SINGAPORE – A 59-year-old Singaporean commercial diver died in hospital on Feb 17 after he failed to surface while cleaning a ship’s hull at an anchorage off East Coast.

He was a freelance diver hired by maritime services company Alphard Offshore, said a Ministry of Manpower (MOM) spokesman on Feb 22 in response to queries from The Straits Times.

The spokesman said: “(The diver) was later found unconscious by rescue divers and brought out of the water. He was taken to the Singapore General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.”

MOM is investigating the incident and has instructed Alphard Offshore to stop all commercial diving activities.

The Singapore Civil Defence Force told ST it received a call for assistance at 31 Marina Coastal Drive at around 1.40pm on Feb 17.

The police said based on preliminary investigations, no foul play is suspected.

In its statement, MOM said a proper dive plan must be established and communicated to all dive team members before the start of a commercial diving operation.

Its spokesman added: “Such dive plans should include the task to be performed, the appropriate commercial diving equipment to be used by the divers, the roles and responsibilities of the dive team members and emergency preparedness procedures.”

ST has contacted Alphard Offshore for more information.

On May 5, 2018, freelance diver Jake Seet, 33, drowned while he was cleaning the stern of a cargo vessel in the south-western waters near Sentosa.

Investigations found that Mr Seet’s communication cord had become entangled with the seabed, preventing him from ascending.

A diving superintendent was sentenced to two years’ jail in May 2021 for failing to notice Mr Seet’s frantic pleas for help via intercom, among other offences.

On June 23, 2018, a 27-year-old untrained commercial diver was killed by a fallen structure that pinned him underwater at a jetty.

Mr Muhammad Firdaus Jasni was employed by ship building and repair firm Marine Diving & Engineering. It was fined $200,000 over safety lapses, including failing to deploy only trained divers for underwater work.

The dead man’s supervisor was sentenced to nine months’ jail for not ensuring the dive team’s safety when it was carrying out the work.

Correction note: In an earlier version of the story, we said that the diver was cleaning a ship’s hull at Marina South Pier instead of at an anchorage off East Coast. This has been corrected.