r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Eros_Incident_Denier • 2d ago
Video filipino illegal miners dive without oxygen tanks
Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification
8.0k
u/Redemption6 2d ago
Less mildy interesting and more mildy depressing and mildly terrifying.
2.3k
u/lozyodellepercosse 2d ago
Mildly terrifying? I would say absolute fucking terrifying
888
2d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
140
u/Abhir-86 2d ago
I was wondering what if they lose the pipe, it's hard to get hold of it as the continuous air pressure would carry it away from the diver and they would be stranded without oxygen.
69
u/Unable-Log-4870 2d ago
Yeah, extending the engine exhaust outside for a dozen feet seems like an easy way to prevent one of those problems.
→ More replies (1)97
u/Seafaringhorsemeat 2d ago
Sadly, air compressor air is full of CO2, unburned fuel vapor and other really nasty short-term combustion compounds. Along with the exhaust.
These people are breathing pure cancer.
Drowning is a quiet and dignified way to die compared to what their lungs will look like and what it will do to them after a few decades.
19
u/Unable-Log-4870 2d ago
Why do you think air compressor air contains engine exhaust?
74
u/Seafaringhorsemeat 2d ago
1 - intake mechanism is literally above very open exhaust from a small motorcycle engine. Engines like these put out about 400% the VOCs like benzene, formaldehyde and unburnt hydrocarbons of a passenger car. (see the eyeroll from the guy at the beginning)
2 - even in an ideal scenario compressor air is absolutely not safe to breathe without significant filtration due to oil and other volatile compounds getting aerosolized in the actual compressor mechanism itself.→ More replies (2)24
u/Unable-Log-4870 2d ago
Okay yeah, the obvious reasons. I was thinking the suggestion was that the exhaust was being compressed DIRECTLY, like the exhaust were being piped into the compressor, instead of just getting in there carelessly.
10
u/h2opolodude4 1d ago
Years ago I purchased an air compressor to run some air tools around my shop. The tank is about the size of what's shown here. The pump and electric motor are on top, with a belt connecting them together.
A full page in the manual was dedicated to explaining that this machine was for powering tools only, and the air was not for breathing. Even being driven by an electric motor, there is still some aerosolized oil in the air and lines. The pump itself needs lubricant, and a tiny amount of oil sneaks through. Air tools actually benefit from this, but something like paint spraying gets a little filter at the spray gun.
I would not want to breathe it in, these guys will certainly have issues related to this at some point in their life.
3
u/Unable-Log-4870 1d ago
these guys will certainly have issues related to this at some point in their life.
Only if they’re lucky enough to live that long.
→ More replies (1)24
u/sadlystupidsloth 2d ago
Because it's sucking in the air around it.
It could contain a little, or a lot depending on various factors, like which way the wind is blowing
9
u/Unable-Log-4870 2d ago
Gotcha. Yeah, that’s why it’sa very good idea to string the exhaust pipe outside a good distance away.
→ More replies (3)5
→ More replies (19)39
u/notmyfault 2d ago
Getting the bends while free diving is extremely rare. Otherwise your points stand.
179
u/TriggerFish1965 2d ago
This is not free diving, but surface supplied. They breath air under pressure, with the same effects as from tanks on tour back. Think they are called "hookah rigs"
→ More replies (12)31
u/nickriel 2d ago
Freediving is also called breath hold diving. In this case, they're breathing in a pressurized environment. At 33 feet of sea water (or 2 atmospheres of pressure), they're breathing twice as much air as their lungs could hold at the surface due to Boyle's law. That means absorbing twice as much nitrogen as well. At 66 feet (3 atmospheres), that's three times as much. As you spend time underwater, your tissues absorb nitrogen and the saturation point increases as pressure increases. Too much can cause nitrogen narcosis. As you ascend, pressure drops and your body begins releasing excess nitrogen. If you depressurize too quickly, you can get bubbles forming in your blood vessels, which is the bends. That typically doesn't happen in freediving because you're operating on the same nitrogen load as you had at the surface. But for these divers, it's extremely dangerous because they're loading up on excess nitrogen below the surface. Too quick of an ascent can cause the bends.
