Divers face grim task in recovery job
POLICE divers will today seek to enter the sunken vessel Dianne, where the bodies of six fishermen and best mates are suspected to be entombed.
Devastated families were briefed about the discovery of the missing boat yesterday afternoon at the tail end of the fourth day of searching.
The “slug boat”, converted from a trawler for sea cucumber fishing, was found two to three nautical miles off Round Hill headland and the Town of 1770.
Water police guarded the site overnight, ahead of an expected grim day today in which police divers will attempt to get inside the boat to search for and retrieve the men for their families.
“A full recovery operation will commence tomorrow morning,” police said in a statement yesterday.
Torrid weather has hampered search efforts ever since the alarm was raised on Tuesday morning about the boat going down in rough seas the previous evening.
But yesterday conditions began to improve, allowing searchers to use sonar equipment to scan the seabed for the first time.
Seven police divers from Brisbane and two from NSW were sent into the search area yesterday on board the police vessel Conroy, one of two vessels using sonar throughout the day.
Police had been highly confident they would discover the sunken boat, based in part on descriptions from the sole known survivor, Ruben McDornan, and information from the vessel’s tracking system.
A rescue operation has now fully transitioned to a recovery effort, with the divers focused on entering the sunken vessel to look for the men.
They can expect to encounter a tricky and dangerous environment, with the Dianne fully laden with equipment and supplies that will have been tossed about inside.
On the day the vessel sank it had set off from Gladstone for a planned fortnight-long stint harvesting sea cucumbers, or beche-de-mer, around the Capricorn and Bunker group of islands and reefs, north of 1770.
Queensland’s sea cucumber fishery stretches from the Cape in the north to Tin Can Bay in the south.
The State Government imposes a maximum annual catch of 361 tonnes, which was harvested in full last year. Mostly the delicacy was exported to China and elsewhere in Asia for cooking and medicine.
Varying harvest techniques are used. On Dianne it is understood a “hookah” compressor supplied air through hoses to divers on the sea floor, who gathered “slugs” by hand.
Commonly divers will place their prey in bags and float them to the surface for collection. Sharks are a constant threat.
Two companies – Tasmanian Seafoods and Seafresh Quota – hold all 18 of the state’s harvesting licences between them. They then contract out to operators such as Mr Leahy and the Dianne.
All commercial fishing vessels are required to have tracking units that emit signals every hour. The last time the Dianne “pinged” its location was at 6.30pm Monday, putting the time it capsized at some time before 7.30pm.
“This has been one of the worst maritime accidents in Queensland’s recent history. It is a stark and harrowing reminder of the potential risks that the men and women of the fishing industry face on a daily basis,” a Fisheries Queensland spokesman said.
Commercial fishing, alongside trucking and agriculture, routinely sits atop lists of the most dangerous professions.
Numerous deaths are racked up every year, but the Dianne’s crew were experienced, capable and had every reason to be confident in their ability to ride out the bad weather lashing the coast.