Police probe fatal Stoney Cove scuba diving accident

A Stockton man has died after failing to resurface during a dive at Britain's National Diving Centre.James Askew, 35, from Fairfield, died on January 24 after failing to resurface from Stoney Cove, a flooded Leicestershire quarry.
It is believed Mr Askew, who lived at Muker Grove, had been diving with his dad on the day of the accident.
Mr Askew was diving under the supervision of the Olympic Scuba Dive School from Seaham, Co Durham, when the incident took place shortly after 1pm.
A spokesman for the school in Seaham said its thoughts were with Mr Askew's family.
He said: "During this sad time, our thoughts are with the family.
"At this time, there are ongoing investigations regarding the instructors and those diving with him.
"Because of ongoing investigations by the Health and Safety executive, we can't make any further comment."
A statement from Stoney Cove said Mr Askew had been reported missing at about 1.05pm and its rescue team made an immediate search, quickly recovering the lost diver.
The statement also read: "None of the divers involved in the incident were under instruction or under the supervision of Stoney Cove.
"The police attended and the Health and Safety Executive has been informed."
Leicestershire Police said Mr Askew's death was not being treated as suspicious.
A spokesman for the Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI) confirmed instructor Graham Rowntree, of Olympic Scuba at Seaham Grange, had been placed in "administrative hold."

He said: "In the case of a fatality of a student who was diving during a training programme, our standard procedure is to place the instructor who was in charge of the dive in question into administrative hold status.

"This temporarily removes the instructor's teaching status while we investigate the incident and also gives the instructor an opportunity to deal with the emotional impact of the fatality before he or she continues with the training of other students.

"The hold status is removed once we have completed our investigation to our satisfaction."

He added PADI would cooperate with the investigation currently being carried out by the Health and Safety Executive and said it would be "inappropriate" to comment further on the incident.
"Our thoughts are with the family of the deceased at this difficult time," he added.
Around 60,000 divers take part in dives at Stoney Cove each year and it has been praised by the HSE as a "model example in diving safety."