BBC Real Men Series Saturation Diving

Jess James used to blow up old bombs for a living Stu Porter refer to build things brick by brick and Martin Poole had a fantastic life on the ocean waves but today the work they do is unseen unheard medical and quite simply unbelievable take some nice deep breaths for me dark wet cold can be nice too is quite peaceful sometimes to do it they must be sealed up for a month in another world to do it they must leave their loved ones behind Jess you and Martin are real men part of a rare breed you can meet this week willing and able to take on the most extreme jobs in the UK real men prepared to work at enormous heights and get back up when they fall 560 feet onto an 18-inch gasps me and landed City welcome to their world this is a film about the men who feed our insatiable desire for North Sea oil a film about diving at the sharp end no this is not scuba diving and yes that is a whale the sea well is a dive support ship based in Aberdeen and groaning with gear between them Steve Jess and Martin have 85 years of diving experience and boy are they stuck in their ways we don't have our own suits no but every time I come on board i usually take the same number I can't tell you what it is because you're the lads might make it he's my lucky Wellington Jess protect the feet on the bottom can't be wearing a yellow ones very heavy out the water twenty twenty-five kilos this just clips into the Hat people Marty and I that goes on like that through my time in the Navy really that's when I first thought about doing it you're involved in the atmosphere in the Navy and you see them all doing the diving and everything and I thought to all I'd like to do that myself you know I was a lot younger than I suppose he was the excitement and the thrill of it really and just clips in there into here but it comfortable and the chimp is there would share with which protects your chin I don't wear a chin strap because the hats so comfortable now and the tubes sit down they don't ride up like they used to I don't feel any need to wear them I actually started a business a building business and when the recession came by 81 82 that was affected quite hard surprisingly enough despite a few bricklayers on the hip hot water see it's got houses on the inside I've decided to join the Navy in the coma clearance diver which I did I spent eight years as a clearance diver in the Navy about three and a half years on the Portsmouth bomb and mine disposal team any old Second World War minds or torpedoes or bombs that are found around the beaches we were going to deal with lobster the reason we we're wearing these suits those are the depth of working out the temperatures about three degrees so we need it basically just to keep us alive one of the lads arriving they've got just two hours to get themselves and their equipment together before the ship sails out to the oil fields so the next time they see this bit of kit will be a hundred and eighty six meters under the sea yeah go in one place now la Mexico yeah that's a doddle there's only one and a half ternal its back yeah this is the world of saturation diving very technical I'm flames off deep inside the sea will of three chambers home for the next four weeks to our divers this world is pressurized enabling them to go back and forth to the seabed every day without suffering decompression sickness they get there via a series of air locks in a diving bell lowered through the center of the ship like astronauts they're completely isolated from the outside world getting man to the bottom of the sea relies upon solid metal and human endurance there's barely a microchip to be seen Silas is a ficus thing as soon I wear under the hot water soon as you can see i'm not as poshest yes I've got an old sweatshirt I've been using for the last 10 years look behalf the pair of tracksuit bottoms they fairly new them I've only up those for about five years so they're all right where that on a harness is it tough to recover one of the other divers we can make clip off to the other diver and have a hands-free so there's still hanging on you knives shifters this is my little fluffy thing that I used to chase ill school until your throat for a 203 please you missed the most important bit which is the hammer and when we bellman it's just a lot more comfortable sitting on these as opposed to sitting on the stainless steel seats especially you're spending six hours in their preteen Spelman I'll borrow is and if Marty's Bowman and I borrow his so I haven't got one of them I'm just go in there with a couple of span of the night these guys have to look after each other and when it comes to the final checks only divers need apply we've got our own safety to look after and so I want to know myself personally there everything's in working order you just test the camera mate two or three yeah that's fine it's at right to vote gonna flush the hat like that yeah the likes of God's jail no one comes checks now okay yeah 1 12345 yeah lung clear communication has always been crucial in keeping divers safe going off