Both processes are instant deaths, faster than the brain can react, though the titan incident is probably even more brutal.
Ngl ur explaination is good ty brotha
I've seen your comment on other Byford Dolphin videos so I wanted to add some of the other stuff I've seen people post.
The pressure likely raised the temperature to an extreme degree for a short window, and the gases already in the body ex: in the lungs also wanted to force their way out of the body to help maintain the equilibrium vs onrushing pressure.
@@goated313so were the people in the titan cooked/vaporized faster than the metal could crush them?
so is the Byford Dolphin accident compares to how a bomb works?
@@syukrihantu essentially.
This is one of those awful things that's way worse for the people who had to witness the aftermath than it was for those who died. I'm glad they didn't even know what was happening, but I feel terrible for whoever had to go in and clean up what was left.
Yeah I think you’re right.
I think it's much _much_ worse to die than to have to clean up the mess, even if the death isn't painful.
@@cheshire1 yeah im gonna have to agree with you
@@cheshire1 My point is, they didn’t suffer when they died. The people who came in after definitely suffered and will continue to suffer.
I met a diver at a diving trip who said that his father actually worked on Byford dolphin when this happened, and he was apperantly one of the people who had to scrub body parts from the deck. He didnt go into detail about how he dealt with that but i can only imagine.
People seeking to go deep underwater should be told this story as carefully and clearly as it’s told here. “The bends” is an explosion that gets much worse the more atmospheres the body has absorbed. At a survivable depth, it’s excruciatingly painful, and if a bubble forms in the inner ear, the diver will be so dizzy he’ll vomit uncontrollably. Thanks for this clear explanation.
Gotta love science
Er, not a very good explanation even for joe public. Bends is not an explosion, it is caused by nitrogen coming out of solution usually by decompressing too fast. Bubbles form anywhere in the body and can wreak havoc. Think of taking the top off a bottle of cola, we all try to do it without the soda fizzing. If you equalise the pressure by doing it slowly there are few bubbles. Divers often use the word 'fizzing' after a dive. Explosive decompression is a completely different monster.
Replace the word explosion with expansion and they are correct. Simply a case of using the wrong word
@@nathanbean2499 depends whose post you are referring to. To be fair, think we got it covered 👍
@David, Watch the histories of saturation diving. Organs all over the walls, as neatly separated as an autopsy. People explode when introduced to extreme pressure.
As someone who's actually done a saturation dive, your videos really got me shook. Btw, our biggest fear at the time was fire.
You were a saturation diver?? I'm fascinated by that occupation! First of all... you are incredibly brave! I'm extremely claustrophobic and so I can't even comprehend it... which is one of the main reasons I am fascinated by it (as weird as I imagine that that sounds). Was it ever hard being in the dive bells or decompression chambers due to the small space? Did you ever get nervous or flat-out scared about the prospect of what could happen?
Hie Daniel.
There is one thing I don't get - If the diving bell was slightly more pressurized, (slightly more than 9 bars) and the trunk at 9 bars then how come the accident occured.
Or was the pressure of the bell at 1 atmosphere ? + What the point of disconnecting the bell if all the divers were in their chamber. I mean do the tenders bring supply into the trunk through the bell hatch ?
I hope I made myself understood...
Thank you for your answers. Bye from France.
@@Irish_Georgia_Girl Actually, I was a USN Deep Sea Diver but not a Saturation Diver. I was qualified to dive using several surface support air helmets/masks, and scuba. My training was more than 3 months long. Saturation Diver would have been the next step if I chose to stay in the Navy AND chose to go that route; most Deep Sea Divers don't. I took part in an 8 day, 300 foot chamber saturation dive. We were test subjects being used to create a faster emergency saturation dive recovery table. One of the guys got the bends on the way up, so we went back down 20 or so feet, then proceeded to the surface more slowly. Spending 8 days with 3 other men in a room smaller than a prison cell was extremely boring. I wasn't all that nervous. We were on a submarine base and the subs still seemed way more dangerous than a chamber. Plus we were working with people we already trusted with our lives and the equipment was all extremely well maintained. We had much more fear of creating a spark in the chamber than we had of the chamber malfunctioning. We had special non-static clothes and bedding, and only certain materials were allowed to go into the chamber. I believe we were only breathing something like 3% oxygen. Also, when doing water dives, I was never too worried. I always had two other divers on deck holding my line and a full dive team. Also, if something went wrong, I could just ditch my gear and swim up. The air in your lungs will expand, so you won't feel like you're running out of breath. You have to blow bubbles until you reach the surface. Also, I saw lots of sailors freak out in Submarine Escape Training, but never in Dive school. I had to jump in the pool several times a week to save submariner students. Oh, the scariest part of being a diver was during Pool Week, where they basically assaulted under water for a week. There's videos of it here on TH-cam. It looks pretty tough but is actually a bit tamer than what they put us through.
