Audrey Mestre
Encyclopedia
Audrey Mestre was a French world record-setting freediver
.
, Seine-Saint-Denis
, to a family of snorkeling
and scuba diving
enthusiasts, at age two she was already swimming and by age thirteen was a seasoned scuba diver. She was still in her teens when her family moved to Mexico City
and, fluent in the Spanish language
, she eventually studied marine biology at a university in La Paz, Mexico.
. They immediately developed a relationship and Mestre soon moved to Miami, Florida
to live with Ferreras. There, she took up serious free-diving and with Ferreras as her instructor was soon reaching record depths. In 1999 the two diving aficionados married and the following year, off the coast of Fort Lauderdale
, Audrey Mestre broke the female world record by free diving to a depth of 125 meters (410 ft) on a single breath of air. A year later she broke her own record, by descending to 130 meters (427 ft).
Beach in the Dominican Republic
to the unheard of depth of 166 meters (545 ft). After more deep dive practices, eight days later she prepared to attempt a dive to 171 meters but at the bottom a problem developed with the lift balloon as she started her ascent. A dive that should have been no more than three minutes resulted in her remaining underwater for more than eight and a half minutes. By the time her husband was able to bring her unconscious body to the surface it was too late and she was pronounced dead at a hospital on shore.
Her death shocked the diving world; many experts in the field were critical of her husband, alleging he pushed her too far, too fast and for a lack of proper safety procedures during the dive that took her life.
In 2006 Venezuelan-born US-citizen Carlos Serra, a former IAFD-partner of Ferreras' and co-organizer of Mestre's fatal record attempt, published a book The Last Attempt which received wide acclaim in and out of freediving circuits. In this book, Serra places the guilt for Mestre's death directly on Ferreras, practically accusing him of a crime. According to Serra's depiction, in October 2002 the Ferreras and Mestre marriage was on the brink of divorce after much abuse by Ferreras, possibly due to Ferreras being jealous about the attention Mestre was gaining at his expense. Serra argues that to punish his wife for wanting to leave him, Ferreras deliberately avoided filling the sled's air tank, a vital piece of equipment to ensure Mestre's return to the surface. Several circumstances leave Serra to conclude that Ferreras may not have intended to murder his wife, but that it was his direct irresponsible actions that led to her death.
Free-diving
Freediving is any of various aquatic activities that share the practice of breath-hold underwater diving. Examples include breathhold spear fishing, freedive photography, apnea competitions and, to a degree, snorkeling...
.
Early life
Born in Saint-DenisSaint-Denis
Saint-Denis is a commune in the northern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the centre of Paris. Saint-Denis is a sous-préfecture of the Seine-Saint-Denis département, being the seat of the Arrondissement of Saint-Denis....
, Seine-Saint-Denis
Seine-Saint-Denis
- Culture :A number of hip hop artists come from the Seine-Saint-Denis, including one of the first major hip-hop groups in France, NTM, as well as Lord Kossity, or more recent acts such as Tandem or Sefyu.- Miscellaneous topics :...
, to a family of snorkeling
Snorkeling
Snorkeling is the practice of swimming on or through a body of water while equipped with a diving mask, a shaped tube called a snorkel, and usually swimfins. In cooler waters, a wetsuit may also be worn...
and scuba diving
Scuba diving
Scuba diving is a form of underwater diving in which a diver uses a scuba set to breathe underwater....
enthusiasts, at age two she was already swimming and by age thirteen was a seasoned scuba diver. She was still in her teens when her family moved to Mexico City
Mexico City
Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
and, fluent in the Spanish language
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, she eventually studied marine biology at a university in La Paz, Mexico.
Relationship with Francisco "Pipín" Ferreras
In 1996 her interest in underwater sports led to her meeting the renowned free-diver Francisco "Pipín" FerrerasFrancisco Ferreras (free-diver)
Francisco Rodriguez, better known as Francisco 'Pipin' Ferreras is a Cuban free-diver renowned for his achievements in deep freediving.- Life :...
. They immediately developed a relationship and Mestre soon moved to Miami, Florida
Miami, Florida
Miami is a city located on the Atlantic coast in southeastern Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, the most populous county in Florida and the eighth-most populous county in the United States with a population of 2,500,625...
to live with Ferreras. There, she took up serious free-diving and with Ferreras as her instructor was soon reaching record depths. In 1999 the two diving aficionados married and the following year, off the coast of Fort Lauderdale
Fort Lauderdale, Florida
Fort Lauderdale is a city in the U.S. state of Florida, on the Atlantic coast. It is the county seat of Broward County. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 165,521. It is a principal city of the South Florida metropolitan area, which was home to 5,564,635 people at the 2010...
, Audrey Mestre broke the female world record by free diving to a depth of 125 meters (410 ft) on a single breath of air. A year later she broke her own record, by descending to 130 meters (427 ft).
Death
On October 4, 2002, with a dive team under her husband's supervision, she made a practice dive off BayahibeBayahibe
Bayahibe is a town in the Dominican Republic, located about 10 miles east of La Romana on the shore of the Caribbean Sea. Founded as a fishing village in 1874 by Juan Brito and his family, who came from Puerto Rico, the town is now a touristic destination....
Beach in the Dominican Republic
Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic is a nation on the island of La Hispaniola, part of the Greater Antilles archipelago in the Caribbean region. The western third of the island is occupied by the nation of Haiti, making Hispaniola one of two Caribbean islands that are shared by two countries...
to the unheard of depth of 166 meters (545 ft). After more deep dive practices, eight days later she prepared to attempt a dive to 171 meters but at the bottom a problem developed with the lift balloon as she started her ascent. A dive that should have been no more than three minutes resulted in her remaining underwater for more than eight and a half minutes. By the time her husband was able to bring her unconscious body to the surface it was too late and she was pronounced dead at a hospital on shore.
Her death shocked the diving world; many experts in the field were critical of her husband, alleging he pushed her too far, too fast and for a lack of proper safety procedures during the dive that took her life.
In 2006 Venezuelan-born US-citizen Carlos Serra, a former IAFD-partner of Ferreras' and co-organizer of Mestre's fatal record attempt, published a book The Last Attempt which received wide acclaim in and out of freediving circuits. In this book, Serra places the guilt for Mestre's death directly on Ferreras, practically accusing him of a crime. According to Serra's depiction, in October 2002 the Ferreras and Mestre marriage was on the brink of divorce after much abuse by Ferreras, possibly due to Ferreras being jealous about the attention Mestre was gaining at his expense. Serra argues that to punish his wife for wanting to leave him, Ferreras deliberately avoided filling the sled's air tank, a vital piece of equipment to ensure Mestre's return to the surface. Several circumstances leave Serra to conclude that Ferreras may not have intended to murder his wife, but that it was his direct irresponsible actions that led to her death.
Awards and accolades
Audrey Mestre was cremated, her ashes scattered at sea. In 2002, she was inducted posthumously into the Women Divers Hall of Fame and in August 2004 a book that tells her story was written by her husband and published under the title The Dive: A Story of Love and Obsession (ISBN 0-06-056416-4). Bluegrass artist Lou Wamp released an instrumental tribute entitled Audrey's Last Dive in 2005.Popular culture
- The Dive is a proposed movie based on the story of Ferreras and Mestre. It will be directed by James CameronJames CameronJames Francis Cameron is a Canadian-American film director, film producer, screenwriter, editor, environmentalist and inventor...
and has a tentative 20122012 in filmThe following tables list films that are in production or have completed production and will be released in the United States and Canada at some point in 2012...
release.