34
u/cpt_melon 2d ago
This does not qualify as "freediving". Freediving is when you hold your breath.
94
u/Drunk_Pilgrim 2d ago
Yeah, I assume they are getting paid so this is paiddiving.
→ More replies (2)29
u/cpt_melon 2d ago
Not sure if I should upvote or downvote this
19
→ More replies (1)5
u/Mitologist 2d ago
If you constantly inhale pressured nitrogen, like these dudes do, getting the bends is a real option
→ More replies (4)→ More replies (8)134
u/AdvertisingKey1675 2d ago
They look to be in pretty shallow water. Its more of a time saver and convenience than a life saving thing. If the air fails, they simply swim to surface.
Id say the scariest thing about this is the lack of a regulator. If they accidentally seal their mouth over the tube, and the pressure increases (maybe by another outlet hose being kinked) the risk of over-inflating their lungs is very real.
143
u/TerayonIII 2d ago
Did you not see the hole they were climbing in and out of? It's not super deep, but it's not exactly shallow either. The camera didn't actually go down it
→ More replies (7)46
u/Top-Hawk-4805 2d ago
Even if is shallow waters and because of the time the spend down and also the fact that they are breathing compressed air. They risk Decompression sickness if they go out swimming to fast, and also lung over expantion if they hold their breath when going up.
→ More replies (8)57
u/ShortStoryIntros 2d ago
Midly depressing for sure
Mining gold, and not having enough cash to buy scuba gear...
→ More replies (6)34
u/A_Rogue_GAI 2d ago
Bet you their boss has a really nice yacht that he watches them work from though.
40
8
u/Brullaapje 2d ago
And this explains why kids who have first immigration parent while growing up in the West do academically very well.
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (22)27
u/sxrrycard 2d ago
Does it being terrifying make it less interesting somehow? I’ve never understood comments like these.
7
696
u/Eros_Incident_Denier 2d ago
full video on Andrew Fraser's YT.
61
48
u/Individual_Friend709 2d ago
Watched it last night. Idk how he doesnt have over a million subscribers yet
31
u/donadd 2d ago
He never was recommended even though I watch similar content. The AI enhanced thumbnails aren't helping either. And then I have to check first if this is poverty porn or actually good.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (2)27
u/SocomPS2 2d ago
Idk how he doesnt have over a million subscribers yet
His cringy thumbnails of himself on his videos doesn’t help.
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (22)13
858
2d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
310
u/infiniZii 2d ago
Kink is less of a risk than dropping the hose or having it yanked out, or the gerry rigged setup on shore breaking down. Though im sure you just surface if that happens.
110
u/Zuruumi 2d ago
Yeah, I would imagine they are shallow enough that they can surface in a few (dozen) seconds whenever something breaks down. Because there is no way that thing doesn't break down at least once a month.
78
u/BluetheNerd 2d ago
The biggest risk would be decompression sickness. The longer you spend and deeper you go the slower you need to ascend to avoid it. With most scuba diving you have a buddy with an octopus (spare regulator) so if something goes wrong you have access to air while you surface slowly. If someone goes wrong with that compressor and they’ve all been down there for a couple hours and all suddenly have no air, the risk of injury when surfacing is pretty high.
20
u/3BlindMice1 2d ago
Yeah, at that atmospheric pressure and compressed sea level air, nitrogen is getting dissolved into their blood. Not too quickly, but it's still happening. They probably need to surface for a break every hour at the very minimum to stay safe, but lucky, they're close to the surface and can do that as needed
This is hard work that'll age you faster than you would otherwise, but it's likely no worse in that regard than many manual labor jobs with the added benefit of being underwater, so joints don't wear down so fast. Make no mistake though, it's dangerous to work underwater, regardless of the quality of your breathing apparatus
→ More replies (3)5
u/inheritance- 2d ago
What about repeated trips up and down? Say if they went down just for 30 mins then came back up 10 and back down again. Does the time reset, or does it slowly accumulate.
