Fatal Incident At Pulau Hantu

Body of missing diver found in waters off Pulau Hantu
By S Ramesh, Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 20 February 2007 1820 hrs


SINGAPORE : The body of a missing diver was found in the waters off Pulau Hantu at around 9.40 am on Tuesday.

Singaporean Sue Qing Wen, who is in his 20s and who had just finished his National Service, was reported missing on Saturday, the eve of the Lunar New Year.

He and several others has gone for their first dive in open waters off Pulau Hantu - as part of their diving certification - but did not make it back.

Pulau Hantu is 15 minutes away from Sentosa by speedboat. Police said they received a call from a member of the public about the body. A diving wet suit and an oxygen tank were also found with the body.

No one responded to Channel NewsAsia's queries when our crew visited his house in Chua Chu Kang. - CNA/ms


S'porean Learner Diver lost Near Pulau Hantu

How did he vanish?

By Arul John (The Electric New paper)

It was Chinese New Year's Eve but he was excited for another reason. Singaporean Sue Qing Wen was going for his first dive in open waters. If he passed, he would soon be certified fit to dive in local and international waters. Everything was planned ahead for the training dive involving 14 divers and nothing was out of place.

But Mr Sue didn't come back on Saturday, like the other divers. He remains missing at press time.

At Mr Sue's home, preparations for the Chinese New Year's Eve reunion dinner was in full swing when the phone rang on Saturday evening. It was the police informing his parents that the eldest son was lost in the waters around Pulau Hantu, a 15-minute speedboat ride from Sentosa.

One of the divers in the group, who declined to be named, said that all 14 divers had assembled at Keppel Marina near VivoCity shopping mall at 7.30am that day. They then boarded a boat to the island for the dive. The group included two dive masters, the boatman, four experienced divers and six student divers, one of whom was Mr Sue. Another diver looked after the other divers' equipment on the boat.

The student divers had taken lessons at a local dive school and were now deemed to be ready for an open sea dive. This would determine if they are ready to be certified capable of diving in local and international waters, said the diver.

'On the way to the dive site, the dive masters reviewed all the lessons we had learnt. They asked us if anyone was unwell or afraid and we even went over the sign language to use to communicate with our fellow divers when in the water. Everyone was well and had no problems,' said the diver.

By 8am, the boat had arrived at the dive site about 40m to 50m off Pulau Hantu. The student divers were paired up and put into two groups, each led by a dive master. Mr Sue was in one group together with another student diver. The other four student divers were in the other group.

At about 8.30am, both groups headed for their first dive - lasting about 30 minutes - to test their oxygen tanks. The divers then rested and did another training exercise.

'We were in the water for about 20 minutes and practised putting on and taking off our diving masks and regulators quickly without panicking. The missing diver - we called him Sue - performed well during both dives and he looked well,' said the diver. At about noon, the larger group went into the water and dived in single file along the anchor line - the chain leading from the boat to its anchoring point about 10m below the surface.

'We were going to practise what to do if our air supply was cut off or disrupted. The smaller group dived in about a minute after the first group went in and they followed down the anchor line too. The dive master was moving around and supervising what was happening. Suddenly, he went to Sue's partner and asked him using sign language where he was. Sue's partner pointed up, indicating that he might have gone to the surface. The dive master went up to the surface but didn't find Sue there,' said the diver.

What could have happened to Mr Sue?

COMBINATION OF FACTORS?

A diver with over 20 years' experience diving in Singapore and overseas waters said that a combination of high tides, strong currents and poor visibility might have contributed to Mr Sue's disappearance.

'The visibility of the water off Pulau Hantu is about 3m and the currents there can be quite strong, even up to three hours after high tide.

'At about 11am to noon on Saturday, high tide was about 3m,' he said.

Around noon, after discovering that one of the divers was missing, the dive master told the divers to return to the boat and then asked for a back-up boat to join them at the scene.

He also asked that Police Coast Guard (PCG) be informed, said the diver.

Police told The New Paper yesterday that they were informed at about 1.30pm and a search was conducted by the PCG boats when they arrived at the scene.

The divers also helped in the search.

Said the diver: 'We circled around the dive site to see if we could detect any bubbles on the surface or debris that could help locate the missing diver but we were unsuccessful.'

They returned to Singapore at 5pm that day, said the diver.

At Mr Sue's flat in Chua Chu Kang, the family was too distraught to speak but a relative, who declined to be named, said that the missing man was an outgoing person who loved the outdoors and diving.

He said Mr Sue had just completed full-time National Service and had not yet found a job.

'This is a sad day for us. We have not heard anything so far, since the news of his disappearance,' he said yesterday.