The Sydney Harbour shark attack that left Ashley with lifelong scars
Ashley Semmens was destined for a life in the water.
A prodigious swimmer who grew up in the surf clubs and swimming pools of Adelaide, he went toe-to-toe with Grant Hackett in the 800-metre freestyle at the 2003 Australian championships, before a career as a navy diver.
Former navy diver Ashley Semmens at Anzac Square and Memorial Galleries in Brisbane.Credit: Paul Harris
“If there was water, I was in it,” he said. “The ocean used to be a place that grounded me.”
That changed on February 11, 2009, when Semmens was part of a navy dive crew conducting a counter-terrorism drill in the depths of Sydney Harbour. The drill became a waking nightmare when able seaman Paul de Gelder was attacked by a bull shark, leaving Semmens to clean up “all sorts of body parts” strewn across the boat where de Gelder’s colleagues saved his life.
Ashley Semmens in uniform.
The ordeal left him with a debilitating fear of the water which, combined with his deployment to Afghanistan, contributed to his (then-undiagnosed) post-traumatic stress disorder.
One day in 2020, he found himself sitting on the edge of a cliff, ready to take his own life.
“I just made peace with death,” he said. “It was too much for me to deal with otherwise.”
New research commissioned by the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide estimates a current or former Australian Defence Force member seeks first-time emergency help for suicide every four hours.
The study, led by Professor Ed Heffernan and Associate Professor Carla Meurk from the Queensland Centre for Mental Health Research, found more than 1600 veterans had suicide-related contact with Queensland Police or paramedics in the three years from 2014 to 2017.
Meurk said general practitioners and other Medicare-funded providers were the most likely health service to have treated veterans in the month before their encounter with police or paramedics, highlighting the “profound importance of GPs” in treating the mental health of current and former ADF members.
“There’s a balance to be struck,” she said. “If someone does disclose distress, it’s important we don’t stigmatise them, or pre-pathologise the mental health of a certain group [veterans].”
Semmens said many serving members dealt with their problems in silence because they feared disclosing mental health issues would result in them losing their jobs.
“That’s what happened to me. Once I put my hand up and said, ‘I’m really not doing too well,’ I never put a uniform back on,” he said. “Effectively within a 12-hour period, I went from being someone to then being no one.”
One in five veterans included in the study was serving at the time of their first contact with emergency service for suicide. Semmens said his suicide attempt, while he was employed by the navy, dispelled the argument that staying in Defence reduced veterans’ risk of suicide.
“Just because you’re in uniform, that’s not a protective factor,” he said.
Nick Kaldas, chairman of the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Commission chairman Nick Kaldas said Defence had long believed serving members were at lesser risk of suicide than the general population, but military chiefs giving evidence at the final block of hearings in Sydney last month accepted the growing body of evidence linking suicide and national service.
“This research demonstrates there is a clear link between service in the ADF and suicide and suicidality,” he said. “We’re not blaming anyone, but there’s certainly been a reluctance by Defence to admit that.”
The royal commission is due to deliver its final report to the governor-general by September 9.
Crisis support is available from Lifeline on 13 11 14. If you are a current or former ADF member, or a relative, and need counselling or support, you can contact the Defence All-Hours Support Line on 1800 628 036 or Open Arms on 1800 011 046.
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