Fatal Depth: Deep Sea Diving, China Fever, and the Wreck of the Andrea Doria [Hardcover]

Joe Haberstroh (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 2003

The gripping true story of treasure hunting and terrible tragedy encountered by divers exploring the world's most dangerous sunken shipwreck.

Editorial Reviews

Review

It's well researched, well interviewed, and written without frills. It doesn't need frills. Wreck diving is already on the edge, an extreme sport with virtually no margin for error. Drama is built in. Haberstroh does a nice job with these issues, the profiles of the five who died are effective, and he understands the sport without having dived himself, which is quite an accomplishment." --National Geographic Adventure

From the Back Cover

At 11:10 p.m. on July 25, 1956, the luxurious Italian ocean liner Andrea Doria collided with the Stockholm forty-five miles south of Nantucket. Half a century later the wreck of the Andrea Doria is still claiming lives.
Professional and amateur divers the world over consider the Andrea Doria to be the Everest of diving. At 225 feet below the surface, the wreck lies at the very edge of human endurance and accomplishment; ordinary air becomes toxic, and the divers who go there suffer nitrogen narcosis or "the rapture of the deep." Symptoms include confusion, lack of coordination, and perhaps most deadly of all, a loss of the ability to make clear decisions. As a result, divers use Trimix, an exotic blend of oxygen, nitrogen, and helium to descend through the strong currents, rusted metal, and twisted wires to the ultimate symbol of deep sea diving accomplishments: china teacups and plates from the wreck of the Andrea Doria. For serious wreck divers, these fragile artifacts are genuine proof of their abilities.
During the summers of 1998 and 1999, three elite divers lost their lives, all on separate dives from the top dive boat out of Montauk, the 65-foot Seeker. Craig Sicola was clearly suffering from "china fever" before he went down. He'd handled teacups brought up by veteran Doria diver Gary Gentile, and the gleam in Craig's eye was unmistakable. Craig dove on June 24, 1998. A few hours later his body bobbed to the surface. He was carrying a plate.
Joe Haberstroh, the award-winning Newsday reporter, watched events unfold during the summers of 1998 and 1999. In this remarkable and intriguing book he recreates what was the pride of the Italian fleet, how it sank, the dangers of the deep, and the gripping personal stories of the men who live or die for a teacup from its remains.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Lyons Press; 1st edition (February 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585744573
• ISBN-13: 978-1585744572
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #928,398 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Accurate but disappointing, March 1, 2005

By 

Greg4408 "Greg" (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fatal Depth: Deep Sea Diving, China Fever, and the Wreck of the Andrea Doria (Hardcover)

I had just finished Shadow Divers when I jumped into Fatal Depth. That's a shame because Shadow Divers so overwhelms FD that a completely unbiased review may not have been possible.

Haberstroh knits together the string of fatal dive incidents using the state of mind of dive boat captain Dan Crowell as the unifying thread. This attempt, though, turns up so little that the incidents really have to stand alone. As such, they seem like little more than incident investigations with perhaps a bit of background color for each of the victims. The author seems to have had no particular agenda and draws no conclusions. Even the status of a lawsuit described in the book's closing chapters is left unresolved.

If you want a STORY, ready Shadow Divers. If you want research material on deep diving fatalities or just cannot get enough of the genre then by all means pick up Fatal Depth.

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars No artifact is worth your life, March 16, 2003

By 

Steve Lloyd "steveklloyd" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fatal Depth: Deep Sea Diving, China Fever, and the Wreck of the Andrea Doria (Hardcover)

The Andrea Doria is often called the pinnacle of wreck diving, and as author Joe Haberstroh relates the stories of men who've died pursuing their dreams of diving on the sunken Italian liner, it's easy to see how the thrill and mystique of mastering one of the world's most challenging wreck dives can cause otherwise experienced divers to throw aside caution in their quest for the sport's ultimate challenge.

Without trying to assign blame, the author relates the circumstances surrounding the fatal dives taken by five men: Craig Sicola, Vince Napoliello, Richard Roost, Chris Murley, and Charlie McGurr. Technical divers with varying levels of skill, fitness and deep-wreck experience, the story of these men and their passion for the sport that ultimately killed them is what makes FATAL DEPTH a book that one can appreciate on many levels. The author (who is not a diver) has obviously done careful research on the sport, and he writes about the psychological and physiological effects of deep diving accurately and engagingly.

I've never climbed a mountain, jumped out of an airplane or surfed a breaking wave, but I have plunged to the ocean's depths to visit the remains of ships lost generations ago. Haberstroh captures that excitement in his prose, and has penned a book that will appeal to everyone who appreciates a spirit of risk and adventure.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sports and Death: Tales of the absurd, March 7, 2003

By 

Mike Reilly (Omaha, NE USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fatal Depth: Deep Sea Diving, China Fever, and the Wreck of the Andrea Doria (Hardcover)

When you think about them, all sports can seem absurd....batting a round ball 400 feet, carrying an oval ball 100 yards, climbing the highest peaks on Earth. And yet each sport attracts its own. Each attracts players who embrace a sports peculiarities, intricacies and risks. Players do it for the love of teamwork and competition, for the unique camaraderie spawned in such pursuits, and for the moments of exhilaration, tranquility and statisfaction that come when pushing toward any form of excellence.
In Joe Haberstroh's new book, "Fatal Depth," the sport is scuba diving at its extreme, riskiest level....200 feet below the surface of the cold North Atlantic, where divers scavenge the wreck of the 1950s luxury ocean liner, the Andea Doria, in search of cups, plates and saucers from the ship's china cabinets. Silly as it might seem to others, scuba divers see the Doria and its baubles as the Mount Everest of their sport.
As the title suggests, the book is also about death....the odd circumstances surrounding the deaths of five Doria divers in 1998 and 1999.
One by one, readers get to know and care about each ill-fated diver. Haberstroh uses a gripping narrative style that's sparse, swift and rich with incisive detail. The craftsmanship is particularly visible at the end of each chapter, where the author is both playful and poignant.
The heart of the book, though, belongs to its ultimate survivor, Dan Crowell, skipper of the charter boat that escorted all five divers to the Doria. Crowell is an enigma, but an unrelentingly interesting one.
Unlike many sports-book authors, Haberstroh resists the temptation to romanticize Crowell and his crew of "big-boy" divers.
Unlike many authors examining untimely death, Haberstroh also resists the temptation to blame or scorn either the five divers or the crew that led them to the abyss.
Instead, he leaves it to readers to judge where fault lies....or whether there is fault when dealing with risks of such a sport at its highest, or in this case, deepest level.
It's those murky depths that help make "Fatal Depth" as rare and valuable a find as a first-class saucer from the Doria herself.