Spooky Dive Story

Do you believe in ghosts and spooks? No, me neither, or rather I didn’t, but now I am not so sure. I am going to tell you two occurrences that have made me think twice, one non diving, one diving.

The non diving is just to get you into the “spirit” of things.

About 5 years ago I was on a TV reality show, 8 blokes and 8 girls dumped on a remote deserted island in the South China Sea. We were divided into two camps of 4 blokes and 4 girls and the mechanics of what happened over the next 2 months are not important to this story.

On the first day we built our shelter out of wood and palm leaves, we managed to get to sleep, then during the early hours I felt a hand on my leg. I thought this is going to be an interesting 2 months! However I then felt both my ankles gripped and I was being pulled out of the shelter! I yelled and was let go, so I shot outside, but there was nothing there.

The next day I spoke to the native guides who were on the island, they told me not to worry, it was the Island spirits who were upset by our presence, but it was not me they were after!!

Fast forward 5 weeks, a new shelter and only 5 of us left, this particular night I am sleeping next to a girl, who allegedly had, how shall I say, been a bit indiscrete on the Island and disrespectful to the spirits. Suddenly we are all woken up by terrible screaming, the girl next to me was being pulled by her legs out through the palm walls of the shelter, I grabbed her and pulled her back.

The others ran out of the shelter, and there was even more screaming, but again there was nobody there.

Now, in my defence, it was only a joke, but in best Morecombe and Wise tradition I had put a coconut shell on top of a pole, draped a old white sheet over it and put a pair of old glasses on it. You get the picture, they had all been confronted with that in the dark!!. However what happened to me, and that girl was genuine, and it was her the spirits were after.

Now just this year, here in Lanzarote, 5 of us did a dive called Shrimp Cave. I have changed the names of the divers to protect the innocent, lets call them Tom Dick, Harry and Fred, and me.

Shrimp cave is a deep dive, about 45mtrs and a small tunnel with room for only one person at a time leads into the cave.

So the plan was for Tom Dick Harry and Fred to go in, in that order. I would stay in the entrance to monitor deco etc and  when the time came I called them out. First out as far as I was concerned was Fred, he moved just behind me and the others came out in the order they went in, then I counted and there were only 4 of us with no sign of Fred who I thought was behind me and who I had clearly seen exit the cave first.

Dick went back into the tunnel and found Fred in there!!

So who did I see come out, how could the others have got past Fred in the tunnel? It’s impossible for two divers to pass in the space that is there.

Fred’s story is that when he went in he could not see as the sand had been stirred up so he waited for someone to find him!!

Was narcosis responsible or was it something spookier?

Have you had any weird experiences like that when diving? Please let us know in comments.