The following article was written for – and published in – ‘Professional Diver Journal’ in 1996.
——————–
Out in Australia’s Bass Strait oil fields the last diver of the day shift completes his surface decompression schedule and climbs from the chamber. On the oil platform’s main deck the diving stages are already secured, the umbilical hoses neatly coiled to prevent kinking and the gear checked and stowed. For the Oceaneering Australia dive team it’s the close of another working day.
The on-going Inspection and Non-Destructive Testing [NDT] of the oil platforms that mark Australia’s most mature sub-sea oil field is a gruelling, year-round programme that allows no let-up. It’s a routine that – with minor modifications – is duplicated around the world.
Headquartered in Houston, Texas, Oceaneering International’s mission statement is to provide high quality technical solutions to meet client needs in harsh environments. Spanning the globe – with 53 offices spread across 37 countries and over 2,000 employees – the company has the hardware and the know-how to deliver the goods. It owns and operates several saturation Diving Systems capable of operating in a range of depths to 1500 feet; specialist air and gas diving systems for Construction, Maintenance and Inspection Diving; a broad range of Remotely Operated Vehicles for all applications and capable of operating in depths to 8,000 ft., and a variety of Hyperbaric Medical Facilities for use in hospital and medical environments.
Oceaneering have also developed, designed and built their own One Atmosphere Diving Suits, the WASP. Capable of operating safely and efficiently to depths of over 3,000 ft. there are three separate WASP spreads involved in heavy activity in the Gulf Of Mexico where two of them are working nearly full time. The pilots flying them doing everything from NDT on platforms, pipeline intervention, re-flanging, riser inspections and deep water work up to 2,000 feet.
The company has made its mark in areas other than just diving. The wide range of services that it provides to industry in general, includes the design and engineering for the oxygen backpack rebreather system presently in use with the NASA Astronauts and the design and engineering for the tooling used on the recent Hubble Telescope repair. {During the June 1996 Shuttle Mission, one of the onboard team was an employee of Oceaneering Space Systems, Dr Mike Gernhard, acting as payload specialist.}.
Apart from hardware developed specifically to meet the requirements of these industries the company is a registered N.A.T.A. [National Association Of Testing Authorities] Laboratory for Non-Destructive Testing services and is currently the only company in Australia to hold N.A.T.A. endorsement for underwater inspection of steel structures.
Engaged in ROV operations in Western Australia, a joint venture operation to survey and test the interior of land pipelines and two projects to extend existing ocean outfalls in Tasmania, Oceaneering Australia still remains best known for its work in the Offshore Oil and Gas sectors, places like Bass Strait where they have worked continuously for twelve years.
For the diving team it’s a job that demands far more than technical expertise. Faced with the constant hazards of isolation, cold, dark waters and unpredictable weather, each day brings its share of fresh physical and mental challenges.
With each inspection programme – depending on what ‘cycle’ the platform is in – taking anywhere between two weeks and three months, the divers are completely mobile. Compressors, air banks, tool and equipment shacks, the twin-lock recompression chamber and their own dive control and operations room move with them from platform to platform.
Normally based around six divers working a 12-hour shift, a figure that’s doubled if the job requires a night shift, the diving is structured around five people; the appointed Diving Supervisor; the Diver; a Stand-by Diver; the Diver’s attendant; and the Stand-by Diver’s attendant. A sixth person, the ‘rover’, is also on hand to attend to any other routine jobs like checking the compressor, refilling the sand blast hopper and preparing photographic labels.
The average diving day begins with an early morning meeting to discuss the order of the days diving, followed by exhaustive equipment and safety checks. While the diver and stand-by diver check their helmets and the gear they’ll be using, the other three crew members organise the gas supply and carry out inspections on the winches and wires. After a briefing from the Supervisor on the nature of the task the first diver of the day is usually standing in the stage ready to be lowered to his work station before 07:00. With the right weather conditions – sometimes lasting for weeks at a time – they’ll dive continuously all day, through until 17.30 – 17.45, generally breaking for meals while a diver is decompressing in the chamber.
All of the diving operations are conducted on air to a maximum depth of 50-meters [an Australian legislative standard] with each diver carrying out one dive in any 24-hour period. Although the policies of both Oceaneering International and the Petroleum and Submerged Lands Act allow for repetitive diving, Brent Wilkerson, Oceaneering Australia’s Eastern Operations Manager says that, “with five divers in a days activity in Bass Strait we generally do four or five dives during a twelve hour period. A schedule which omits the Supervisor from the need to dive.”