@@Bertrand146 I understand you but it's been 7 months since I watched the video, so I'd have to go back and watch again for all the details. From what I remember, the tragedy happened from careless mistakes and/or not following protocol (like most accidents). In practice, the technical details are often less important than simply following protocol.
@@danielh377 Thank you for your help.
Excellent recap. To give an idea of the difficulty of this kind of underwater diving operation, consider that at all times a spaceship is "only" trying to prevent 1 atmosphere inside from equalizing to 0 atmospheres outside. The vessel on the Byford Dolphin was trying to keep *9* atmospheres from equalizing to 1. If you're on a space station and it develops a leak you only need to figure out where the leak is and patch it before you bleed off all your atmosphere. On a high pressure diving vessel like that a sudden leak means you literally explode.
Daaaamn! Tyvm for that!!
Brutal
This is a mad window into the extreme endurance and remarkable ingenuity of humans, and the risks pioneers face. Addicted to these episodes now, so tense watching this one as every detail drops.
This just goes to show how humans can be blinded by a fat paycheck to make them do anything.
@lIlIlIlIlIlIlIlIlI these men were working. A job they chose. Do you enjoy heat in your home?, gas in your car? A hot meal?? Then shut the f*ck up. You sound jealous that these men were paid well. They should be!. Jerkoff
Thats just the thing, there was nothing pioneering about it. I'll say this in a crass manner, but essentially this is just a job undertaken by people, it just so happens that there's a lot of things about this kind of job that doesn't allow for an employee to come and go at a moments notice as if you'd be in the office. Not to mention the physical changes in environment that most others don't experience.
Another way how you could look at this incident, using the 747 as example: If that 747 would be flying at cruising altitude: kick in a window. It's basicaly like that just 3x as much.
Had a friend describe this incident, and it was interesting, but the concepts made no sense to me so it didn't really leave that big of an impression. This video on the other hand, had me anxious and on the edge of my seat with every new detail you explained. Fantastic job.
That brilliant. I so glad you enjoyed it. And Im glad it made sense too.
Yes, it made me think, youbhave to absolutely trust everyone who you work with 😅😅
This story has always fascinated me, but your account is by far the best-explained and most well-illustrated description of what actually happened. I just had to come online and comment on it. Great job!
Brilliant. Thanks for saying so.
The sobering thought about this incident was its inevitability. If the Byford-Dolphin divers didn't buy it then others would in the future. As the saying goes - Health & Safety regulations are written in blood. The fact that safety systems weren't robust enough to prevent this terrible tragedy meant this fate was hurtling towards everyone in the industry and like a game of musical chairs - when the music inevitably stopped someone was going to be SOL. Suffice to say - when management assures workers in a novel and hazardous occupation that "safety is their number one priority" - take those words with a grain of salt.
Indeed so. People who dismiss health and safety have likely never had to face up to the consequences of this or other industrial “accidents” and it winds me up no end when in training sessions the tutors are derided as jobs worths or worse. It’s never the CEOs or the finance directors who feel the pain (except when you hit them where it really hurts: their bottom line). Legislation and rules aren’t just written for a laugh.
I remember a similar horror story my uncle told me decades ago. Concerns the tyre manufacturing industry. My take was that huge barrels of raw rubber was rolled into a half moon shaped long containment area where curing was done over week-ends. Sealed tight. Temperatures (gas nozzles) would flame periodically sending the heat up to extremely high levels, then switch off, and gradually cool. Like a giant pressure cooker. In this incident a worker sneaked in during loading the area for a rest, and dozed off. The curing door was closed and sealed and the process began. One can imagine the rest.....
@@martinbisschoff988snuck*
Reading/hearing about this incident always makes me sick to my stomach to think about, and as a former veterinarian with interests in surgery and pathology as well as a bit of an addiction to anything horror-related, that's VERY hard to do. The part of the pathology report of this case that I actually find to be the worst is where it talks about the blood of the divers who were deeper in the chamber - it details how the sudden increase of [nonpolar] nitrogen and helium in their blood caused the instantaneous precipitation of proteins and fats that were dissolved in the plasma, so their vessels were basically instantly clogged with chunks of fat and protein along with bubbles of gas. Like you mentioned, the only saving grace is that they were instantly and painlessly rendered unconscious, likely before their nerve fibers could even complete the transmission of pain signals to the brain. Still, I wouldn't wish such a fate on my worst enemy...