comms down under the water it gets very lonely with your only contact with the outside world a rope and an airline now two ways field telephones put things right and ensure that those above do not forget the diver with the microphone fitting neatly into the helmet he can speak up for himself there's a plate to inside which when pressed by the divers chin rings a bell on the telephone set installed on the pontoon above to call the attention of his assistants it's tricky and dangerous work and mistaken signals can cost time and even life itself and the 50s commercial diving was quite primitive the depths to which they could sink were limited by the technology available what does he want it can't be more L these days they can go much much deeper Stu Martin and Jess regularly dive down to 200 meters yeah that's the height of the London Eye the diving bell will take them into an environment as hostile as outer space it's very it's a very close atmosphere obviously in there feel it now when it in the belt on the surface so can imagine it too well being down a depth sir i'll give it sticky in just over 24 hours Martin will hold the fort in this tiny capsule while jessence to work on the seabed because we've been doing it so long we're um let's see it's just second nature to us now you know but you're still careful and conscious of everything you know your bail checks when you're checking the guys out when you're getting them ready you you get everything dead right you've got to you know the sea well set sail heading for the oil fields east of Shetland it's nearly time for the divers to enter the chamber the empty horizons stretches for miles but below the waves is a network of wells in pipelines 30 years ago journalist Trevor Philpott charted the emergence of this multi-billion pound industry the fields run in a spine roughly halfway between the coast of Scotland and Norway the North Sea now could almost be called an industrial estate nothing remotely like the platform's had ever been built before from the seabed to the top of the drilling derrick will be six hundred and ninety feet the steel had to be protected inside and out by a combination of plastic coatings in electrolysis not something you can do in any old Tatas yeah and somehow these cumbersome steel contraptions had to be set afloat and towed 110 miles offshore and to be set up right and pinned on the ocean bed launching day nobody could guess what might happen next it was as much religion as engineering hundreds of men lived and worked on these platforms pumping oil back to Britain to run our cars and eat our homes for the last thirty years North Sea oil has driven our economy stew is making the most of his last half hour of freedom when the pumping jobs happening it's not a spectator sport so if you're not involved please get clear there's no excuse at all for anybody not to feel that they can't have a contribution they can't stop the job and can't get any changes they want in there so i'll say before saying in anybody can call the Lord stop that's what it all comes down to please think about what you're doing you know we've got all the safety checks in the world all the equipment's okay but please please please think what you're doing have a safe trip each chamber holds six divers so there's one more important job deciding who gets the three bottom bunks so we do this drama yes they've been put in fairly that'll be a no you're the air all the best that's a oldies now last number one you're not marked on my toes so you can tell which is with smallest one was number one you wanted it hey look at that result is a sort of look at you thank you I'm at what physical yes negative no is even the six single verse is number four so you're actually one off from choosing huh she has miss his Jordy stick together you know yeah what did you guys do I don't know the sickness a lot of people like the bottom bunks as opposed to the top ones because you got a diver bed and wake everybody of all things fall off in the middle of an a you know look tell me mp3 players Justin bits on the on the year battle grid it doesn't it doesn't sound very much but when you're in there for 28 days it's a big deal where you see it's more room come on room in the bottom bunk geez now take living in there detached house on the bottom competitive holy story block a flat upstairs feel like flashes on the top you know oh I just want to get out of it with now so 15 minutes to go and fight in the space stick that on that bag Gary have a good one call you back see you at man this is the point of no return as their boss Terry Duffy knows only too well it will will be basically you know if anything happens in in the water or in the chamber then it's the divers have to deal with it themselves steer once a divers house burned down but he still had to stay in the chamber what you want Betty I'm not that familiar with going to the moon but i understand it takes about you know two and a half days or so to get the guys back from the moon and as i say could take us five and a half days to get the guys back to surface from