Drowning inquest

Drowning victim had too many weights on

A verdict of accidental death has been recorded in the case of Bertrand Brandao, the French national who died whilst free-diving off Old Head last week.
A chef in Westport’s Plaza Hotel, 29-year-old Mr Brandao was putting down lobster pots off the rocks at the end of Old Head with a friend, when he got into difficulty and disappeared underwater.
He was not scuba-diving, nor was he equipped for this, but was wearing two weight belts.
A statement, read to his family yesterday (Monday) at the inquest, by an interpreter, said that one of the divers who recovered his body had told Gardaí it was his opinion that Mr Brandao, who lived at number three Altamont Court, Westport, had far too much weight on him for free-diving.
The statement also said that four or five kilogrammes of weight would have been sufficient for diving without scuba equipment, but Mr Brandao had in the region of 16 to 18 kilogrammes of weight around his waist and on his chest.
The statement of Dominik Kolodziej, who was with Mr Brandao on the headland at Old Head last Wednesday, April 9, outlined that after arriving at the beach around 6.15pm that evening, Mr Brandao put on his wetsuit, flippers, mask and snorkel and swam out a small distance where he dropped the first lobster pot. At this stage he was only wearing the chest weights and dived down to see that the cage had landed the right way on the seabed. He then needed to put bricks in the pot to anchor it and asked for the waist belt to help him get down. He went down again and came back up to ask how to place the brick inside the pot.
Mr Kolodziej said the deceased man went down and came up three times but then, as he was preparing the second pot on the cliff side, he saw Mr Brandao come to the surface but go back down before he broke the water. He could feel something was wrong and he dived into the water to look for him but could not see him. He began experiencing breathing difficulties and left the water and ran to the pier where he got help.
The coastguard helicopter and Achill Lifeboat joined the Westport coastguard in the search, but it was called off later that evening and resumed at first light. At 7.50am the following morning, divers recovered Mr Brandao’s body in four-and-a-half metres of water, in the same location as where he had gone down.
Coroner for south Mayo, John O’Dwyer, said that a post-mortem examination carried out at Mayo General Hospital had found that death was due to asphyxia by drowning. He recorded a verdict of accidental death and extended his sympathy to Mr Brandao’s family, who had travelled from France to repatriate his body.
Superintendent Pat Doyle also extended sympathy, on behalf of An Garda Síochána, and acknowledged the ‘excellent work done by the coastguard’ in what was a ‘terrible tragedy’.