And finally can I just say that it blows my MIND that whoever built the chamber didn't think, "hm, maybe an actual mechanical, physical failsafe mechanism should be included, since there will literally NEVER be a reason to be able to open the compartments at different pressures..." I mean even if they didn't know exactly what would happen to the divers on a physiological level, it's still very obvious that explosive decompression would be super dangerous to anyone outside of the habitat. I will seriously just never understand why there was no failsafe, it really was a matter of "when" and not "if" because of that.
PS great explanation of the behavior of gases at pressure and in the body, really makes it clear why what happened happened
I found the autopsy photos to explain what happened to them physically very interesting. The veining of his stomach and hand was bizarre at best. His stomach looked huge but I'm presuming that is from the nitrogen/helium mix. Seeing his face just laying on the table (complete removal of facial soft tissue) was interesting.
@@athenathegreatandpowerful6365 yeah, those are definitely images that will stick with you. Don't get me wrong, from the POV of a doctor and former chemist, the actual pathology is nothing short of utterly fascinating, particularly at the molecular level. And that perspective does lend some comfort from the conclusion that the men who weren't physically injured by the pressure release were likely rendered instantaneously unconscious and therefore unable to feel any pain... But even still, the physical processes that would've occurred are just so bizarrely destructive that I can't help but feel my stomach do somersaults when I stop to really consider them.
Btw for anyone interested, I'm drawing that conclusion of instantaneous loss of consciousness based on the fact that the large amount of nitrogen gas suddenly precipitating in their bloodstream and tissues would have, besides denaturing proteins and precipitating fat, also likely acted in the same way that nonpolar anesthetic gasses do in the neurons of the central nervous system, ie breaking up lipid rafts on the cell membranes and causing an instantaneous loss of consciousness. I highly doubt this theory has been tested at all, mainly because we've only just discovered the lipid raft mechanism of anesthetic gasses in the past few years; and it probably doesn't even matter since the lipids and proteins that make up the rafts wouldn't have remained intact for very long anyway. But the important thing to note is that the movement of those rafts is essential for the state of consciousness to exist, and whether they're disrupted or destroyed, the end result is still loss of consciousness and therefore an inability to process pain (though honestly it's unlikely that nerve axons would've even been able to propagate depolarization waves anyway so the signals probably never even reached the brain).
So yeah... An absolutely, positively, terrifyingly horrible way to die from an anatomic/histological POV; and at the same time, a swift, painless, blessedly merciful way to die from a neurochemical POV. Quite the dichotomy 🤷🏼♂️
@@pizzlerot2730 The lipid raft mechanism is fascinating. I love chemistry, even though it was definitely never my strong suit. Great comment! PS Love your username
look up how many people died in walk in freezers due to the door closing in on them. the door was unable to be opened from the inside. the makers than put in an emergency lever to open the door
Fabulous explanation. I’ve been trying to wrap my brain around what happened, but I was struggling a little because I’m not familiar with diving or physics. Your video is very helpful, so thank you!
Yes I think most people who tell this story don't understand it themselves.
I've been teaching scuba for some time and I run another channel about how you scuba dive so I've had some practe on how to explain this concept.
Thanks for watching
I'm having a hard grasping what happened as well. I wish there was like a 3D animation that showed what happened
I was told that when technicians work on nuclear bombs, there is one who does the work, and a second who reads the instructions out loud from the manual, step by step. This is the best they can do for safety.
In a case like the Byford Dolphin incident, it is inexcusable that there were not mechanical fail-safes designed into the system.
I think airline pilots have similar procedures. Human error prevails, failsafes make safety catches.
One of the lead designers of the Manhattan project died because he was covering the core by hand. He made contact with the outer shell which caused it to emit a blue flash which was an instant lethal dose of radiation. He died shortly after.
@French onion that was the demon core incident. A spherical plutonium core intended for use in a possible 3rd atomic bomb (which ultimately wasn't needed after japans surrender) so they did experiments with it on getting it close to criticality. It actually caused 2 direct deaths in 2 seperate incidents, can't remember their names of the technicians who sadly received fatal doses of radiation, but the first time it was surrounded by bricks of tungsten carbide which were being placed in different orientations to measure their effects on reflection of neutrons, sadly a brick fell onto the core sending it momentarily supercritical. The second time the core was surrounded by 2 neutron reflective half spheres with a slight gap in between them, some sort of wedge like stoppers were used to stop it closing completely but sadly the technician got overconfident took out the stoppers and used a screwdriver to get it as close to criticality as possible to take whatever measurements were required, the screwdriver momentarily slipped and the half spheres connected causing complete reflection of escaping neutrons back into the core sending it supercritical and giving the unfortunate technician the largest single dose of radiation ever received by any human. He would have instantly known his fate but he still had the presence of mind to flip off the top half sphere which would have ultimately saved the lives of the other technicians in the vicinity
@@samcranmer434 the man in the 2nd incident did stay with the man in the 1st incident when he was in his deathbed to comfort him. And history still repeated with a screwdriver.
