Fined £2,300, diving instructor whose pupil died 140ft beneath sea
A DIVING instructor has been fined £2,300 after breaching safety rules before a dive during which a trainee died.
Ashley Roberts, 29, was training William Peace and Richard Heppell for a 148ft dive to the wreck of a German submarine off the coast of Dunbar, East Lothian.
He instructed both men to complete an assessment dive and the trio descended 43ft.
A friend of Roberts had also been on the July 2017 trip but pulled out after his drysuit began leaking.
Roberts returned to the surface but Mr Peace, 59, of Markinch, Fife, and Mr Heppell descended and got into difficulty at a depth of 130ft to 144ft, the court heard.
Mr Heppell tried to rescue his companion, who was unresponsive, but had to surface for his own safety.
Mr Peace’s body was discovered later after a search was mounted.
Roberts, of Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, appeared at Edinburgh Sheriff Court and admitted breaching health and safety laws.
A Health and Safety Executive probe discovered he had failed to carry out a suitable assessment of the two men’s competence before the dive.
It also found the assessment dive should have been carried out in shallower waters.
But it concluded the failings did not cause Mr Peace’s death. A post-mortem found he had suffered ‘significant’ coronary artery disease.