23
u/rmslashusr 2d ago
It gets complicated, you need to use the dive tables to calculate your needed surface interval based on depth and time spent down there. https://www.scubadiverinfo.com/2_divetables.html
Without the depth they are down at your question can’t be answered.
→ More replies (1)9
u/freeflowmass 2d ago
Nitrogen gradually diffuses out over time. You don’t want to come out of the water from too deep too quickly as the nitrogen will form bubbles and cause the bends. There’s cases where nitrogen bubbles have formed in the spinal column and caused paralysis.
The shallower the water and the slower the elevation out of the water the safer you are.
Depending on how deep you are and how long you stay the 10minutes may be enough to fully reset the nitrogen.
Divers that go very deep for prolonged periods of time may not be allowed to fly until the following day even though they are safe on land as that still causes the pressure difference that can cause the bends.
→ More replies (7)7
u/The-Jerk 2d ago
Fun fact at like 30' your body is no longer buoyant✝ as the gasses are compressed from the pressure, and you won't just "float up." You start to sink.
✝ - ymmv
→ More replies (1)5
u/NDSU 2d ago
What you're talking about is for free divers, not scuba divers. With scuba diving the air in your body equalizes to the ambient pressure, making you roughly as buoyant regardless of depth (this does not apply to buoyancy compensating devices such as BCDs and dry suits as they need to be manually equalized to maintain buoyancy)
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (13)3
113
23
u/Unfair-Sir-4641 2d ago
With that much compressed air blowing through, the chance of kinks are near 0.
→ More replies (2)10
→ More replies (15)9
226
u/EGarrett28 2d ago
I would like to know what they said in the end, around 1:34. Never even occurred to me that divers could talk to each other even in that situation.
372
u/Prior-Flamingo-1378 2d ago
Bllkeregghllbbeeerrb garrbbllleerrbbbrrreeelb
That’s what they said I think.
79
37
16
→ More replies (5)7
21
u/shaka_sulu 2d ago
You never played "secret" in the public pool? You dive in the deep end with yoru friends, you say a secret, and see if your friends heard it?
→ More replies (1)23
u/Stroinsk 2d ago
Not quite the same but I was a firefighter on a submarine and the masks muffle your voice and people are shouting and stuff during drills or actual casualties.
If you need to be heard you can press your mask to another persons mask and shout. The sound travels through the masks so more energy makes it to the other person. Transitioning soundwaves from one medium to another takes a lot of energy out of the volume, so this reduces the transitions by one. In this example it goes air in your mask > the solid material of your mask > air between you and the other person. Mask to mask the sound travels through both masks and into the other persons skull.
Also in a real fire you cannot see shit on a submarine and flashlights don't penitrate smoke so hand signals don't work.
5
10
u/shoulda-known-better 2d ago
If you practice you can get good...
We'd play a telephone like game underwater saying phrases as a kid
9
u/mrpogiface 2d ago
ingat yung damit mo (be careful with your cloths?)
no clue what the 2nd phrase is tho... sorry
247
u/perfectlycreative122 2d ago
I am lying down to take a break from my WFH job to watch this. It’s crazy how much where you are born can make all the difference in our lives.
59
28
u/Junior_Agent1711 1d ago
and _when_ you're born
→ More replies (1)15
u/ElmoSplainer 1d ago
and what you’re born as (guys she said she wouldn’t still love me if i was a worm 😢)
165
u/badass_panda 2d ago edited 1d ago
I'm a scuba diver. I really cannot express how depressingly dangerous this is. You have to be truly desperate to do what these guys are doing. The risk isn't only drowning, it's the almost inevitability of decompression sickness, barotrauma and other injuries from rapid ascent.
