Aberdeen Evening Meeting – Diving – Research, Practice and Safety

Wednesday 12 February 2025 | 18:00 – 20:00hrs

Aberdeenshire Cricket Club, Aberdeen

Registration – £15 SUT members / £25 non-members (+ VAT)

This event includes four great presentations from very experienced and knowledgeable speakers, covering topics from the latest research related to cellular stress, a case study from the North Sea and two presentations related to safety – what happens when it goes wrong, as well as a look at the systems we have in place to provide safe refuge for divers if a dive support vessel has a catastrophic failure.

Commercial Diving Incidents and Lessons Learnt – Bill Chilton, IMCA

The talk will look at two commercial diving incidents (a shellfish diving fatality in Scotland and the subsea decommissioning of a North Sea oil and gas installation) that occurred during the speaker’s time at HSE.  The talk will look at what went wrong, what could have been done differently, and changes to the commercial diving industry in the UK as a result of these events.

Bill Chilton has 25 years of experience in commercial diving and prior to joining IMCA and becoming Diving Manager he worked at the UK HSE for 12 years. Regulating the safety of divers working in the offshore energy and other sectors of the diving industry is a subject close to Bill as he previously was an air and saturation diver as well as having held ‘topside’ positions including project engineer and project manager. Bill holds a BSc (Hons) in Geography; an MSc in Marine Resource Management; and an MSc (Distinction) in Decommissioning.

Hyperbaric Rescue – Graeme Robb, JFD Head of Technical Services

When a Dive Support Vessel is severely damaged there may come a time when it must be abandoned. Divers in saturation inside a diving system present a particular challenge as they cannot be safely or readily decompressed in order to be evacuated in the same way as other crew members –  this is when a Hyperbaric Evacuation Plan and Hyperbaric Reception Facility is called into action.  This presentation will cover what these facilities look like, how they function and how and when they are used.

Graeme Robb, JFD Head of Technical Services, worked with Divex / JFD since 2007 on commercial diving new build DSV projects, product servicing and after sales service support.

Closed Bell Resuscitation, The Dunoon Method – Mario Gagliardini, Diving Operation Lead, Boskalis

From the Boskalis offshore diving projects team twelve of our colleagues collaborated with specialists from Derby University Hospital on groundbreaking research that has significantly shaped the future of resuscitation protocols for saturation divers. Their dedication and expertise have been pivotal in the development of the Dunoon CPR Protocol, which now serves as a cornerstone in diver safety and industry standards.

This presentation will delve into the collaborative efforts and outcomes of this research, highlighting the critical advancements in resuscitation protocols and their implications for diver safety..

Mario Gagliardini, Diving Operation Lead, Boskalis. Mario has over 10 year offshore saturation and air diving experience in many different and challenging working environments.  Currently Diving Operations Lead at Boskalis Subsea Services, he brings valuable knowledge and experience with a vast array of tasks and tools in large scale EPIC, field decommissioning, IRM and construction subsea projects.

More speaker information to follow