Two UK-based Polish rebreather divers died in Malta following a wreck-diving incident on 6 July – and now the circumstances of the death of one of them, Krzysztof Białecki, have been called into question with the suspension of a diving and hyperbaric medicine consultant at Mater Dei Hospital.
Białecki, 48, was the founder of London-based Diving Explorers, the UK’s biggest Polish expatriate diving club, and he had been trying to help out a fellow-member, 45-year-old Dominik Dubaj, who had got into difficulties while diving the 65m-deep Polynesian off Malta’s easternmost point.
Both men subsequently had to make rapid ascents and missed safety stops in a fatal incident that was subsequently reported on Divernet.
Now it has been reported that the unnamed consultant had decided to go home from the hospital’s hyperbaric unit, and had left only a junior trainee to monitor Bialecki’s recovery.
The allegation is carried by the Times Of Malta, which reports that Malta’s health ministry has confirmed the consultant’s suspension pending the outcome of a magisterial inquiry into Białecki’s death.
Fully conscious and alert
The two stricken divers had been picked up from their charter-boat by an Armed Forces of Malta rescue vessel, brought ashore and transferred by ambulance to Mater Dei near the capital Valletta. Dubaj had died there shortly after arrival.
Bialecki had reportedly been suffering from decompression illness but was “fully conscious and alert” on entering the chamber for treatment, to the extent that he was said to have given a thumbs-up sign to a visiting dive-centre employee that afternoon.
He had been thought to be responding well to treatment and to be on his way to recovery, but at 7.10 that evening he was suddenly pronounced dead.
Bialecki’s death is said to be the first involving a fully conscious diver to have occurred at the hyperbaric unit since 1985 – and the long-ago incident had occurred while the chamber facilities were still under development.
Malta’s Professional Diving Schools Association (PDSA) is reported to have called on the tourism ministry for an internal investigation into what happened at the unit, in an effort to reassure the wider diving community.
According to the Times of Malta, the diving and hyperbaric consultant holds diving-medicine degrees from South Africa and the UK, and acts as a diving incident expert witness.
Also on Divernet: 2 POLES DIE AFTER MALTA WRECK-DIVE, BRITISH DIVE-PRO CAME TO THE RESCUE IN MALTA, DIVER DIES, 17 RESCUED AT WINDY MALTA SHORE-DIVE SITE