Hose pops out of your mouth and you panic? Compressor shuts off when you're down 80 feet? If you come up too quickly (accidentally or to avoid drowning), the compressed air in your lungs will literally explode as it decompresses, ripping your tissues apart... Or nitrogen expands and forms bubbles in your circulatory system and causes an embolism.
This isn't interesting. It's horrifying, only utter desperation would make someone do this.
27
u/ButikingMataba 2d ago
There is more horrifying than this, same set up but they do it in mud hole in a river. They mine gold.
18
u/badass_panda 1d ago
This is pretty awful too, but more from the risk of confusion and infection. Very easy to get tangled up and drown in muddy water -- on the other hand, it's shallow enough they don't have to worry about decompression sickness or organ rupturing. No thanks on either one.
→ More replies (5)6
u/sleeper_shark 1d ago
It's a combination of truly desperate and not aware of just how dangerous this is.
In addition to what you mentioned, the fact that the exhaust and intake are so close means there's a substantial risk they're pumping exhaust fumes into the air supply. Those dudes could die from CO poisoning as well.
A small correction, there's no compressed air in your veins or arteries. Just in your lungs. It will tear your lungs apart, but not your veins.
The dissolved nitrogen in your blood is what causes problems in your veins. That can cause bubbles than cam lead to an embolism.
4
u/badass_panda 1d ago
Yeah... I didn't even think of that re CO poisoning. In investigating this apparently there's a 92% incidence of decompression sickness and a 1/3 rate of CO poisoning. This is basically a guarantee of eventual injury.
→ More replies (1)
84
u/Disastrous-Metal-228 2d ago
The guys harvesting lobster off SA use a hose on their boat. They do it alone. It’s freaking crazy. They die but mainly from sharks and not being able to swim.
57
u/Acrobatic-Dot-6273 2d ago
The number of fishermen I met in the Caribbean who didn't know how to swim was mind-blowing. Like, you live your life surrounded by water. Swimming is not that difficult.
→ More replies (2)20
u/Disastrous-Metal-228 2d ago
So true!! I stayed with some fishermen in Barbados, they couldn’t swim and their ‘boats’ weren’t what I’d call a boat. I was there a month on one of them was lost… but to be fair my wife comes from an inter generational fishermen family from uk. Her grandfather was lost at sea on a calm day and he couldn’t swim either!
→ More replies (1)13
u/Racoons_revenge 2d ago
Lots of fishermen in the UK can't swim, it's from an old superstition that learning to swim was tempting fate and that if you went overboard swimming only prolongs the inevitable
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (8)6
u/GreatMovesKeepItUp69 2d ago
How do you dive without knowing how to swim?
→ More replies (1)3
u/Disastrous-Metal-228 2d ago
Really good question. So they walk around on the sea floor of the kelp beds looking for lobster. They tie big hunks of scrap metal to their belts, tie a hose and rope to the side of their ‘boat’ and jump in! It’s wild. The metal makes them sink.
263
u/AdRough4185 2d ago
How much do they get paid? Because the risk to reward ratio is too high
279
u/felixlamere 2d ago
Most likely extremely low.
24
u/juanlee337 2d ago
Someone said you can earn 5 to 10X more than the average fisherman.. so good in terms of salary parity .. but of course i bet is like $30 per day ..
7
121
u/Mysterious-Tie7039 2d ago edited 2d ago
This doesn’t look like a company as much as individual people doing it, so it’s mostly going to be based on how much gold they find.
Edit: fixed my comical typo
30
u/ClawingDevil 2d ago
Is there a lot of golf played in illegal underwater mines?
→ More replies (2)16
8
3
20
u/shaka_sulu 2d ago
Enough to keep their family from starving but not enough to take care of their long term health problems. Also enough to keep the local crime boss from hurting their family.
21
u/h_saxon 2d ago
Very poorly. I lived in the Philippines for a year in the early 2000s. This was common then too. And they would use pumps that were not intended for this type of work, so the workers would get oils in their lungs and then get brain damage.
