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'Best of Times, Worst of Times: David Gibbins'. Interview by Sue Fox.

Sunday Times Magazine (UK), 4 December 2005

An underwater archaeologist and author of the novel Atlantis, David Gibbins is an authority on ancient shipwrecks and lost cities. Now 43, he recalls a brush with death while exploring a sunken mineshaft

'I could swim almost as soon as I could walk, and I've been obsessed with diving and underwater adventures since I was a child. My grandfather was a captain in the merchant navy and I was riveted by his stories. By the age of six I had circumnavigated the world by sea with my parents, who were academic scientists. I did my first open-water dive on Lake Huron, Ontario, at 15, and over the next few years I became friendly with a guy called Steve, and we trained together and did several dives - even one under ice. One dive we were keen to try was in a flooded quarry in southern Ontario. It was ludicrously dangerous - we had none of the safety equipment that's mandatory today - but with the insouciance of youth we assumed we'd be okay. And if one of us got into trouble, we'd trained to ascend face to face and "buddy-breathe", sharing our air.

Twenty metres down, visibility was nil. It was freezing cold. We swam, arms linked, through a cavernous chamber. Its supporting timbers lurched at crazy angles around us in the light of our single torch. It was exhilarating - just how I'd imagined the Mines of Moria in the Lord of the Rings. We had no safety ropes, and our air tanks had no gauges to warn us supply was getting low. All we had was a J-valve: at 500 lb per square inch it shuts off the air flow. You could open it, if your breathing began to tighten, by pulling a rod on your tank, knowing there'd be enough air to reach the surface.

When my breathing tightened I opened my J-valve and signalled to Steve that my air was low. I was anxious to get out. But as I eased myself back into the shaft, my air cut off totally. I must have whacked the cylinder on one of the beams and jammed the valve. In the shock I dropped the torch. We were in pitch blackness.

We didn't panic. We began buddy-breathing, an arm around each other's neck, passing the regulator back and forth. We had the presence of mind not to hold our breath or surface too fast - we could have suffered an embolism. Steve and our training saved my life that day.

I was shaken, but diving continued to be my absolute passion. Five years ago I was excavating a classical shipwreck in the Aegean. It was a fabulous site - a quintessential moment in my career. I was using an airlift - a kind of vacuum cleaner that removes silt and sediment - to uncover some exquisite pottery cups dating from the 5th century BC.

At the end of my shift I swam back from where I was working, 45 metres down in the deepest part of the site, to reposition the anchoring weights of the airlift ready for the next divers. I finished just as the timekeeper on the surface rang the bell signalling that it was time for me to swim up to the decompression stop. This was a metal frame 10 metres deep with breathing regulators, where a diver must wait for 20 minutes, breathing out excess nitrogen from the bloodstream - which is essential to avoid the bends.

At that point I began to hyperventilate - not unusual, but it hadn't happened to me before. Air is denser under pressure, so it's harder to breathe - like becoming breathless on land but more alarming. I told myself that at 45 metres any extra effort would be bound to accelerate my breathing, but I felt I was panicking. I had to reach those breathing regulators at the decompression stop or die.

Although I was desperate to reach the surface, I knew I had to spend 20 minutes at the stop. I was terrified I'd lose it and just swim flailing upwards, and almost certainly get the bends. I reached to stop and transferred to the breathing regulator. I gripped the line and shut my eyes. Then my mind began to play tricks. I was back in the mineshaft with Steve, halfway up the shaft, just when we knew we were safe. I'd hardly thought about it in all that time, but it must have been lurking below the surface of my mind.

For a long time afterwards, before every dive I had to steel myself. I was frightened of having a panic attack, of becoming claustrophobic. I couldn't talk about it to anyone - to confess how I had to psych myself up would have been appalling. Today I realise I'd been suppressing a lot of things: my father had died, suddenly and devastatingly, a few months before, my emotional life was in turmoil and there were difficulties in my professional life. I was vulnerable.

I do still dive, and climb, but sometimes I lie awake wondering if I still need to be doing these things. These days I'm aware of flying, of being on the Tube, in lifts. I'm terribly close to my daughter, Molly, and each time I do something that puts my life at risk I berate myself. In many ways, I'm happiest taking Molly for a walk and writing novels. Then I let my fictional character Jack take the risks, and I can be content with the vicarious pleasure.'

For the full text of the article by David Gibbins on which this feature was based, click here.