these these or debts you've got everything in here you're sitting out and just stick them in in the lot through okay I'm at and I seen a month ago okay go for it go man let's go from 0 without starting to get blown down but blowdown increases the pressure in their chamber until it's the same as being on the seabed less runs saturation control or counterpart he'll go and check now for external links make sure we don't have any problems there as soon as he confirms that book do checks again at 10 meters and then it just becomes a 2 meters a minute blow down it should take us about 75 80 minutes to get them down to date for comfortably the temperature rises on the blow down here and it's very easy and very fast to go up into 30 degrees Celsius plus so we try to keep that down to a minimum so it doesn't cook them these boys sort of filter off towards their fades and that will always keep one in front of the camera purely but it happens we can see him at least and don't have any cameras into their sleeping space it's the only privacy they get whilst they're there so that we don't need to prove it in Ferguson that's usually the case but on this job the divers are using a camera just for us well where's the zoom in and out again yeah you keep touching that right okay I'm with you it's gotta be zoomed right out that's it I've got it stand apart the blow down with a check all their equipment make sure that all the tops are off their shampoos vitamins and stuff that they'll take in with them very all well good he'll notice his voice is now change yes Dylan maybe I'm an oxygen and as they go deeper they get even harder to understand see what I mean the very first Saturday my wife obviously wasn't used to the job and I found it from from death in a very squeaky helium voice I mean it was about to clock in the morning and before she knows less at this time known as soon as she picked up the phone she put it straight back down again and for the police I just thought it was a a dirty phone calling you know I just thought what you want you know and I kept saying what you want she told me this after I got home it says what was plainly I said who was gonna call you eleven o'clock at night in a helium Voice that it's got to be me nobody else at these depths breathing normal air would be deadly so dave has to mix them a very different cocktail these tubes are dedicated to heliox mixture of oxygen helium that the Diamonds breathe and it's stored cleaned and recycled in the stern of the ship we always have to be aware of what we're dealing with I mean this stuff any sort of pressurized container high pressure gas and complaint you if if you're not careful we're quite proud of this kid because although it's quite old it's it's as good as anything else it's being used what protein the ship will not they all were a good one Stu Jess and Martin share this tiny pod with Cohen Andy and Gary for the next four weeks everything they need has to be delivered through an airlock Oh next door are six more diapers the sea well works 24 7 hey guys could you please make your way to the right foot no one escapes lifeboat drill oh la la la la but in a real emergency getting out of one of these chambers would be no joke we've got a hyperbaric live bugs which basically is a lifeboat the same as same as all the others but this one has got a hyperbaric chamber inside that said the same pressure as the guys on board so they can actually transfer into that lifeboats the lifeboat could keep them alive for 72 hours it's never been needed but accidents do happen in the early 70s it was it was really bad you know there was maybe five or six guys killed a year you know where now thankfully it's it's a lot less than that rescue workers are still searching the North Sea around the smoldering wreck of the piper alpha oil platform on the sixth of july 1988 an explosion in the North Sea rocked the oil business 167 men lost their lives a tragedy that Martin will never forget were recovered the bodies from the terrible accident on the piper alpha which was as 20 years ago now that 1988 a team of the team of divers went into a recovery recover the bodies its main accommodation module is finally brought to the surface of the North Sea and it's there that it's thought that many of the men may be found was recovered upside down so we were walking on the ceiling and all the partition walls had all fallen in so there was a lot of her there's always stuff to recover and to take out of the module before we actually yeah for actually could find the fan of guys yeah I think I was a probably the worst part of it really after piper alpha safety improved hugely in the oil industry the disaster was a stark reminder of how precarious life can be in the North Sea Oh Oh am I in chamber three another dive team are emerging after 28 days work okay so nice to see ya hello David knows the role it takes a moment for their voices to get back to normal one you've lazy they're all still asleep in there yeah this is not mine by the way is not mine oh no that's not mine either sir hey would you look about