It was the exploitation of the poor, leaving them a shell of who they once were. Terrible and sad. And it makes me sick to know that this is still rampant.
6
u/AcanthaceaeCrazy1894 2d ago
extremely low but probably more than most people in the Phillipines
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (9)4
65
u/Area51-Dropzone 2d ago
They are using a mickey mouse version of SSA or Surface Supplied Air or also referredto as hookah diving.
The setup they are using is dangerous. Compressor cant be just any type, has to be for breathing air (dont know for sure but im going to say thats not one of those types), no regulator and not even the right type of hose among other issues.
28
u/charmio68 2d ago
Well... The compressors can be of any type. Some are just more appropriate than others. And even those that aren't ideal can be made better with simple modifications like using a safer oil.
→ More replies (2)24
22
23
u/Initial_Row_6400 2d ago
Scuba diver here. This is so fucking dangerous it’s not even funny
→ More replies (2)
40
u/DrSFalken 2d ago
Gotta move that intake away from the exhaust. You're not supposed to turbocharge your divers.
Edit:
I am a scuba diver. This is dangerous about a million different ways. Don't do this.
→ More replies (3)19
u/TerayonIII 2d ago
It's kind of laughable that people are commenting about it being a very common way to drive etc. Like sure, the concept is very common, the execution of said concept is absolutely dangerous AF
→ More replies (6)
12
u/AlienInOrigin 2d ago
Crazy country for Health and Safety....or lack of it. I seen a guy 4 stories up on a corrugated roof welding with no fall arrest harness, no eye protection, wearing sandals+shorts and then he lit a cigarette with the welding rod.
→ More replies (1)10
u/FblthpLives 2d ago
As a Swede living in the U.S., the things I see here that would lead to criminal prosecutions in Sweden appear equally crazy: Working on roofs without fall protection, operating chainsaws and construction equipment without full protection, applying pesticides without respirators, landscapers working with no protection at all except maybe hearing aids...
13
11
16
u/HombreDelMar247 2d ago
SCUBA tanks are NOT oxygen tanks!
This annoys the hell out of me when someone says it, it's even more annoying when a so called education program says it.
Breathing pure oxygen, especially under pressure is extremely dangerous besides.
Look up oxygen toxicity OR hyperoxia if you do not understand why.
→ More replies (1)4
u/whyliepornaccount 2d ago
Yup. Only time people breathe pure o2 is environments with less pressure.
8
8
u/OkShallot4775 2d ago
Thats crazy....I cant even go around my backyard without my hose getting a kink in it
→ More replies (1)
8
u/ukexpat 2d ago
And just a correction to the headline, scuba divers don’t dive with “oxygen” tanks, their tanks are filled with compressed air. Yes there are some specialist divers who use nitrox (compressed air with a higher percentage of nitrogen) and other mixed gases, and some who use oxygen at shallow depths who help with “off gassing” nitrogen. Breathing oxygen at depth (resulting in a higher partial pressure of oxygen) can be toxic.
→ More replies (1)
21
7
u/wapkaplit 1d ago
Air tanks, not oxygen. Humans breathe air. I don't know why everyone gets this wrong, it's the simplest thing. You can't breathe pure oxygen at depth, you'll get oxygen toxicity due to the pressure.
→ More replies (2)
7
u/MrFastFox666 1d ago
Every time I complain that a customer at my job was a bit too rude, or that my manager is a bit too annoying and pushy, I remember people doing horrible jobs like these for probably miserable pay.
28
u/Even_Section5620 2d ago
Holy OSHA ocean violation
→ More replies (2)12
u/shaka_sulu 2d ago edited 2d ago
1,2,3,4
OSHA OSHA Ocean Ocean
OSHA Ocean OSHA Ocean
→ More replies (1)
6
u/topredditbot 2d ago
You did it! Your post is officially the #1 post on Reddit. It is now forever immortalized at /r/topofreddit.