There is some speculation that the divers were so fatigued from their long hours diving there might have been a communication error or misunderstanding between diver Truls Hellevik and tender Crammond. Truls might have unwittingly made some hand-signal that the pressure hatch had been closed and that it was ok for Crammond to proceed with unlatching the diving bell...
Others speculate that Crammond might have "communicated" with Hellevik though the pressure chamber window and asked if it was "ok" to proceed which Hellevik misunderstood as a gesture Crammond would proceed only *after* the hatch had been closed.
Whatever the case may be Truls Hellevik was in the process of sliding the circular hatch into the correct position when Crammond unlatched the locks to the diving bell...
This pressure door was designed to work much like the door of a bank vault. It was center double hinged and had to be swiveled into the correct position before the door could be pushed into the circular frame and be properly shut.
What happened was that the door was swiveled almost to the correct position when the latches were released. The gargantuan force (I've read the forces would amount to roughly 20 tons instantly trying to escape through the small opening) therefore violently pulled the circular pressure door into a slightly diagonal position much like a manhole cover left ajar. What remained was a small crescent shaped hole (about 60 centimeters long) and all those 20 tons of forces violently pushed Truls through it. Needless to say his body was too large to fit through that small crescent shaped opening and it was therefore bisected.
Anyways knowing that this happened within a few milliseconds, and the human mind perceives something in a tenth of second it's clear neither Truls Hellevik nor anybody else had any idea what hit them.
It's really strange to think that a pressure chamber designed in 1975 *didn't* have any safety signals or warning systems to prevent such an accident from happening. I mean it wasn't WWII levels of safety so to use something so dangerous in 1983 was beyond belief.
Thanks for the extra detail. Yes it is unbelievable but it seems around that era there were plenty of cracks in the systems, knowledge and training. Not a great time period to be a sat Diver.
If I had to make a guess why such an unsafe system was still in use, I'd say profit maximization.
The capitalist system and it's managers have a fetish for dead things like money and place no particulate importance on living & feeling things like humans (or animals for that matter).
Need an example? Just watch the next video from this channel. They uninstalled a safety system that could have saved all divers just for some extra loading space to maximize work-time and thus profit.
I have the official report on my computer. It's disturbing to say the least. They had worked 13 hour shifts (8 is max.) for the last two weeks prior to the accident and got as little 3 hour sleep. Martin Saunders said in an interview with a norwegian newspaper in 2009 that they were extremely exhausted to the point where they could barely stand on their feet.
This is the best explanation I've ever heard on the subject, and I've heard and read about it many times before. Incredibly well explained.
Thanks. I think it helps to understand the diving physics.
I gather that it's a difficult incident to describe without diagrams and without going into the anticipated correct procedure. But then you get into limitations on research from the company itself, not wanting to comment, not wanting to release photos of the hatches. Lawyers .... Pretty complex engineering involved to get the entire system to work, under all that pressure, without tiny cracks that would result in catastrophe.
English is not my first language so I had a really hard time understanding the whole story before I came across your video. You’re the only one who explained it really well and very detailed. Appreciate it man
Thanks, I'm glad it was helpful
Well, you definitely write like a native English speaker. Well done!
@@VapeLordNito ye wtf?! I'm confused because he writes better than most English people.
The recreational diving limit is 40 meters/133ft. There are 16 pockets in the body which store the nitrogen. If you dive past 10 meters, a safety stop is required to be safe. Just because there’s a no decompression limit doesn’t mean you won’t get the bends(DCS) under that limit.
There are now strict procedures because of this accident.
Thank you for explaining the physiology and physics involved and the step by step procedures that took place. I watched other videos on the incident but never understood what exactly happened. Your explanation was clear and now the whole tragedy makes sense.
That's what I was aiming for so I'm glad it makes sense. Thanks for watching
@@waterlinestories
There is a photo of the remains of the diver expelled from the trunk door.
It's on Google.
This is the clearest explanation of this tragedy that I've seen. Good job on explaining it with understandable comparisons and visuals. Also really good job on the description of the process that went wrong. It helped me visualize the scenario and understand how things were supposed to work. Thank you!
