FIRE AND WATER -

In old Broome, the invention of the diving helmet and suit were of great importance for the pearl diving industry. Few people know the unusual story about how the diving helmet was invented.

The man credited with the invention was John Deane. He was involved in fighting a fire at a friend’s farm when a number of valuable horses became trapped in a stable. The quantity of smoke kept people from rescuing the animals by Deane had an idea.

He used an old helmet from a suit of armour that was kept in the farm house. He then attached the hose and hand pump that was being used to pump water onto the fire and instructed the farmer to only pump air through the hose.

He was successful and managed to rescue the horses. This gave John the idea to develop the invention and he filed a patent for fire fighting purposes in 1828. After thinking more about the invention he decided that the same apparatus could be used to go underwater.

His first test was less than successful as the diving suit filled with air and he turned upside down. After this life-threatening event, he decided to add lead boots to the diving suit and solved the problem.

John and his brother Charles went into business and became famous underwater engineers.

John licensed the invention out to German engineer, Augusts Siebe and it was the Siebe diving suits that were used to great effect in Broome. The design was so effective that it changed little over the 90 years during which there were used.

GET YOUR OWN COPY -

If you would like to get a PDF copy of the stories on this website that you can read offline or even print out and turn into your own hard copy book, you can order through PayPal at the link below. All sales of this book help us to gather more information and stories for this site and our main website. It is only $3.99 AUD!