Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #231745 in Books
• Published on: 2004-08
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

Synopsis
At 11:10 P.M. on July 25, 1956, the luxurious Italian ocean liner. Andrea Doria collided with the Stockholm forty-five miles south of Nantucket. Half a century later, the wreck of the Andrea Doria is still claiming lives. Professional and amateur divers the world round consider the Andrea Doria to be the Everest of diving. At 225 feet below the surface, the wreck lies at the very edge of human endurance and accomplishment; ordinary air becomes toxic and the divers who go there suffer nitrogen narcosis or "the rapture of the deep." Symptoms include confusion, lack of coordination, and perhaps most deadly of all, a loss of the ability to make clear decisions. As a result, divers use Trimix, an exotic blend of oxygen, nitrogen, and helium to descend through the strong currents, rusted metal, and twisted wires to the ultimate symbol of deep sea diving accomplishments: china teacups and plates from the wreck of the Andrea Doria. During the summers of 1998 and 1999, three elite divers lost their lives, all on separate dives from the top dive boat out of Montauk, the 65-foot Seeker. In this remarkable and intriguing book he recreates what was the pride of the Italian fleet, how it sank,

Customer Reviews

A good book, but not what I expected it to be...
The book refers about 5 deaths in technical diving while diving in the famous wreck "Andrea Doria". Another important thing is that that the people that died were all customers of the same charter "The Seeker". The writer tries to find a lot of information to explain why these divers have died.
The main problem of the book is that the author (Joe Haberstroh) is not a diver. And many cases it leaves the accident analysis way behind. It has a point of view about Technical Divers as "Top Guns" and their action or safety procudure are beyond despute. But if you give this book to technical instructor it will tell were the mistakes were made, and no level of expertise can ever make you overcame some obstacles without having someone looking over you...
Finally there are some typical mistakes in various points in the passage such as to describe the boats' velocity it says knots per hour (but this is in fact a way to measure acceleration).

Events and surcumstances around some diving accidents
To be a non-diver, Joe Haberstroh have really done a good job investigating and retelling the accidents of: Craig Sicola, Richard Roost, Jack Moulliett, Vince Napoliello, Chris Murley and Charlie McGurr all on the Andrea Doria. Although the outcome of most of the accidents is know in advance, the story is still thrilling - and even when most of us really can't relate to the type of diving in the book, we can all learn something from it.
One side of diving related accidents not so often told in other books, are the relatives stories. In this book the author brings the reader to the perspective of those left behind, and shows the even darker side of the accidents as family, friends and loved ones have to deal with the loss and also decide what to do with the things that the deceased died for but also killed him.
This is a book that I definitely made a mark in my mind, and I really can recommend it to all divers, but I would not recommend it as a gift for a divers friends and family.