Jailani recovers from diving accident with Gift of Mobility Cart

Feb 24 2024

Deep water diving accidents have been quite common in Indonesia in the past, and are still happening, resulting in local divers often being crippled by the ‘bends’ otherwise known as decompression sickness, divers disease, or Caisson sickness. These accidents occur because impoverished young men are often employed as divers to ‘work’ the seafloor. They receive no formal training, poor pay, and often provided the most primitive of diving equipment (a 50-100meter long hose pipe feeding them compressed air from a standard compressor mounted on a small outrigger boat above them). Their employment may be to collect Oyster shells to sell on to the Pearl farms operating in Indonesia, to harvest Sea cucumbers which have a high export value to China, Singapore, & Malaysia, or to collect valuable ornamental tropical fish for aquariums. Potentially all high value markets, but all come at a very high risk to the diver. These young divers often have no knowledge of the serious physiological risks they are taking.

Recently the Global Village Foundation Bali team spent 2 days in the coastal villages of North West Bali locating victims of deep-water diving accidents. Over the two days the team found 13 persons, all males from just three villages, who had suffered serious diving accidents over a number of years. There are many more to find, and many more young men who have died along the way. All 13 ex-divers located were gifted a ‘MOBILITY WORLDWIDE’ Mobility Cart by the Global Village Foundation team. None of the 13 had ever owned a wheelchair before to assist them. (More updates of them later)

This short video is of just one of the 13 ex-divers receiving the gift of Mobility after a 17 year wait.
Jailani is 41 years old. In 2007, at 24 years old he was at his physical peak. A strong swimmer, a free diver, a keen sportsman, but from a poor family. He took a job as a deep-water diver to earn money collecting ornamental fish for sales on to Aquarium wholesalers.

He hadn’t been diving long when he found himself on one dive at a depth of (he thinks was) up to 100 meters. He had been underwater for 2 hours already connected to the compressor above. His body began trembling, and confusion set in. He got scared and headed straight to the surface. At the surface his body was numb. His friends took him to the shore. He, nor his friends understood at the time the seriousness of his condition.

As a result of that fateful day, for 14 years Jailani had no feeling at all in most of his lower body. He was totally bedridden, and suffered for years with severe bed sores. His young wife left him within his first year of disability. He has been lucky that his brother & sister-in-law have cared so well for him that he is still here at all. Many of those who suffered this same type of accident in Indonesia are not.

In 2021 he began to get a little feeling back into his legs. He built himself a primitive walking frame from wood (seen in the video), and has struggled since to teach himself to walk again.

With the new Mobility cart gifted to him by the Global Village team, his world has expanded dramatically. He says he can again go to the beach (500 meters away) to fish. He can visit his friends in the village instead of them always travelling to him. He was very happy to receive his new cart.

Please enjoy this short but moving video of the day Jailani got back his mobility. The Global Village team wish Jailani the very best of luck as he continues on his long road of recovery, and we say thank you so very much to all the volunteers at Mobility Worldwide in the United States for your support of the Global Village Foundation in Indonesia, and helping people like Jailani across the world regain their mobility. Bless you all.
Name: Jailani
Country: Bali
Disability: injury
Partner: Global Village Foundation