Thanks for saying so and thanks for watching.
Thank you for referring me to this horrific phenomenon, Sseth.
Sseth? Form the Merchants guild?
@@jean-bastienjoly5962 Aye, he said not to learn what happens when the pressure is too high, we didn't listen.
Its weird to say it like this, but im happy they (apparently) felt no pain, because surviving long enough to feel it sounds horrible
Wow I feel bad for everyone especially the survivor who was blamed for the accident. Survivor’s guilt is a real thing especially in tragic circumstances.
Yes its something that will haunt him.
The Byford Dolphin came here into Belfast in 2015 for work to be done by Harland and Wolff. At one point there were three Dolphin rigs - Byford, Borgny and Borgholm - berthed side by side. A rare sight indeed! I'm pretty sure that the pic at 1:09 is the Byford at H&W. Interesting too is that in April 2007, the 'Samson' gantry crane hit a Henson crane causing it to collapse.
Amazing to see them all together.
I drove past the Borgland Dolphin rig this summer in Flekkefjord, Norway and all the Dolphin rigs look very similar. Byford Dolphin was located in the Rosfjord in Lyngdal from 2016 to 2019 before it was scrapped. My coworker can now enjoy the Rosfjord from his cabin without staring straight into an old oil rig..
That’s really interesting, I only recently heard about this accident but grew up in East Belfast seeing the cranes and various rigs at H&W everyday. Now I’m a Floridian who loves to dive but there’s nothing like coming home and seeing Samson and Goliath! Glad I found this channel you explained depressurization so I now understand the process much better!
That was such an awesome sound effect of the air rushing out it sounded real my heart was pounding!
First of all, how does this guy not have more subs? He does a really good job explaining and uses real photos and video when available. His videos are real good... And how in the world did the one guy survive that?
Thanks. That really great to hear. I only started this channel a few months ago so its still new.
The guy who survived was outside the bell and just far enough away not to get hit directly by the bell as it was projected away from the habitat. Just lucky.
This is the absolute best and easy to understand video I’ve seen on this tragedy. Kudos.
Damn, what a horrific accident. As someone who enjoys snorkeling at most and never heard about saturation diving until today, I appreciate all the details and clearly explained technical concepts. Good job keeping your vids both informative and suspenseful. Looking forward to more content
Thanks, I appreciate that.
Maybe a few of the full face mask snorkeling incidents would be a good topic since you mentioned snorkeling... Many first timers on Vacation have had to be rescued or even died from poor engineering and lots of advertising... "Amazon prime death mask" would be a decent name for most sold on there... Even the couple of properly designed branded versions seem iffy to me... Especially for someone not aware of the dangers and warning signs before blackout... 🤨
Good shout. I'll see if I can find a story.
@@berryreading4809 what happens?
I was working as a North Sea Diver,when this accident happened, the rumour was that there was an argument over overtime payments and one guy walked away and did not inform the other the the TUP chamber was still pressurised , the guy removed the horseshoe clamp ,that's the clamp that holds the bell onto the TUP . The soda sorb blew out through the TUP after the bell took off and it acted like a giant grit blaster on the diver in the lock ,one if the guys in the habitation chamber was found very dead and still looking like he was reading his book
SAT divers are currently paid £30 k a month in the North Sea ,now you know why
I was wondering how much money these divers make, fortunately no amount of money would get me down there you guys deserve every single penny Respect and thanks for your information ❤
@@peterbalac1915 There are people that literally seek this job out and do it for the thrill.
30,000 a month? That's pretty darn good, isn't it?
@@billblaski9523 That's $360,000 a year.
@@richardmoore609nah. will be more like 120-150k since they must have off-time. I heard of guys being 2 months off and working one.
I've heard several tellings of the BD incident, but I pictured it differently until I heard this version. I guess it was lack of understanding on my part; I knew there was an explosion and that it was a devastating blast...I hadn't realized that the trunk, the bell, the men, the very air detonated. I appreciate your concise summarization. Subscription sequence initiated.
Yeah I had seen it told several times by people who had not fully grasped the mechanics of it all. It was the story that made me decide to start this channel.
@@waterlinestories For someone who has never dived, this story was always difficult to picture. Now I get it.
This is one of the best explanations I have ever heard of not only this incident, but of how the forces involved work. Thank you
Thanks, I really appreciate that
I really appreciate your explanation. A lot of channels cover this incident but they always seem to just read the steps the divers were supposed to take/the steps they did take off a script without actually articulating what each of those steps mean. Thank you for being thorough, mate!