yours at Sam Scylla many of these men will suffer headaches in extreme lethargy afterwards because of the reduction in numbers of red blood cells in their bodies the valve this job takes its toll physically which is why divers typically only work four or five months of the year it's a nice feeling coming out but we it's like one week actually and come out we like we want to get home you know straight away and the separation is particularly difficult when you've got a young family like Jess and my mom name he said happy birth last week he was playing with the birthday present he gave me and asked me what I got from my birthday it's hard to understand my dad because um you don't you deduct language and I did I don't I don't speak duck oh just about finished a dive line now so i'll be sending it down to sat control should be getting on location about sort of 20 hundred hours so probably be in the early hours of the morning before we get going this is an unusual way to earn a living but there's something special about the sea when i was a kid i thought was gonna be a diver yeah more or less set my heart on that from from an early age with the shock justo programs on a sunday afternoon my parents weren't very happy with that Jacques Cousteau has a lot to answer for we first tested the Aqua rank in the summer of nineteen forty two on the French Mediterranean coast with my friends ferragamo and philippe de yay at that time we had no idea how it would change all our lives later on we would add new sophisticated equipment that the important thing was that now the diver was free and safety was in freedom Cousteau didn't stop with the Aqualung his passion for exploring the oceans in submarines and underwater laboratories contributed to the development of commercial diving these incredible diving machines are the vanguard of a fantastic technology on which the future of civilization may depend yesterday's fantasy is today's reality this fearsome beast is driven by the boy races of the North Sea who confidently predict that they will soon take over the world this evening it's doing a survey the majority of structures that are going in the water in the last ten years they've all got out of you intervention panels on them so a lot of the deeper water stuff it's offered to be engineered to be ought to be friendly so the arteries can talk on operate valves basically diver list they can dream but for now the divers reign supreme some parts I woke up a little more water / / / / from hurtful Oh somewhere beyond the sea fish mainland this is the main one when chief fish was up Wednesday fish a lot of state chorus corazon of warm they're liable mainly fishing salads we look after him with beat him we keep them outfit we're tend to get all the guy was done with all their meals before everybody else gets their work for the Dodgers we wouldn't be able then again they wouldn't be if with going through so teeth to rest its healthy option I'll go see field spa I've basically just looking after the lads when they're in saturation yeah general dogsbody glorified wheeler there's a running joke on board about who works the hardest the divers get it in the neck lazy education we are big enough to hide a oh it's pablo contract yeah yeah you guys you gotta give me some know me as a units you know like all the other people you're corny to shake the gel together your knowledge it's just a real good life all of us aren't you know you safe enough everybody room ready Oh ah over on the boat was the law gotcha something you can see Snowden candies out there epic contest do you think when I don't know what's he doing ok yeah the comte's the contest anything put chilies in it can get onto omelettes real spicy chilies we seen body count season but Devon tins strong feelings just for cancer Stu Jess and Martin start diving tomorrow morning so they need to build up their strength well a follower will then waterbrook all around I couldn't live in there you've got to be a different kind of person you kind of do with a boredom and everything other the lads go on through I couldn't do it no we're up on deck the crew are checking the equipment that will go to the bottom of the sea the divers have got to fix a broken oil pump this electrical cable will put it right and get the oil flowing again the deck is a tough place to work even in good weather it must remain operational 24 hours a day okay that's four o'clock you boys are on shaft and your breakfast is coming breakfast will be soft the lads have an hour to get ready for their dive outside everyone is working flat out pick a next even got a visual sunlight the underwater robot has found the 40 oiled pump the North Sea awaits nothing is too much trouble what was trying to make sure that the suits are perfectly dry for them and because some of them wins like hell when the suits on bro I haha every time we go into the bell to take to fresh sawdust or pan tostado it's just saw the line with beautiful in it and charcoal this cleans the air for them when they're down that aisle are around 11 found over command from Oh find a white