The body of a Chinese diver who died off Kakaban Island, one of the Derawan Islands in East Kalimantan, Indonesia, has been recovered after she disappeared while trying to retrieve a dropped camera.
The diver, a 30-year-old woman identified by local authorities as Zhang Xiao Han, appears to have dropped her GoPro camera during a safety stop at the end of a dive on the morning of Saturday, 3 May.
According to witnesses, Zhang surfaced but jumped back into the water without her scuba gear in an attempt to retrieve the camera. She failed to surface and was reported missing at approximately 9 am local time.
A joint search and rescue operation was launched by the local Basarnas Balikpapan rescue team and members of the military police.
Ms Zhang was located at the popular Kelapa Dua dive site, a steep wall famous for thresher shark sightings, within a matter of hours. It took several attempts to recover her body due to the depth and strength of the current at her location.
‘A team of divers from the joint SAR unit was deployed and managed to locate the victim at a depth of 87 meters, but initial attempts to retrieve her were unsuccessful due to the extreme depth,’ said Endrow Sasmita, head of Basarnas Balikpapan, who led the recovery effort.
‘The search location was quite difficult and challenging,’ added Sasmita, ‘but thanks to the support of all parties, the victim was successfully found. This is the result of solid teamwork.’
Zhang’s body was brought to the surface at 2.55 pm local time and returned to Tanjung Batu port before being taken to Abdul Rivai Regional Hospital in Tanjung Redeb, Berau.
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