Diving company heavily fined for breaches
A diving company and its director have been fined almost €50,000 for a number of breaches of the Health and Safety regulations which led to the death of one of its employees in Dublin Bay.
North East Diving Services and Director Nigel Hoblin pleaded guilty to four counts under the act of failing to ensure the dead man Damien Byrne was not exposed to risks during a commercial dive.
The court heard Mr Byrne who worked for North East Diving Services took part in a commercial dive to salvage a yacht on the evening of the 3rd of July 2004.
On his second dive the crew began to get concerned as there were no bubbles and he'd been down for ten minutes.
He had become entangled in rigging, he threw off his jacket and was turned upside down.
He was eventually taken to hospital where he died.
It emerged that a number of basic diving standards were not observed, Mr Byrne wasn’t in a position to summon help as he had no lifeline and he didn’t have a knife with him to cit himself out.
The judge fined the company and the director a total of just over €48,000.
