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Daring Diving |
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Ali Drummond started work on a pearling lugger as a deck-hand at age 15. His father, Mohammed Ali, came from Malaysia in the early 1900s to work as a diver. Ali joined the Haku lugger operated by the Cleveland Pearling Company and worked beside Japanese divers and a Papua New Guinean crew. From deck hand, Ali progressed to cook and then to spare diver, second diver and eventually to chief diver and skipper. The Japanese divers taught him to dive. Ali recalled in 1999: I was young, daring and stupid. After the war Ali worked on the Nobby (1948), the Gypsy (1948-49) and the Whyalla (1951-52). He retired from diving in 1952. Darnley Deeps was considered one of the most dangerous places in the Torres Strait for diving because the water reaches depths of more than 30 fathoms. Many divers lost their lives in these waters. Recalling his experiences Ali said: They would drop the lead line to determine depth. It was cold with nothing swimming around. You would be hanging in empty space. It took one hour to stage. If you shake you know you would not get the bends. The bends were like ants crawling all over you then it hits you – ‘boom’ all of a sudden. You would only become conscious when someone staged you. You were like a yoyo going up and down. Most divers did not know the art of staging. Panic mostly killed them or water-snakes. They would hold their breath to the surface instead of breathing out along the way up. Their lungs would burst when reaching the surface, just like a paper bag.
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