Skilled Diver Nigel Band And The Uncommon Rolex Sea-Dweller And Oyster Perpetual Fashions That Plumbed The Depths And Scaled The Heights – Reprise

Nigel Band is knowledgeable diver with over 30 years’ value of economic and educating expertise underneath his belt.

Off to work, Rolex Sea-Dweller on wrist (picture courtesy Nigel Band)

He additionally owns two reasonably uncommon Rolex watches: the primary is a 1986 “triple-six” Rolex Sea-Dweller Reference 16660. It’s uncommon in that it’s about as removed from a desk diver as you’ll get. Most dive watches solely get moist within the kitchen sink or bathe and are available no nearer to helium than balloons at a kids’s celebration. However Band’s Sea-Dweller has clocked up greater than 20 years’ saturation diving to depths of 120 meters.

It’s the true factor.

The second is a 1952 Rolex Oyster Perpetual of appreciable historic curiosity, which ventured to nice altitudes. However I’ll get to that later.

Because the son of an oil firm govt, Band had an unusually peripatetic childhood, residing in 5 international locations by the age of 15, and has some reasonably entertaining tales to inform. I caught up with him for a Zoom interview final week, as is the present trend, and he informed me how he received into diving within the first place.

Diving as a profession

“It was truly after a casual comment that my father made at dwelling in London. As soon as it had develop into clear that I most likely wasn’t going to make it to school any time quickly, after one other heated household dialogue alongside the traces of ‘what are we going to do with Nigel,’ as he left the room in despair my father stated, ‘Nicely, you may all the time develop into a diver’.”

For an oilman like his father, this was tantamount to saying, “Nicely, you may all the time drive a taxi.” However although he had no precise diving expertise, it struck a chord with Band, who had all the time felt as a lot at dwelling within the water as on dry land, if no more so.

As a boy in Oman, he recollects heading off to the seaside to go snorkeling with friends after faculty every day reasonably than taking part in soccer as most children do. And when Band’s father sat him down along with his brother and sister to inform them that the household was transferring to the UK, the youngsters checked out one another in horror and burst into tears concurrently. The offshore life held a robust attraction for him.

Band instantly utilized for a diving course in Plymouth however was turned down as a result of he was too younger. He did nonetheless handle to wangle an apprenticeship on an oil companies barge within the Far East, and his diving profession was underneath method.

As a fresh-faced 18-year-old English public faculty (personal faculty within the States) boy he didn’t match the same old diver mould in any respect – his first colleagues have been a battle-hardened crew of People, Australians, and New Zealanders – actually, as most of them have been Vietnam veterans. For the primary week he didn’t dare open his mouth.

1986 Rolex Sea-Dweller

Band got here to his Sea-Dweller after a colleague returned offshore seeking to make a fast sale of a Rolex watch after a longer-than-planned spell of unemployment. He figured he might afford the asking value, however was sternly informed by his supervisor, “you’re too younger for a Rolex, lad, you may get one whenever you’ve carried out your first saturation dive.”

In the intervening time he carried on sporting his Casio G-Shock – which was a well-liked alternative for divers on the time, even when they needed to hold a backup because of the watches’ tendency to blow up on the best way again to the floor – adopted by a Seiko 150 Sport, a rugged quartz dive watch.

He finally purchased the Sea-Dweller for £680 at Schiphol airport in 1986 on his method dwelling from an offshore venture within the Center East. The airport’s Rolex retailer will need to have been a bit of greatly surprised by the scruffy 23-year outdated sauntering in wearing denims, T-shirt, and flip-flops and asking to strive on the Sea-Dwellers.

Nigel Band’s Rolex Sea-Dweller (picture courtesy Nigel Band)

Diving deeper

Saturation diving (“SAT”) was first experimented with in 1938 however took off in a giant method with the expansion of offshore drilling within the oil trade within the Nineteen Sixties. Technically, it is extremely completely different from scuba diving with a compressed air tank. Saturation diving includes respiratory a combination of helium and oxygen (which “saturates” the physique tissue); divers can dwell and work underwater at nice depths for a number of weeks at a time, returning to the diving bell and pressurized lodging after every shift. However they require a decompression interval of as much as a number of days as soon as a tour has been accomplished to keep away from decompression illness. Not like in scuba diving, the saturation diver wears a full helmet loaded with communication gadgets, lights, and cameras, all fed by an “umbilical” air line from the floor vessel.