Responsible to the Operations Manager, Supervisors are not required to dive, although they can, at the Supervisor’s discretion and with permission from the operations department, in situations where they’ve run short of divers during the days activities.
{ Although the use of exotic gases are an option for deeper diving, the operations would become prohibitively expensive when weighed against active bottom time versus additional gas costs. An ‘eye-ball’ ROV is employed in situations requiring deeper inspection work.}
It’s not sufficient to merely know how to dive to make the grade with Oceaneering Australia. Because clients generally request a level of qualification that suits their current programme the first thing Oceaneering seek from their divers are Inspection qualifications. A minimum qualification of a CSWIP 3.2U – a United Kingdom standard with international across the board recognition, is preferred [CSWIP is the premier certifying body for the range of divers who hold that certification. In some cases they have to go back to the UK to re-certify every five years]. Occasionally crews have to be supplemented by non-inspection qualified divers but that is a rarity and Oceaneering will often provide and pay for additional training that helps to enhance the skill levels of their divers.
Trade skills are an additional asset. Experience in hydraulics, welding, or as a diesel mechanic or fitter and turner go a long way to furthering a diver’s employment prospects in the industry. Especially for new divers.
“Divers now are much more technically oriented than they used to be.” says Brent. “The days of the hard living, heavy smoking, rough-house, deep-sea diver are virtually gone. He’s been replaced by a more technically minded person more aware of the type of work he’s undertaking, adaptable, quick thinking and versatile. ‘The ability to dive is not a panacea for the skills one lacks. It is only a vehicle to get one to the job site’.” It’s a maxim that Brent believes epitomises the new breed of commercial diver.
Once dressed for work the diver, like many of his land-based counterparts, catches a lift to the ‘office’! The stage, equipped with a large air cylinder and hose as a back-up safety measure, is a winch operated cage that carries the diver the 25-metres or so from the platform deck to the sea surface and on to his planned working depth.
Gradually being phased out in favour of the Kirby-Morgan KM 17 Superlite, now becoming the industry standard, the diver can wear a ‘Rat Hat’, the helmet developed by Oceaneering and still in use throughout the world. Equipped with a hard wire communications system the helmet also carries a mounted video camera. A device that’s dramatically improved the interface between diver and surface allowing the diving supervisor to simultaneously view what the diver is seeing. Because it’s easier to pull on in an emergency the team also employs the Kirby-Morgan band mask for the stand-by diver’s use.
With water temperatures in Bass Strait ranging between 11 – 14 deg C., the divers wear ‘off-the-shelf’ wet-suits with an in-built hot water system. Opting for the larger, loose fitting sizes the warm water envelope surrounding the diver provides a greater level of comfort than a more snugly fitting suit.
The diver’s umbilical consists of the air hose; the Kluge – a pneumofathometer that accurately measures depth through pressure feed back and which can also be used for inflating a lift bag or blowing away debris. {The Kluge can also serve as a back-up air supply in the event of primary failure. Although the diver carries a ‘come-home’ cylinder with sufficient air to get him back to his stage and the on-board emergency cylinder, the Kluge – fitted with a quick connect adaptor – can be plugged directly into the helmet through a secondary whip. Generally a last resort because there are two reserves top-side that are plumbed into the system air banks and are activated by simply switching the diver from the LP diesel compressor to an air bank.}. Also contained in the umbilical is a hot water hose, supplying water heated to 32 – 37 deg. C., to the suit, the communications cable and the video cable connecting to the helmet mounted C.C. camera. With the exception of a video cable the stand-by diver’s umbilical exactly duplicates that of the diver’s.
The entire assembly is clipped to the diver’s safety harness and the hose paid out to the diver by a hydraulic umbilical wheel – referred to by John Schwarz as the ‘whizzy wheel’ – controlled by one of the divers observing the stage. During transport the umbilical is also clipped to the stage, a precaution against the diver being pulled out of the stage by an over exuberant ‘whizzy wheel’ operator.
Improvisation has long been the hallmark of all working divers and while there’s a tendency to design and make many of their own tools and instruments, there’s a certain conservatism about the choice of diving equipment.
“We use basic diving equipment that gets you to the job site.” Says Brent. “Why try and improve on something that isn’t broken? The standard for the diving industry for so many years now has been a diesel driven Quincy compressor, a Delmonox Air Filter, Helle-radio, a simple panel, gauges, Gates Diving Hose and the Kirby-Morgan, a good, basic, hard-working hat that, like all of the equipment items I’ve just mentioned, require minimal, but regular, maintenance.”
