They call it the swim-line, and it is an activity that rarely makes more than a paragraph in a newspaper. Divers apply it, when participating in a search. By the time they are summoned, however, there is little hope of "rescue". Their job is to find the deceased.
It is an experience shared by many amateur divers across the country, and their activities never merit more than a line or two in a newspaper report. From the early 1960s, when sports diving developed in this State, the Garda S∅ochβna began seeking help from local enthusiasts in recovery situations.
Up till then, searching for bodies had been a much more primitive affair, according to Mick Moriarty, Corkman, Army colonel with much UN experience, and a diver of over 43 years. He emphasises "primitive", in the sense that ropes and grapnels were applied.
The four or five-pronged grapnel was thrown into the water and drawn back to the shore or riverbank in the hope that it might snag a body.
One of Moriarty's most arduous experiences is recalled in a book he has just published on a lifetime of diving - a book which deals with everything from Irish scientific contribution to subsea developments to the discovery of the Spanish Armada wrecks of f this coast. Moriarty was one of about 45 participating in a spearfishing competition in Kilkee, Co Clare, on June 29th,1969, when word spread of a serious accident up the coast.
The Redbank Oyster Fisheries Company near New Quay had just taken delivery of a new flat-bottomed boat, designed to work in the shallows of the shellfish lagoon. A gala day had been organised to celebrate its delivery and blessing by the parish priest.
"A group of schoolgirls, who had been away playing a camogie match, arrived just after the skipper had called a halt to the trips for the day and had tied up at the pier," Moriarty writes. "They pleaded with him to take them out and he reluctantly agreed.
"Unfortunately, many others climbed aboard . . ." It transpired that there could have been up to 49 on the vessel as the weather worsened. The boat was manoeuvring to return to the pier when it broached, and took on water.
"All the passengers rushed to the other side," Moriarty says. The vessel capsized, throwing most of them into a strong tidal current and the upturned hull began to drift with the tide out to Galway Bay.
Horrified onlookers were "galvanised into action", and "some quite extraordinary acts of heroism followed", he recalls. Anyone who had access to a craft set out to pick up the survivors. Three men in one dilapidated rowing boat used planks of timber and the top of a biscuit tin to propel themselves to the scene where they hauled out several people from the treacherous waters.
One young girl from New Quay had become trapped under the hull of the boat in an air pocket that enabled her, and others, to breathe. She found her way out, and went back several times to save a number of others. Many were able to swim to shore, but when the counting began, "fear and dread swept over the crowd".
Eight could not be accounted for, mostly young people. And one young girl who had been rescued from the sea died in the ambulance on the way to Ennis Hospital.
The garda∅ in Galway requested a helicopter from the Air Corps and called out George Ryder, a leading member of the Galway Sub Aqua Club. Though he had never been in a helicopter before, Ryder jumped some 12 feet from the aircraft into the waters below, and dived into and under the boat to check for more bodies. There were none.
That next morning, Mick Moriarty and several colleagues from the Army initiated the long recovery operation. They had no luck, but were asked to return and assist the Garda Sub Aqua Unit. It was in the days before inflatables were commonplace, and Manuel di Lucia of Kilkee - veteran of many rescues off the west coastline - was contracted to provide a "mother" ship. In the latter stages, the Naval Service ship, LE Cliona, participated. The last of eight bodies was found on July 16th - over two weeks after the accident had occurred.
The New Quay recovery exercise forged bonds that have never been broken, and Moriarty recalls many other incidents of co-operation and dedication in the face of tragedy.
The number of searches and recoveries conducted by amateur volunteers are "legion", he says, and many have gone unrecorded. Yet the State has never moved to introduce legislation to protect the divers upon whose services it is so happy to call, he points out.
"The same willingness to risk life, limb and personal property is shown all over the country by other organisations such as the mountain, cave, cliff and coast rescue; parachute groups; the 60 or more voluntary sea rescue teams around the coast; not to mention the long-established lifeboat stations," Moriarty says.
He recalls the response of Michael Heffernan, member of the Ballina-based Grainne Uaile Sub Aqua Club, who died while trying to rescue a group caught in a sea cave several years ago.
"There is no good reason why amateurs should continue to take the risks and to tolerate the circumstances under which they work, but they do, and their willingness was, and is, being exploited by the State," Moriarty writes. He believes that it is not beyond the power of the Government to devise a scheme whereby divers or rescues can be covered by State insurance for the duration of a rescue, on being called out.
Submerged - A Lifetime of Diving, by Mick Moriarty is published by The Irish Underwater Council, Comhairle F≤-Thuinn, at £15.75 paperback (€20.00).