The Diving School on a mission in Frederikshavn
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 A team from the Diving School has travelled the long road from Holmen to Frederikshavn with four large containers to take part in Sorbet Royal. The team consists of 14 people and three of those are doctors with a speciality in diving illnesses. The commanding officer of the Diving School, Commander Erik Toft Jensen (among colleagues called ET), explains how the Diving School have their equipment and expertise available for the other nations during the exercise. The divers on the team are normally instructors at the Diving School and Erik is in no doubt that he has some of the best divers in Denmark.Erik explains that the Diving School has three primary areas of operation besides participating in exercises like Sorbet Royal. They train professional divers, maintain the diving equipment, and they are in charge of the treatment in the decompression chamber located at Rigshospitalet. |
 During the exercise, the team from the Diving School has taken part in a large operation from the Swedish vessel
BELOS. The exercise was to supply the Danish submarine SPRINGEREN with fresh air. During the 24 hour exercise the team delivered 1,5 million litres of fresh air to
SPRINGEREN, which equals seven times the amount of air in the submarine. This would be a typical task for the team in case of a submarine accident. According to Eric, this tactic is very efficient since the team can move out with short notice and ensure that the sub is ventilated with fresh air until a rescue vehicle, such as LR5 or
URF, reaches the area. This way it is also possible to decompress the submarine from the surface if this should be necessary. Furthermore it is possible to attach advanced analytical equipment to the system to examine the amount of toxic gasses etc. in the submarine so the right precautions can be taken. The team can operate down to 60 metres because this is the diving limit for the divers. |
 Erik explains that he has experienced a great interest in the equipment from the other nations. Especially with the smaller nations who have a small defence budget, the equipment can ensure the survival of the submarine crew by buying time until rescue vehicles from other nations come to the rescue.Another task during the exercise is to take part in a free ascent exercise from a submarine. The team has doctors standing by to help in case of an emergency. The team also has a member doing an actual free ascent. Another exercise, the team has to go through, is to work with an atmospheric diving suit, which can be deployed to a depth of 250 metres. For this to be possible, the team has changed the equipment to make sure that it can be handled using the claws of the diving suit. During the exercise, the team has worked under tough conditions with cold waters, strong currents and bad visibility. Despite the tough conditions, the team have had great success with their operations. Erik puts this down to the fact that the equipment is simple and “low-tech”.
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