A coroner is urging divers to get appropriate qualifications and regularly check their equipment after a Whangārei man was found to be using faulty diving gear that led to his death.

On January 27, 2020, Lee Victor Tohu, 52, was found floating motionless in the water at Kauri Mountain while on a diving trip with two friends.

Around 9.15am that day Tohu, with friends Ben Waldron and Terry Fricker, launched Fricker’s boat from the Tūtūkākā boat ramp.

Just over an hour later Tohu and Waldron entered the waters off the coast of Kauri Island. Conditions at the time were calm and sunny, with a gentle sea breeze and about 0.5m of swell.

Shortly afterwards Tohu became separated from Waldron. Fricker, who had remained on the boat, saw Tohu surface and waved to him. By the time Fricker turned the boat around he could not see Tohu and assumed he had resumed diving.

After surfacing, Waldron realised Tohu was missing and began to look for him while Fricker reported Tohu missing.

About 60 metres from where they started diving, Waldron found Tohu dead in the water.

Coroner Debra Bell found Tohu was using faulty diving gear; had no formal diving qualifications; had consumed cannabis beforehand and didn’t have a dive watch.

The police national dive squad (PNDS) believed Tohu had run out of air supply and didn’t abandon his weight belt, meaning he did not have enough air to ascend in a controlled way.

The squad noted his diving regulators, which controlled the pressure of breathing gas, were in “very poor condition” and were causing Tohu to inhale harder than normal. He also had a faulty submersible pressure gauge, which displays how much air remains in a tank.

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This was a “significant contributing factor” to Tohu’s death, the dive squad said, as it was giving him incorrect information and leading him to think he had more air supply than he did. His depth gauge was also faulty, so he didn’t have an accurate idea of how deep he had dived.

Bell said those defects, coupled with Tohu not having a dive watch, meant he was essentially “diving blind”.

“Scuba diving is an activity with a serious number of risks,” Bell said.

“You must not only be appropriately qualified to dive but also be aware of risks and how to safely manage them. There is also a need to be meticulous in maintaining and servicing your dive equipment.”

The dive squad report recommended that anyone diving should complete a dive course or a refresher if they were not diving consistently, along with ensuring they were medically fit to dive.

They should also wear a dive watch to help plan dives, ensure equipment worked and was serviced at least once a year, abandon weights when in trouble and dive with a buddy.

Bell said it was important not to consume any illicit drugs before diving.

The coroner endorsed recommendations made by the PNDS including that a person should complete a scuba diving course and a refresher course where they have not been diving consistently, and ensure they are medically fit to dive. Divers should also wear a watch or other timing device to assist in planning their dives and be familiar with how to use it, and ensure dive equipment operates correctly and is regularly serviced, at least annually.

The coroner found that Tohu died in the waters at Kauri Mountain from drowning in the background of decompression sickness.

‘’In a moment of panic, likely induced by suddenly running out of air, Mr Tohu likely attempted to resurface but was fatigued from inhaling harder than he should have otherwise had to on the regulators,” Coroner Bell said.

“This would have been compounded by his fins, which would have been less effective at elevating him to the surface, and because he had limited or no air, he could not inflate his BCD [buoyancy control device] to assist in his assent.”