Simon Mitchell

Simon J. Mitchell (born 1958) is a New Zealand anaesthetist specialising in occupational medicine, hyperbaric medicine and anaesthesiology. He was awarded a PhD in Medicine for his work on neuroprotection from embolic brain injury, and has published more than 45 research and review papers in medical literature.

Mitchell is an author and avid technical diver. He authored two chapters of the latest edition of Bennett and Elliott's Physiology and Medicine of Diving, is the co-author of the diving textbook Deeper Into Diving with John Lippmann, and co-authored the chapter on Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine in Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine with Michael Bennett.

Background Mitchell received a Bachelor of Human Biology (BHB) in 1988 and later a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MB ChB) in 1990 from the University of Auckland. In 2001, he received a Diploma in Occupational Medicine (DipOccMed) from the South Pacific Underwater Medicine Society. Mitchell then went on to complete a Doctor of Philosophy in Medicine (PhD) in 2001 and Diploma in Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine (DipDHM) in 1995 from the University of Auckland. Mitchell received his Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists (ANZCA) Certificate in Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine in 2003, and became a Fellow of the Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists (FANZCA) in 2008. He became a Fellow of The Explorers Club of New York in 2006.

Mitchell has dual Australian and New Zealand citizenship. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

On 23 August 2017, Mitchell delivered his inaugural lecture (as a full professor) at the Grafton Campus, Auckland, New Zealand.

Diving Mitchell began diving in 1972. In 2007, Mitchell and Pete Mesley were responsible for identification of the Port Kembla including recovery of the ship's bell. Mitchell attempted to recover a Robinson 22 helicopter engine from the poor underwater visibility of Lake Wānaka for use in the Transport Accident Investigation Commission investigation of the death of Morgan Saxton.

AHS Centaur

AHS Centaur was a hospital ship which was attacked and sunk by a Japanese submarine off the coast of Queensland, Australia, on 14 May 1943. Of the 332 medical personnel and civilian crew aboard, 268 were killed. Following World War II, several searches of the waters around North Stradbroke and Moreton Islands failed to reveal Centaur’s location. It was believed that she had sunk off the edge of the continental shelf, to a depth the Royal Australian Navy did not, and still does not, have the capability to search for a vessel of Centaur’s size.

In 1995, it was announced that the shipwreck of Centaur had been located in waters from the lighthouse on Moreton Island, a significant distance from her believed last position. The finding was reported on A Current Affair, during which footage of the shipwreck, underwater, was shown. During this time, Dennis had been convicted on two counts of deception and one of theft through scams. Jackson had been studying Centaur for some time, and believed that the wreck was actually another, much smaller ship, the long MV Kyogle, a lime freighter purchased by the Royal Australian Air Force and sunk during bombing practice on 12 May 1951. By the end of 2008, the Australian Federal and Queensland State governments had formed a joint committee and contributed $2 million each towards a search, and by February 2009, the tender for the project had received eleven expressions of interest.

Awards DAN / Rolex Diver Of The Year Award 2015 EUROTEK.2014 Discover Award UHMS Albert R. Behnke Award

In 2015, Mitchell was awarded a Bravo award by the New Zealand Skeptics for his rebuttal of claims in a The New Zealand Herald article about a Hyperbaric machine entitled ”Hope is in the air: Hyperbaric chambers – the real deal or a placebo?.