Saturation divers are a uncommon breed as they require each bodily stamina to hold out shifts of six to eight hours after which stay on web site in cramped, pressurized lodging for a number of weeks and the psychological capability to work on the ocean mattress or underneath a drilling platform in whole darkness and/or zero visibility.

This work shouldn’t be for the faint-hearted, and educated welders and fitters tempted by the prospect of doubling their earnings by “doing it underwater” typically discovered that they merely don’t have what it takes. On one “zero-vis” job, Band recollects being “zapped” by electrical rays as he felt his method alongside a pipeline again to the platform, a lot to the amusement of his floor colleagues whose laughter was clearly audible in his helmet earpiece.

However he took his revenge when a big sea snake adopted him into the diving bell on the finish of the shift. The snake grew to become disoriented and aggressive on discovering itself apparently on dry land, so Band decapitated it for his personal safety. Then, when his diving bell docked, he tossed its still-writhing physique to his horrified colleagues within the lodging unit as an arrival present.

SAT additionally requires a distinct kind of diving watch because it additionally will get “saturated” or pressurized. The helium gasoline that accumulates contained in the case in the course of the dive is unable to flee on the identical fee because the stress is normalized on the ascent, ensuing within the crystal blowing off. The Rolex Sea-Dweller is basically a Submariner with a helium launch valve.

Rising into the diving bell after a shift (picture courtesy Nigel Band)

In Band’s case, the work consisted of “primarily nuts and bolts” – equivalent to supervising the decreasing of pipeline sections from the floor vessel and becoming a member of the flanges on the finish of every piece along with bolts that may weigh as much as 140 kg every. He solely not too long ago retired from “moist” diving operations and now applies his expertise as a industrial dive planner and supervisor within the Center East.

After quite a lot of years saturation diving and spending lengthy intervals in pressurized lodging, Band’s Sea-Dweller was trying considerably the more severe for put on and never holding time because it ought to, so he despatched it again to Rolex for a service, which included having the badly corroded fingers changed.

It’s on this level that the distinction between an genuine device watch and a mere “desk diver” turns into clear. Firms like Rolex make investments appreciable money and time in growing diving watches to a rigorous set of trade specs, in some circumstances laid down by the army or a protection ministry that governs timekeeping, water resistance underneath excessive stress, and legibility. They’re required to take care of these requirements when a watch requires upkeep. Given {that a} faulty or unreadable watch might endanger a diver’s life, they’ve little regard for the issues of classic watch collectors who swoon on the sight of a spider dial, light bezel, or fingers whose lume stopped glowing years in the past.

Some years later, because of such repeated helium publicity, the bezel on Band’s Sea-Dweller had “ghosted” to a lightweight gray to the purpose that the numbers have been illegible, so the subsequent service included a substitute bezel. The Sea-Dweller now appears to be like remarkably recent, and whereas he’s conscious that it might most likely be value much more in financial phrases if it nonetheless had all the unique elements, that isn’t why he purchased it.

“Watch conkers”

Readers of a delicate nature ought to look away at this level, or soar to the subsequent part, particularly if they’re into uncommon watch prototypes.

As industrial divers spend lots of time sitting round ready, both earlier than going into motion or in decompression after a deep saturation dive, they inevitably search for methods to enliven the boredom, and relaxation and recreation intervals typically lead to excessive jinks.

Within the mid-Eighties Band was on a job trenching a phone cable between Karachi and Fujairah, supervising two French Comex divers who had beforehand been concerned within the French marine exploration firm’s Janus IV venture, working at file depths all the way down to 501 meters.

Eighties Rolex Sea-Dweller commercial

After the venture was accomplished and the divers have been enjoyable with a bottle of whisky on board the barge, one of many Comex divers was vaunting the accuracy of a quartz watch he had been given by Rolex to check (probably a now highly-coveted Beta 21). So Band, who was sporting his indestructible Seiko 150 on the time, requested, “Do you suppose your Rolex might beat my Seiko at watch conkers, monsieur?”

This was a recreation that Band had devised to whereas away prolonged relaxation intervals. Just like the English recreation performed with dried chestnuts on a string, it concerned holding his Seiko out by the bracelet and letting his opponent take a swing at along with his watch, no matter that could be, after which returning the blow till one or different watch (or its proprietor) caved in.

Band’s Seiko had acquired a number of dents and scratches alongside the best way however had soundly overwhelmed off all comers, together with a “big Omega” that he subsequently recognized as a PloProf, no much less.