Easily the best video I’ve seen on this terrible incident. Your clear and patient explanation and narration is a credit to you and your channel. I guess it takes a diver to really explain this well. Thanks for the video.
Out of all the videos I've watched about this incident, and all the scuba diving videos I've seen, you explained the process of why divers breathe mixed gas better than any of the videos. Thank you so much. Now I get it. Now I'm not confused. Thank you again. Great video.
Thanks for saying so. I'm a diving instructor which helps but I also have another channel about how to scuba dive so I've practiced a little at finding a way to explain it.
Thanks for watching
My respect to all those men who take these dangerous jobs, so that we can live our life easily without any issue.
Their brain neurons didn't even fire fast enough for them to raise what was happened. From their perspective, they went from being alive to disappearing from existence in a millisecond.
Right alive and then darkness
You earned yourself a new subscriber! Your ability to narrate captively and put the listener in the situation you're describing is awesome... and you have a very soothing voice!!
Thank you for the clear and concise explanation on how it happened. Absolutely tragic incident.
While not a diving person myself (most ive done is sit in a 14 foot pool), this story is one of the most gruesome and scary stories of saturation diving I know.
If the images I’ve come across are actually from this incident, there really wasn’t a lot left of them intact, it seriously was destructive.
When I’ve looked, some of the images are like the body but the infrastructure that’s destroyed is not.
I recently came across your channel and really enjoy the vids. Been watching a lot of them keep up the good work
Thank you! This is such a great and in-depth explanation. I wrote an essay on the effects of decompression on the bodies in this case when I was at university for Forensic Science, but had a hard time picturing what it was like in the bell and chambers. I’ve got a whole new outlook on it now. What a horrifying thing, and all for oil drilling.
Yes it’s fascinating. Oil keeps the world turning at the moment and there are some incredible people who keep it working. Even if we wish for better ways.
Yes oil...It's what you put in your car. It's what you brush your teeth with
A lot of useless Ai produced garbage on TH-cam. This is by far the best channel I have come across on these type of topics. Keep it up!
Hiya. Found you through Legal Vices 😊
Very well explained and sound design was on point. Great telling of this horrific accident.
Thanks
You have a good channel mate, I've watched a good few of your vids and diving is definitely a dangerous job with lots of things that can go wrong. I'm glad that these lads atleast didn't have to feel any pain.
Thanks. Yeah it was pretty instant.
You did a great job on the video. I could understand you clearly while doing work. Keep on posting mate.
Brilliant. Thanks for watching.
Subbed! Great video, this is the best explanation of this accident I've seen. Keep up the good work!
Thanks. Im really glad you appreciate it.
The only video explanation of this incident that actually gave me a good understanding of what happened.
Brilliant. Thanks for saying so
i love this channel so much. i'm pretty much a knucklehead when it comes to anything related to these type of topics, but you explain it so well
Thanks I appreciate you saying so
Your videos that you show really do make your content so much better, im nerding out on your channel
Brilliant, thanks
I can't even stand the pressure of diving to the bottom of my pool. How do people even do this?
I thought this was a bigger channel than it was, comments for the Algo! Thanks for the content!!!
Ha ha. Thanks. I've got another channel about how to scuba dive which you could call my training ground. Not my first rodeo. Really appreciate you saying so.
Thanks for explaining it properly!
My goodness that's horrific. I had a friend called Dave who was a pressure diver. He died recently, after having been retired for only about a couple of years. RIP Dave.
Im sorry to hear.
Im sorry to hear.
@@waterlinestories Thaks. Really like your videos. They're really interesting.
you explained this so much better than any other video ive seen. i was under the impression(from other videos) that it happened while submerged. ty
Thanks for watching
Least viewed but most illuminating vid on this I’ve seen. Watched several videos which really only recited the info but this guy knows what he’s talking about.
Thanks. This is exactly why I started making these videos. This very story. I saw so many people regurgitating what was written in Wikipedia and I could see they didn’t understand the words they were reading.
Thanks for saying so
It would be good for Saunders to speak further about this accident from his perspective. It seems extraordinary that Crammond, himself an experienced diver, should not triple check communication when they all knew they were working with a faulty system.
I would imagine it's something he doesn't want to think about. But I'm sure not a day goes by that he doesn't think about it.
The problem is that were all subject to human error. No matter how experienced.
In fact someone's experience and habit are counter productive. Have you ever got in your car and you need to turn right but you normally turn left and so you automatically turn left and only realise you're going the wrong way when you're half way down the road.
@@waterlinestories No doubt that's the reason. It would be too horrific to contemplate.