round and they're ready to go Martin's in charge of the diving bell so is first to go in the weakest point in this pressurized system is this junction between the chamber and the diving bell if the seal goes and pressure is lost the divers would decompress in an instant and be killed their internal organs would explode inside them as they fill up with air Walton good morning to you proud Martin you had a copy of the diet plan and you understand the briefing thank you confirm your huh began to analyze a reading is the status light is green thank you and obviously the bullhorns working your diaper recovery when she working correctly sound that phone madden plea happy you've done you guys kept you happy that Roger that completes the checks so you happy okay I'll get the other lads up we've been given a 30 minutes notice from the bridge this weight goes down first to stabilize the diving bell to stop it moving sideways in a current one slip and these guys get to go diving to the bridge let's see half guard weights left service Moving's ready the Bell passes through a hole in the middle of the ship called a moon pool the aquanauts are on their way it takes about five minutes to travel the hundred and eighty six meters to the bottom of the North Sea 3450 jury okay let's find got your load and clear on the through water comes okay secure your box thank you the divers are on their way to repair a pump which feeds oil to a platform on the surface 11 miles away I'm 15 ok bus and 150 women at the site it's so deep here you could stand Big Ben on top of itself and only just break the surface you bail has been dressing stew and Jess in such a confined space his hard work okay boys go for your door when you get home or you clear to go check for leaks as he goes please don Roger in the water reclaims good thinking hey checking for leaks r is good for legs there and I Khloe's you're a pinch bar the seabed is now one graceful leap away good morning Stu good morning Jess okay we're ready for a busy day lovely to hear enthusiasm bursting source okay what so once you get your tools we'll go and have a look exactly what we're gonna be working with the oil company is paying a hundred and fifty thousand pounds a day for the sea well and its crew just one of the many costs of keeping the oil flowing from deep under the sea it's just a case of Paul de Mike you might need to leave MIT you send a little over just to Jeremy just to open them again but it's over them and just pull it straight back just got be very careful what you're knocking against there any movement it's solid at the moment with the three as amethyst or share dinner during the dive the ship must stay directly above the divers if we don't then we'll move around and dragged all the day before n deceivex so we need to keep the vessel in position while they're doing what's up C and it's done with six thrusters and a lot of clever computer software it's quite a tapir but the chaps upstairs can't take all the credit it's the boys below who keep the engines firing on all cylinders if anything goes wrong we're in character propulsion we need to let the rich nor and I've control know obviously coming here find out what's wrong go and fix it if it's a worst-case scenario will recover the divers will tell them that's M story get back up for you petrol heads out there there are six 2,500 horsepower v18 twin turbo engines for everyone else they are big hot noise don't don't damage anything as you can ah something move did it he's got it off very good that's off now okay good shot okay more when I get a poet Cuban coming down drive or two just to let you know for the month the divers never see daylight they're unaware that morning has broken Cyrus Turner's I'm speakin lugging the cable around reduces visibility in the gloom they must be careful not to tangle up their lifelines obviously be aware the hydraulic connectors as you're coming up you know it's down there near them that's the first one we're gonna go into time is marching on already they've been down here for two hours clean up to start with that's a [ __ ] one that you've got there they should just pull straight out can you give it a big yank yeah as long as you don't get too zealous with it you got it naughty you always went someplace there okay it's basically all ready for the jumper connector now okay he's just taking a rag off the end and he'll make sure that so clean before it comes down to you divert one okay can you see any damage it's nice and clean it's nice and clean no sign of any damage or indentation okay that's fine we'll stick that into OC just watch the hydraulic connectors below you to complete the job Jess puts the boot in with the new cable is now securely connected Roger okay if you both come clear go on top the air manifold while it's powered up with 5,000 volts the guy's retreat to a safe distance Joe's clearer so you boys clear safety is paramount for the divers because when things go wrong at sea they can go very wrong jess was only 19 when he came face-to-face with tragedy the worst thing I think I did as a