After inquiring “what eez conquers?” and receiving a proof of the principles, with a bit of encouragement from his colleagues the Comex man duly agreed to play conkers along with his quartz Rolex, which he was sure would simply see off a mere Seiko. After asking him a number of occasions, “Do you actually need to do that” and enumerating different victims that had been felled by the Seiko, Band let him take first shot, which merely added one other scratch to his Seiko’s bezel. Once more, he provided the Frenchman a possibility to withdraw, however he “persevered and signed,” as they are saying in France.

The blow from the Seiko was deadly, with the Rolex’s crystal, fingers, and case ending up scattered to the 4 corners of the room. The Comex man presumably reported again to Rolex that after due consideration, the watch was “not match for the rigeurs of diving life.”

1952 Rolex Oyster Perpetual – the Everest connection

Because the son of an oil firm govt, Band spent the primary 9 years of his life in Venezuela, East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), and Oman. One in every of his earliest childhood recollections is of his father George giving a presentation to an appreciative crowd of Europeans and English-speaking East Pakistanis at what he remembers as some form of church corridor.

Eagle-eyed observers of Rolex memorabilia, and specifically Rolex Explorer memorabilia, could have already observed that Nigel Band shares his surname with one of many members of the staff led by Sir John Hunt that conquered Mount Everest in 1953. Nigel’s father George Band was the youngest member of that staff, recruited whereas nonetheless a geology pupil at Cambridge College.

George Band choosing the day’s rations, Mount Everest 1953 (picture courtesy Royal Geographical Society)

Described by Sir John Hunt as “the expedition wit, clever and amusing,” George Band was the staff’s official wi-fi operator and far appreciated for his catering abilities, which ranged from opening tins of conserves to skinning yaks.

George Band and George Lowe skinning a yak on Mount Everest (picture courtesy Royal Geographical Society)

Despite struggling altitude illness and a protracted bout of dysentery on what was his first trek excessive within the Himalayas, he helped pioneer a method by the Khumbu icefall and was first out of base camp at 21,000 toes to greet the descending Hillary and Tenzing on their descent from the height.

George Band congratulating Tenzing Norgay on his descent from the height of Mount Everest (picture courtesy Royal Geographical Society)

Through the years the Everest staff continued to carry common five-yearly reunions to have fun the occasion, typically at Pen-Y-Grwyd in Wales, the place they’d educated for the expedition, so Nigel Band grew up surrounded by household associates and acquaintances who have been family names on the time.

On one event he took Tenzing Norgay’s spouse into London to decide on cassettes of “the newest pop music” for her household again dwelling – Standing Quo and Queen he remembers. He additionally recollects his mom turning as much as accumulate him from boarding faculty one half-term “in a big blue Citroen property, with Ed Hillary within the passenger seat.” This earned him appreciable kudos along with his incredulous classmates, however on the best way dwelling, “Ed provided to drive and promptly crashed the automobile whereas negotiating the slip highway onto the M4 motorway.”

From these conferences he recollects Jan Morris (Occasions reporter on the 1953 expedition who very not too long ago handed away, and James Morris on the time) giving a chat, leaning on the lectern, and intriguingly twirling her spectacles with one hand as she spoke, in stark distinction to the opposite members’ extra formal displays. And through a chat by Sir Edmund Hillary, one stalwart leaning over to a different member and muttering “in fact it wasn’t a Rolex he was sporting on the prime, it was a Smiths . . . ”.

However that’s a subject for an additional article.

At one other occasion a journalist sought to “troll” Sir Edmund Hillary by asking him to touch upon hypothesis that George Mallory had in reality summited Everest in 1924 earlier than dying on the descent. To which Hillary responded, in sometimes laconic trend, that he’d had a rattling good run as conqueror of Everest and can be fairly blissful to let another person take over.

George Band continued to play an energetic position within the worldwide mountaineering neighborhood and with Himalayan organizations for the remainder of his life, writing a number of books and being awarded the OBE in 2009 in recognition of his companies to mountaineering. His achievements are too many to enumerate right here, however embody his participation on the profitable 1953 Everest expedition and what was his crowning glory, the 1955 conquest of the “Final Nice Mountain,” Kangchenjunga, along with Mancunian builder Joe Brown.

As is effectively documented, Rolex had been equipping mountaineering expeditions with watches for some years, and the Everest staff carried 13 Oyster Perpetual licensed chronometers with them in whole, six introduced for the 1952 Cho Oyu expedition and 7 for the brand new members of the 1953 staff. George Band’s Oyster Perpetual Reference 6098 was one of many latter.