Yes, I imagine as was mentioned Crammond was fatigued and was just operating on autopilot. There would have been a lot of noise and machinery operating at the same time as well and he could have been distracted.
Also, there are a number of false versions of this story floating around that all the bodies in the living space exploded. I've just tracked down the photos of their bodies on reddit. Not for the faint-hearted, but it appears part of their jaw and face of some of them blew off doubtless as their lungs exhaled in a millisecond, but their bodies were fine. Others looked perfectly normal, and faces were fine (perhaps they had just exhaled when the accident happened.)
You did a good job on this story.
I'm in a different field that has repetitive actions of sometimes simple sequences of events, that are easily screwed up despite the best tools that have been thrown at the problem: checklists, automated safety interlocks, etc. People still get in a rush, run on mental autopilot, recite the checklist instead of actually engaging with it (and the items checked) etc. So in an abstract sense, I totally get what it looks like happened here.
@@FlyNAA I think Pilots have got this right. They have to because they carry passengers where the oil industry just has one man die.
There is a guy who runs a diving organisation that talks about the human factors in diving. His background is in flying so hes trying to bring that rigor to the industry of diving. Hes got an interesting documentary.
www.thehumandiver.com/ifonly
@@waterlinestories I watched that documentary. Tragic. Thanks for the suggestion. Sometimes life is so fragile. I really like the comments about social media and blame culture. More people need to watch that film!
Such great content and a great narrator!!! I had NO idea what saturation diving was all about!! Fascinating stuff. Subscribed!!!!
Thanks, I really appreciate that
I must have read or heard someone explain it quite a few times, but the way you relayed the behaviour of nitrogen in the body was the clearest I've had it presented to me 👍......and I can be remarkably obtuse 😳
Thanks
Idk why but trying to understand this is insanely difficult for me.
Took me years to fully wrap my head around it
Thank you for your explanation I’ve been attempting to understand how this accident occurred but never found a description I could understand
Fun fact y'all - it's not an explosive decompression unless it happens in under one second! Great vid! Cheers mate!
Thanks. I appreciate that
This was a well made video, thank you!
That was a stellar explanation of such an enigmatically horrendous event
Unbelievably horrific! I hope and pray none of those men realized what was happening…. I feel for the family’s.
Death in any way is hard but to die like this, while it doesn’t matter for the men who died this type of death has to be extremely difficult for the family’s to deal with.
Yep. that it is.
I was aware about the air inside the habitat, which is already horrifying, but when you mentioned that the air inside their bodies will expand to 9x the volume I was like... shit.
That's a horrific story... In a weird way I am glad they didn't feel anything at least and it happend to fast for anyone to notice. But... that's not really comforting :( RIP.
Better an instant death with no pain than a slow, lingering death with dread and time for the pain to register in their minds
Ok so I've watched like 7 different videos about the byford incident , and only yours made me understand that not only was the atmospheric pressure inside the habitat at 9 atmospheres but also inside their bodies was also compressed at 9 atmospheres!! Hence why some of the stories explained how their fat cells were turned to oil because of the heat and pressure their bodies went through
Yeah I’ve watched a few. It was that very reason I decided to make this video.
Thanks for saying so.
I spent two days (and a night) aboard the Byford Dolphin in the early 90s. She was doing exploratory drilling in the Great Australian Bight. My job was to install a transportable Inmarsat A terminal on the roof of the radio room and connect it to the shipboard telephone system and fax machine. Cellular phone service (AMPS) was very spotty. Telstra (Australian phone company) tried a duplex VHF phone link to the mainland but it didn't work very well. I had no idea of this drilling rigs dark past.
This is basically what happens if a space suit fails. I didn't fully realize that explosive Decompression could happen in atmosphere, but the more you know.
I finally understand decompression sickness and the cause of it completely now. I'm autistic and though I've watched tons of videos about diver accidents and discoveries that summarize how it works, I've only understood it vaguely. I can't be told something 100 times and not get until it's told in just the right way and then suddenly I understand. You explained it perfectly here so thank you.
Thanks, I'm glad it clicked.
I sincerely hope the experts are right about their deaths being quick and painless, because the alternative is too horrifying for words.
Well, if you think about it, all their brain matter was going up in red smoke at the same time as every other part of their nervous system. How could you experience pain when you're being vaporised faster than it takes electricity to travel through your neurons? This is more humane than some forms of capital punishment.
Hey bro I just wanted to say I appreciate the warning about the graphic stuff online. Wanted to do more research and now I know to be careful. Love you
Ha ha. Yeah my pleasure.
that explosive sound effect still shocks me now that I rewatched this video several times
8:58 God damn, for a microsecond I thought I was gonna die from explosive decompression. Scared the shit outta me! Lol I was so immersed. Good job!
