Fined for submarine cruise off JBR beach

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

7DAYS

A submarine owner’s hopes of an underwater adventure were sunk by a leak and eagle-eyed police officers, a court was told.

The Turkish man appeared at Dubai Court of Misdeamours yesterday where he explained how he had taken his new Dhs35,000 toy for a test dive off the coast at JBR beach.
However, instead of going 20,000 leagues under the sea, he ran into trouble. The vessel owner said: “I loaded it onto a pick-up truck and went to the beach. I unloaded it into the water and got inside.

Submarine

“But when I reached a depth of about 2m I noticed there was a leak. I returned to the beach. I was tired so I took the battery out so no one could use it, left the submarine on the beach and returned home.
“I contacted the company I bought it from and asked about the leak. A couple of days later I received a call from police asking me to go to a station.”
Two Emirati policemen stated in court records how they were “surprised” to find the submarine while on patrol.
The 34-year-old defendant said he bought the two-seater vessel for Dhs35,000 from a shipping firm in Al Quoz.
“The company agreed to sell it to me in September but said they would first carry out maintenance on it,” the Turkish man said. He finally took delivery of it before taking it on its maiden voyage last month.
The defendant claimed he was in the process of registering the 567kg vessel, which can travel up to 8kph, when police found it. The submariner was found guilty of cruising illegally and fined Dhs1,000.