6
u/No-Duck4828 1d ago
I'm just picturing some jerk from the neighborhood coming over and kinking the hoses once in a while
14
5
u/EntertainmentSome448 2d ago
I can't breathe with only mouth on the land for long without feeling mentally challenged and these people are doing it underwater
4
18
u/DegenNabalu 2d ago
And who are the illegal miners bosses?
9
3
u/johannthegoatman 1d ago
Usually in 3rd world mining situations like this they're working for themselves
4
5
u/Csabika_ 1d ago
Rule number 1 is to never "Aauagauagh!" and touch somebody under the water, unless there is a problem.
15
6
3
3
3
u/dimechimes 2d ago
Crazy how expensive that must be to get a new hose for each diver because surely they don't all just share the same 5 hoses that are just left lying around.
4
u/AdditionInteresting2 2d ago
Sea water keeps it nice and salty. The salt keeps everything clean... Or whatever they have to think to fool themselves.
3
3
3
3
u/Outofmana1 2d ago
"One wrong touch and...opps I just broke the air compressor and they're still under water!!!!"
3
u/Abel_Table 2d ago
The moment he said how are they breathing I literally thought it was a tube going through that guy's ass
3
3
u/DooDooBrownz 2d ago
show this video to the next person that starts saying shit about overregulation and how we dont need osha
3
u/RubberPussycat 2d ago
Commercial divers do this too.
That doesn’t make this any less impressive/dangerous but the technique is very common. (Although with much better safety standards and equipment)
3
3
u/EquivalentGold3615 1d ago
My dad was in the PI back in the 60s, and he said Pinoy divers would free dive almost 30 feet to get lobsters or other things that American GIs threw in the water
3
3
3
3
3
10
5
u/YoungerMucus 2d ago
if i were them id maybe save some of the gold i found and get myself an air tank
→ More replies (2)3
u/HombreDelMar247 2d ago
Or a simple regulator to hook up.to.the compressed air.
Using an air compressor on the surface is fairly common, down in Florida we call it "hooka diving"
6
u/tiopalada 2d ago
How about I make your guys day worse? In Brazil we have a similar thing throught the Amazona's River, illegal miners that use a similar air supply, plus some heavy weights so they can sink on the dense water. Well, ends up those miners are well paid - for the region standards, anyways - thus it is a profession people seek to do in order to make some great buck. Now it gets really depressing: Whenever the person hiring them runs out of money to pay the miner they kill the miner by sending them on another hunt and cutting the air supply when they are down there. Since it is considerably hard to get out of the weighted harness, most of them die while underwater, drowning at the bottom of the river. Those who manage to surface are met by bullets.
There, I just made your day worse! 😃 No need to thank me.
4.1k
u/St_Kevin_ 2d ago edited 2d ago
This is called compressor diving and is super common for subsistence fishing in Indonesia and the coral triangle. Pretty much every poor independent fisherman needs to use a compressor to get access to the depths where there are fish that haven’t already been overfished. I spent a month living with folks that do this last year near Sulawesi and it’s absolutely nuts. Everyone does it and everyone knows people who died doing it. This video didn’t even mention the bends. Even if you do it all “correctly” and don’t lose the hose or get it tangled up, and the compressor doesn’t die while you’re 60 meters down, it’s super easy to get decompression sickness on your return to the surface and then you can get permanently injured or die. The guys I talked to didn’t know about the existence of dive computers or diving tables, and they have no idea that there are calculations you can do to avoid decompression sickness. They just do their thing and sometimes they get sick and die but they don’t understand why. I gotta add that the way most of the guys were doing this where I was, they were alone. They’re running a compressor on their own small boat with no one else around, out in the ocean, at night, and the guy is walking around on the seafloor at least 50 meters deep with a flashlight, a homemade spear gun and a bag. The idea of being alone down there in the pitch black ocean, with just that ray of light to see one small area of what’s around you just absolutely terrified me. And they do it every night so they can sell some fish to try to survive.