In 2007, one of a team of expert cave divers died in strange circumstances while exploring Bell Island's flooded Iron-ore Mine in Newfoundland, Canada. Joe Steffen's death was a terrible shock for his team-mates and an unexpected and unwelcome tragedy for his friends and family. Although the expedition continued until its scheduled conclusion, and successfully placed two kilometres of permanent guideline in the mine's network of passageways and galleries, Steffen's death closed the mine to further exploration and the possibility of guided dives for almost a decade.
In his new book, best-selling author Steve Lewis tells the story of Steffen's death and its aftermath, from his perspective as expedition leader and Steffen's roommate during their time together in Newfoundland. He writes honestly about the profound effect his friend's death had on him, how it wove itself into his life — both underwater and above — until finally, somewhere on the road to Spain's Santiago de Compostela, how he rid himself of the heartache and guilt associated with it.
He says: "I needed to write this book because it turns out the story of Bell Island is more important than four shipwrecks, several square kilometres of flooded mine, and a dead friend. What started out as one local man's quest to put Bell Island on every diver's bucket list, became much more complex than anyone — certainly any of the people involved in that quest — would have guessed."
From Lewis' childhood dream of sinking below the surface of the ocean into "a blue world as quiet and as soft as cotton wool" to dropping in on a shark out for a morning constitutional, all the way to floating in a Mexican cave and reading in the flowstones and stalactites "all the complicated activities acted out in the sunlit jungle overhead," this book is not your average dive book. This is not an average story.
According to one reviewer, Lewis' narrative "delves into the very nature of adventure and what drives people to push the limits of their existence."
Robert Osborne — a Toronto-based documentary film-maker who produced a TV show about the 2016 expedition to Bell Island Mine — writes: "Death in Number Two Shaft is not only a book anyone fascinated by adventure should read, but everyone interested in a good story, well told and giving us insight into the human condition."