clearance diver was when Harold of free enterprise rolled over I was part of a six-man team that went went into the vessel six hours after it rolled over the full horror of what happened last night became clear when a team of British divers and a BBC camera crew boarded the herald of free enterprise at daylight evidence of the frantic struggled to escape the deadly icy waters was everywhere windows smashed by rescuers desperate to free the surviving passengers who'd been helpless trapped behind the thick glass pieces of clothing still litter the outside of the topsy-turvy wreck unused life jackets are strewn about inside a grim reminder of how quickly it all happened the rescuers came today hoping to find survivors they thought they might hear sounds perhaps tapping from people inside 193 people died you can train someone to do bom and mine disposal but you can't train anybody to see that sort of human tragedy really that's what I see it now I'm not going to talk anymore about it jess was commended for his bravery hi to control lighter controls he guesses SeaWorld client come back it's off okay they're just trying to confirm communications with a platform at the moment either control 11 miles away the platform is checked that the pump is working but making contact is proving difficult and time is money time is of the essence at the moment already got some twelve o'clock with his eyes real man the future maybe about robots but they are not yet as reliable as divers nor is popular with the fish and we watch one absurd that you know the trillest your left while they're waiting to hear from the platform Stu and jess are completing a job that the robot couldn't manage tightening a very big screw okay what we want to do is try to reconnect it and calc your turn so she goes think anti-clockwise yeah that's it s s 1 and s st okay basically all you got to do is put your crew bar in the end of the handle out of your handle and turn it clockwise till it locks it's not it turns doesn't look like it's doing anything what do I is it yeah okay I've been asked to keep it turning it 18 turns to better Roger look how the number of turns us even get 16 and a half as a minimum of 18 each dive is supposed to last a maximum of six hours this one's been going for five hours and the platform still hasn't confirmed that the pump is back online so often our scene he knows that we're against the clock a little bit I told him to aquatica as if we do have to commit the other team on either an hour to browndown something this means an agonizing wait on the surface but an hour to chill down below it's very calm very quiet down there but it's serene it's it's it's hard it's hard to explain but it is it's 4am is if you want on the surface of the Moon I suppose but common you know as we can here is your own breathing and the feeling of being weightless at last the message comes through oil is now being pumped up from the seabed the boys can come home okay well done lads that's the old tests completed one hundred percent and you're ready to go back to the bell oks dlm is gonna watch you as you coming backwards to come up on your umbilical Roger you claim it ok that one's claiming in about just dig it nice and easy as you claim on the clump up in this [ __ ] first bellman he's almost there Roger tues of the club my turn you guys okay okay come on ages you okay well done diver one after six hours in the water Jess looks exhausted okay ready for you divert to now it's tues turn to come in from the cold oh you'll get back for your dinner well right through the vents lair well well well okay come up with the ball and that's Bertha the rope well I pick up their family and pop over the field all alone rhythm Oh but the only place to relax after a hard day's work is back in the chamber while the divers strip off here's a sneak preview of yet more real men tomorrow we hang out with the high wire men who turn Britain on using up their 200 foot up that's where taught cement on the boys yeah on Wednesday meet the real men who really do paint the Forth Bridge it's very very much a man's well it's a man's man's man's world the jobs are ordinary scaffolding stripping decorating but in an extraordinary place and Friday fasten your seat belts with a silent service how many people realize who does is come along for the ride to find out how many real men it takes to change a light bulb meanwhile Martin and Stu have waited long enough for the shower prefer the divers have got 12 hours to rest before their next dive 26 days until they can leave the chamber and rejoin the outside world and their families real men are an inspiration to us all see you tomorrow next here on BBC one another crisis at the chase BBC Two's off to the coast and adrenaline junkies get your fix with last man standing over on BBC three

Channel: TheIDIdiver

Views: 174,813

Rating: 4.8543801 out of 5

Keywords: Saturation Diving, Underwater Diving (Profession), underwater welding, commercial diving, Diving (Sport), diving documentary

Id: YehAf4hKn5A

Length: 58min 52sec (3532 seconds)

Published: Tue May 06 2014