“Where we tend to change equipment is in the inspection and testing side of the business. One of our divers designed and built our own underwater housings for standard Nikon cameras. Some of the most recent ultra-sonic detection units have become digitalised and very sophisticated but don’t necessarily perform as well as existing technology.”
Working depths vary according to the task. “We average 30 to 40 minutes on a dive,” says Jon Schwarz, the Diving Supervisor, “ with a total bottom time of about 90 minutes which includes surface recompression. If we’re diving deep – say 150 ft – we’ll do a decompression dive. The diver will do a water stop at 30 ft, and then we’ve got about five minutes to get him from thirty foot back up to the platform deck out of his gear into the chamber and back down to 50 ft.. to carry out his surface decompression in the chamber. While one diver runs the panel the other guys can have a meal break and prepare for the next dive”
Like many Commercial Diving companies, Oceaneering Australia employ their own proprietary decompression tables derived from the US Navy decompression tables and which, over the years, have been modified to suit cold-water diving or long duration diving. Prescribed by Oceaneering International’s Safety and Training Department the tables are based on available data from the field and through consultation with leading experts. While the deeper work is generally a combination of short water stops coupled with surface recompression in the chamber, Oceaneering International have a range of different tables to cover widely differing situations, a policy that allows them to dive in the safest manner possible.
Safety is a major element in every area of Oceaneering International’s operations. Administered by the Vice-President of Safety and Training, who reports directly to the President of the Company, the world-wide safety programme helps to identify problems before they occur. A policy that reflects in an accident-free record second to none and one which Oceaneering constantly strives to maintain and improve upon.
This strong commitment to diver safety is reflected in the statistics. “We’ve worked for over six years Loss Time Incident [LTI] free in Bass Strait, a record we are extremely proud of,” reports Brent Wilkerson, “and over 3 years Treatable Injury free. We haven’t had an injury that’s required medical intervention to the point where someone is incapacitated. Our safety record is due to the diligence of the crew, their ability to follow safety procedures and their inherent worksafe attitude.” 
Operating around the globe for so many years Oceaneering Australia have adopted some of the world’s best practice into their operating procedures manuals. With a total commitment to providing the safest and most cost effective services to their clients they have recently developed an accredited Quality Control system to ISO 9002.
There are no compromises in any of the Oceaneering undertakings, offshore or inshore. The minimum size of a dive team, as prescribed by Australian Standard AS 2299, is three people but, as Brent Wilkerson explains, “In one of our Tasmanian operations we have a diving supervisor, 4 or 5 divers and a project manager. We use three people when we’re doing simple jobs as in propeller clearance or hull inspection. However! If we’re going to do anything that requires distance between the diving supervisor and the diver, or where someone is required to operate a piece of equipment that may be remote from the dive station, we’ll use a four person crew. It depends on the job, the conditions, and how long we may be there. If we’re going to be there for 12 hours in the water I wouldn’t expect three men to do that. I’d send four men. That’s impacted on by the client as well because he wants value for money. If he thinks the task can be done by two or three people then ….. Well! We’ll miss out on the job!”
It’s an attitude that inspires loyalty and attracts the best of the best. According to Brent, “There are no other diving jobs in Australia – or ever have been, that I’m aware of – that have employed a core group of people for so long on the same project. Our crews have been together for a very long time. They know what to expect from each other, how each will react to certain situations, the level of back-up they’ll get and whose best at doing what. They put those skills together for us in a great fashion and that’s where the inherent bond really works. As a Company we’re where we are because of our people. We’re mindful of that and very appreciative.”
Despite the long tenure on this one project, Brent still views diving as a nomadic lifestyle. It’s an opinion reflected in his own background. Born and raised in Illinios he’s worked the world’s major offshore diving locations, from the Gulf of Mexico, the North Sea and Asia, to Australia and the Pacific. “Divers tend to go where the work and the money is,” he says, ”and wherever the job happens to be is where the divers are to be found.”
And is offshore diving an exciting life? “Well! It depends what you like to do as a diver.” He responds. “Some divers much prefer doing heavy construction work. There’s a lot of that happening in Western Australia especially. Some divers hate inspection work. It’s painstaking work that can take a long time to do properly. To sit out here on a platform for two weeks at a time would be viewed by some divers as really quite boring!” 
—ENDS—
The above article was written for – and published in – ‘Professional Diver Journal’, issue #5, in 1996
Categories: General
NEKTONIX 