We were loading up for a job Monday and had the dive spread loaded up in the company pickup(said F350). When the truck was ready for the trip to the dock I began loading my own gear from my own pickup that was parked about across the lot, about twenty feet away. Since I was the dive supervisor I didn't really need to bring it, we were only going on a simple job to pick up some sensor packages for NOAA, just one day diving off of our crew boat. I usually bring my gear just in case though, you never know.

Anyway, I grabbed my hat bag first and walked it over to the truck. I went to put it into the back seat of the cab since the bed was pretty full already, picture sanford & son. The door was locked and the truck wasn't even running so I set it down and walked back to retreive my backpack with the all important paperwork in it.

I must also include that it was only myself and one of our green divers at the shop at this point, everyone else had already left to go to the dock. Ol' greeny has had a pretty bad run of luck at my company. Last year he totaled a pickup while on the phone, somehow he escaped being fired and a few weeks later backed into another co. truck while driving a forklift. He was banned from driving company vehicles at this point, if only he had followed that directive. He still works here and now he's going after my helmet.

So I turn around after locking up my truck and to my horror, Greeny is gunning the engine of the Built Ford Tough dually pickup as he tries to find out why it won't roll in reverse. It turns out that a SL 17k can stop a pickup in it's tracks given the right placement. So I somehow kept my cool and walked around to the passenger side where the "obstruction" was hoping against hope that SURELY he didn't run over my helmet. Nope...

My trusty dive helmet, that I bought brand new and have treated like one of my own children, dove in just about every body of water east of the Mississippi and kept in fairly good repair, was now wedged under the front axle of the truck. The hat bag, I use one of the padded jobs, had been ripped open and I could see the devastation inside. I had to get Greeny to back up off of the hat and then retrieved my former helmet from underneath.

I had to keep my cool since we still had to work together that day, but Greeny avoided me like the plague, understandably, which isn't easy to do on a sixty-five foot crew boat.

I've yet to recieve any compensation for my loss from anyone involved. Several people have advised that since it was a company truck involved, the auto insurance should cover it. I tend to agree with this but my boss doesn't. In the current atmosphere of dive work, I can't really make an issue without worrying about being starved out, so I will just keep my fingers crossed that someone will do the right thing. Ya right! That's how it went down, maybe some day it will be a funny story, but right now it still pisses me off.

Here are a few photos I took of the damage. They aren't all that dramatic but I guess that is a testament to the strength of a dive hat. The damage consists of the broken off side weight, (the screws were sheared off at the shell), the bent tube was crushed and twisted, the regulator dial-a-breath and inlet port were bent inward about 15 degrees, one of the sealed pins on the camming sytem was badly bent, (It is still operable though!), there is a large gouge in the handle weight, and damage to the shell which isn't very visible in the photos consist of a hole in the back under the weight, and a fine crack where the side weight was sheared off. It obviously underwent a lot of force, but considering it had the weight of a loaded dually pickup axle on top of it, I think it faired pretty well.

Jon Bozeman
Diving Supervisor