Diving fatality in the Blue Hole, Dahab: Barbara Dillinger

Various videos on the web show a badly decomposed body lying somewhere on the sloping floor of the Blue Hole, and people believe this to be Barbara Dillinger (RIP 1974-1998), an Argentenian woman. After watching an interview by a dive centre staff in the documentary "The Sacred Truth: The Blue Hole of Dahab" by Elena Konstantinou, I wanted to set the record straight.

According to the interview, died as a result of a burst lung from rapid ascent in the Blue Hole of Dahab. During her dive she must have panicked probably due to a combination of nitrogen narcosis and the eerie atmosphere created by the arch and the Blue Hole itself, and she swam up to the surface too quickly without exhaling properly, which causes the lungs to over-expand due to the dropping water pressure as you go up towards the surface.

She was taken to staff at a dive centre and then put on an ambulance to Dahab, where her she was let down by luck; the oxygen tanks were almost empty, and the ambulance would also ran out of fuel on the way. She passed away whilst her rescuers were waiting for fuel to arrive.

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Background

Dozens of people die every year in the Blue Hole, the true figures have never been revealed by the Egyptian authorities. Many dive centres are willing to guide inexperienced people through the arch which opens up from about 55m down inside the Blue Hole. 55m is very close to the limit set by most diver training agenices as the maximum recommended depth for diving air, which contains a high percentage of Nitrogen, which has narcotic effects when breathed at high pressure at these depths. The effect of narcosis on the diver depends on their state of mind during the dive, and can be euphoric or it can induce panic. Many inexperienced divers seem to succumb to panic under narcosis in the Blue Hole when swimming under the arch, as it can be dark and gloomy, and coupled with it's sheer overwhelming scale and the ceiling of the arch blocking the route to the surface, it can be a scary place.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• blue
• hole
• dahab
• fatality
• barbara
• dillinger
• diving
• scuba
• narcosis
• the
• arch
• elena
• konstantinou
• sacred
• truth

[overseasmedia]

Thanks a lot, Jonny!

[diverjonny]

Hi Elena, I was about to email you about this! :)

[murkydiver]

It is an extremely technical dive. One needs mixed gas and a deco plan to attempt this dive. Those divers without this training or expertise are just committing suicide. You think the trail of grave markers would wake people up...sad and tragic. It makes diving look dangerous and it is not when done properly!

[hugboxx]

You fucking idiot.

People die there because they don't plan accurately; it's a dangerous place and they come like you with zapped brains, talking about vibrations and dimensional shifts, thinking that the sea is a big blue comforter with lovely anthropomorphic fishies in it.

You fucking clown.

[a6km]

I dont give a fuck about people who die there just because of their stupidity

[MudRat02]

"Dozens of people die every year in the Blue Hole"...uh, yeah that's a big exaggeration. Its more like two or three, from silly things like inexperienced divers trying to go through on a tank or poor preparation.

[Goodness250]

I can't understand half of what this guy is saying... Is it just me?

[stussyboys]

People who are susceptible to panic attacks should not dive period.

[stussyboys]

the truth is these people running these dives centres havnet a fuckin clue what they are doing they are all trying to live the dream and fuck the consequences ive worked in a few dive centres trust me if u knew how easy it was to become a dive master u would be shocked not only that from my own experiance most people genuinly suck at diving and are extremely careless and thats the instructors themselves

[stussyboys]

people do a few dives a year and think they are all that, what they dont realise is that unless u dive consistantly and i mean weekly lik i used to u are just not ready for doing dives such as the blue hole it amazes me when people go onb holiday and suggest doing dives like that u need at least a good month of prior diving leading up to such a dive get real people

[thegirl44]

@overseasmedia

Thanks, Elena. It's nice to know that we can get the facts from a knowledgable source such as yourself.

Completely unrelated comment, amazing how well preserved the gear stays down there after such a long time.

[overseasmedia]

@thegirl44 In fact it's very unusual for a family not to look for a body, even if it's really deep like 250 m they can use ROVs. But the accidents I was talking about in the film took place long time ago, there were less tech divers to dive 100m+ to recover the bodies.

[thegirl44]

@overseasmedia

I understand that the families sometimes opt to leave the body in the body of water but is it not unusual for family not to come looking for a missing loved one?

Or, did the family perhaps come looking and the story just got lost along the way?