page_title: Wildrake diving accident
section_title: Aftermath
hierarchical_section_title: Wildrake diving accident / Aftermath
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: NSS Felinto Perry (K-11) ein U-Boot- Rettungsschiff der Marine Brasiliens an der Küste vor Arraial do CarboEnglish: NSS Felinto Perry (K-11), a submarine rescue ship of the Brazilian Navy, at the coast off Arraial do Carbo
context_page_description: The Wildrake diving accident was an incident in Scotland in August 1979 that killed two American commercial divers. During a routine dive in the East Shetland Basin of the North Sea, the diving bell of the diving support vessel MS Wildrake became separated from its main lift wire at a depth of over 160 metres. Although the bell was eventually recovered by Wildrake, its two occupants, 32-year-old Richard Arthur Walker and 28-year-old Victor Francis "Skip" Guiel Jr., died of hypothermia. The accident resulted in extensive subsequent litigation and led to important safety changes in the diving industry.
context_section_description: On 9 August 1979, Department of Energy (DoE) inspectors and police boarded the Wildrake to investigate the accident. DoE inspector Roy Giles found multiple safety violations and evidence of negligence. Richard Walker's widow and Victor Guiel's family retained San Francisco attorney Gerald Sterns, who filed a wrongful death complaint in the United States on 30 July 1980 against ten defendants, including Infabco Diving Services and Møllerodden AS.
  On 28 November 1980, Infabco Diving Services Ltd. was indicted on criminal charges in Aberdeen Sheriff Court as the employer of Walker and Guiel. At the criminal trial, which began on 15 December 1980, the diving company used what later became known as the "Infabco defense", claiming that the divers were actually employed by a company called Offshore Co-ordinators Ltd., which was located in a bank on Jersey and registered in the Isle of Man. On 19 December 1980, Sheriff Alastair Stewart ruled that the Crown had failed to prove that Infabco was Walker and Guiel's employer. He therefore directed the jury to find Infabco not guilty.
  In May 1981, the United States District Court in Los Angeles awarded compensatory damages of $475,000 to Walker's widow and daughter and $75,000 to Guiel's family. This judgement, however, would never be enforced by the British court system. A fatal accident inquiry on Walker and Guiel's deaths was held from 11 to 22 May 1981 in Aberdeen. At the inquiry, Walker's widow, Jeanne Walker, read aloud the final entry from her husband's diary, written on 7 August 1979, in which he commented, "I don't even know if I'm gonna get out of here alive." Sheriff Douglas James Risk issued his Determinations on 13 November 1981. He found that the removal of the clump weight contributed to the divers' deaths and that the absence of a bell stage indicated "that the diving contractors were more concerned with speed than with safety". He also concluded that Walker and Guiel "could probably have been saved" if Masterson had not ordered the crane lift to continue without investigating the obstruction impeding the lift, which proved to be the SALM base.
  On 17 December 1981, the Thames Television current affairs series TV Eye broadcast The Last Dive, a documentary featuring investigative reporter and former Member of Parliament Bryan Gould, which alleged that an improper relationship existed between Brian Masterson and Joe Singletary, BNOC's Offshore Construction Manager at the time of the accident. On 23 July 1982, the Edinburgh law firm of Simpson and Marwick filed suit in the United Kingdom against twelve defendants on behalf of the Walker and Guiel families. In October 1986, the remaining defendants settled, agreeing to pay £293,000 ($422,066.50) to the Walkers and a much smaller amount (possibly around $8000) to the Guiels. No admission of wrongdoing was ever made by the defendants.
  The Wildrake, renamed Felinto Perry, later became a submarine rescue ship in the Brazilian Navy. In May 2000, the Wildrake accident records in London were found to be missing.
caption: The Felinto Perry, formerly the Wildrake, in 2015.
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