Brilliant. That's what I was aiming for. Just a little shit in the 👖
@@waterlinestories 😂 😂 so well done!!
@@waterlinestories😂😂😂😂
Thank you so much for the breakdown 🙌🙏💔😢 Such a horrific accident my prayers go out to all their families and friends what a terrible tragedy
I just know they are special angels God needed for a special assignment only they could fulfill ❤🙏🥹🙌
This story was very well detailed, thank you.
Thanks for saying so
Thanks for giving a good step by step take on the procedure of what was supposed to happen and what did happen. Every other video never explains any detail and only uses the same stick figure diagram and says that one guy unhooked the bell too early and all hell broke loose in under a second. Other videos sound like they are just reading a Wikipedia Page. Heck, from the other videos of this subject, I thought the whole thing happened under water.
The other videos are made by non divers who didn’t understand it themselves
God I'm just imagining what I would look like from the outside to see this happen. A few people might have lost their ear drums
I had a hyperbaric event at 2 fathoms and it was bad; I can't imagine 9...it must be instantaneous
Very well spoken and delivered, love your channel
Thanks I appreciate that
High pressure returning to normal pressure is scary as all hell
A little error when dealing with high pressures under water can be catastrophic as with an error in a space vehicle, great documentary!!
It's actually infinitely worse because in space you're going from 1 atmosphere of pressure to 0. Under water you're going 5+ atmospheres to 1 and the force of the compression/decompression is exponential to the difference.
In space you have some warning and time to fix the problem if you can. Underwater, like in this story, you go from alive to dead faster then your brain can process let alone react to and figure out a way to fix the issue.
Basically those five men either got exploded inside out or smashed with the diving bell, faster then anyone could figure out something went wrong and attempt to stop it. Zero reaction time o any failures is the scary part, unlike space and other dangerous jobs if someone screws up, you're just dead end of story.
Whats worse than experiencing someone explode is experiencing them explode and knowing you're at fault.
Wow...can't find words to comment...Great explanation..
Its either a very small B747 or a very large camper van for the volume of that plane to be only 9 times that of a camper van.
Working under pressure can be very dangerous. Audience wishes their survivors all the best. Cheers!
Thank you sir, very well explanation. I will rewatch. I want to share with my family but worry the gruesome details will scare them. Now I appreciate this type of work is extremely dangerous. I will be mindful and not complain when my desk bound job is long hours or customers give me mental stress. Nothing I do can possibly compare to the stress these workers face. Sending love from Singapore ❤❤, please make more such interesting videos.
Hey hey people.
I honestly am too scared to look further into the images but what is the explanation for the most commonly used image of the diver with the white eyes?
Photoshop. That image is just a grainy photo of a commercial diver. It doesn't actually relate to this story. Someone colored the eyes white. There are more gruesome photos that are real. You don't need to look.
Very interesting video. Yes, I am here because of Titan. This is the first video that had me on the edge while absorbing the technical aspects of what happens with decompression vs compression. I didn't even know about the Byford Dolphin Disaster but the rabbit hole lead me here.
Well the titan crew suffered something similar, all that pressure which was pounding the sub with all force was like water jet witch cuts metal pieces but much higher so after implosion that all force of pressure was released on people inside and what comes inside needs to go out, so they been sucked out tru cracks and other small space with not much remains left something like gelatin mush
Very well put, best video on the topic I saw so far, but one question: Did that happen at surface level or below the water? I suppose at surface level?!
Thanks
Yes it was at the surface
Thank you for explaining what happened so I could follow it
You explained it so well
I will not go looking for the images. Once it's in my head, it may haunt me for the rest of my life. Just hearing the story is enough.
Yes it probably is
Really enjoy your videos, thanks so much.
Thanks I appreciate that
I love the effects you used in the video!
Thanks. Im doing my best to make it engaging.
Probably my favourite explanation of the Byford Dolphin Incident
Thanks, I really appreciate that
What I don't understand is that the trunk needed to be 9 atm for them to move into the chamber. So when he hadn't closed the door I don't understand why it went to 1 atm straight away. The door from the trunk to the bell was closed and the trunk was at 9 atm. It had to be for the divers to move into the chamber. Can anybody explain this to me? Thanks in advance.
Here after the Titan fiasco. My recommendations are all about pressurization for divers and subs. I have learned a lot and understand this is not the same thing that happened to the Titan but overall the educational and historical information of this video was really engrossing to watch.
Cool, thanks for watching