George Band’s 1952 Rolex Oyster Perpetual (picture courtesy Nigel Band)

This model of the Oyster Perpetual options the domed “bubble-back” case, required to permit room for the automated winding rotor mounted on what was initially a handbook motion. It was not till the slimmer 1030 motion was launched, designed from scratch as a self-winding motion, that the Oyster Perpetual and the Explorer boasted flat case backs.

The again of this specific watch is engraved “EVEREST 1953” and “G.C. BAND,” with a fainter engraving of the Rolex crown and “H6” indicating that it was quantity six of the second batch of watches introduced to the expedition staff by Rolex.

George Band’s 1952 Rolex Oyster Perpetual from the again (picture courtesy Nigel Band)

George Band’s different Rolex: 1953 Rolex Oyster Precision with “Explorer dial”

Kangchenjunga was as soon as believed to be the very best mountain on this planet and deemed unclimbable. Even after it was decided that K2 and Everest have been larger, it remained essentially the most daunting of the three for mountaineers and continues to be honored by the native inhabitants because the holiest of mountains.

Kangchenjunga and its satellite tv for pc peaks type an enormous mountain massif of 5 peaks that straddle the border between India and Nepal. Excessive climate circumstances and excessive avalanche threat on account of its proximity to the Bay of Bengal made it what Everest chief Sir John Hunt referred to as “essentially the most troublesome feat in mountaineering.”

George Band on the western strategy to Kangchenjunga, 1955 (picture courtesy Royal Geographical Society)

Constructing on a route carved out almost 50 years earlier by satan worshipper and (reasonably incongruously) enthusiastic mountaineer Aleister Crowley, aka “the wickedest man in Britain,” George Band and Joe Brown summited Kangchenjunga on Could 26, 1955, often reported as “stopping simply wanting the height out of deference to native spiritual beliefs.” The expedition had been deliberate as a reconnaissance journey with a view to summiting in 1956, and the staff had solely obtained permission from the Chogyal of Sikkim to discover Kangchenjunga on the final second on the understanding that they might go nowhere close to the highest.

For this expedition Rolex had given George Band a black-dial Oyster Perpetual Precision Reference 6150 with the now-familiar 3-6-9 dial and Mercedes fingers.

The success of the Kangchenjunga expedition and the truth that the primary Explorer fashions had syringe fingers for the primary 18 months (to not point out the truth that neither Hillary nor Tenzing have been sporting Rolex watches on the height of Everest, as has now been confirmed) certainly makes it the true religious ancestor of the Rolex Explorer reasonably than the Oyster Perpetuals utilized by the Everest staff. This watch was offered at a Phillips public sale by the Band household in 2017.

The Kangchenjunga Rolex 6150, an Explorer in all however identify (picture courtesy Eszter Faykiss/Loupiosity)

George Band handed away in 2011 on the age of 82, having taken half in a Kangchenjunga reunion expedition within the Himalayas on the tender age of 76 and reconquering the Breithorn with the Alpine Membership aged 78. His Oyster Perpetual now belongs to Nigel, who wears it sometimes, nonetheless on the Fixoflex bracelet that his father most popular for each of his mountaineering watches.

Nigel absolutely understands the significance of holding the Oyster Perpetual in completely unique situation – simply as his Sea-Dweller, which continues to be a working device watch, has been maintained in working situation for the aim for which he purchased it.

Nigel Band’s 1986 Rolex Sea-Dweller and 1952 Rolex Oyster Perpetual (picture courtesy Nigel Band)

Nigel remembers that his father wore each the Oyster Perpetual and the Precision repeatedly all through his childhood, with a choice for the black-dial Precision on account of its higher legibility. They have been solely retired from energetic service when any individual introduced him with a newfangled digital timepiece with a built-in altimeter. Which proves you could deliver the mountaineer down from the mountain, however you may’t take the mountain away from the mountaineer.

I requested Nigel whether or not his father’s love of mountaineering had rubbed off on him in any method. “Not likely, I’ve carried out some hillwalking within the UK however past that I simply don’t have a head for heights – I’d a lot reasonably be underwater!”

It might be a coincidence, however it’s curious that of their completely completely different chosen fields, each father and son ended up sporting respiratory equipment and Rolex watches.

*This text was first printed on November 25, 2020 at Skilled Diver Nigel Band And The Uncommon Rolex Sea-Dweller And Oyster Perpetual Fashions That Plumbed The Depths And Scaled The Heights.

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