Tag Archives: EMCM/MDV (Ret) Mary J. Bonnin

Mary Bonnin Closes her Dive Locker

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EMCM/MDV (Ret) Mary J. Bonnin has passed in an accident on dry land, near her home in Panama City, at age 63.

Wisconsin-born Mary joined the Navy in 1976, finished “A” school to become an Electrician’s Mate (EM), and became one of the first women (following Donna Tobias in 1975) to complete Navy Second Class Dive School in Little Creek in 1977 (with a 200-pound dive rig), graduating at the top of her class, the Honorman position.

After service on a dry dock, in 1982, she completed First Class diving school in Panama City, becoming the first enlisted female diver certified in both air and gas diving (with a 300-pound hard hat rig).

Finishing tours with USS Samuel Gompers (AD-37) working on ships husbandry, she became an instructor training at the Second Class Dive School at NAB Coronado for three years, then shipped out as Master Diver on the salvage ship USS Grasp (ARS-51), having made MD in 1990 by unanimous decision of the Board.

Keep in mind that of the 7,750 dive-certified personnel in the Navy, only about 1,300 are rated as Navy Divers (ND) and only about 75 of those are Master Divers.

She was the Navy’s only female MD until 2024!

She trained for another three years at the First Class school at Panama City, finished her uniformed career at the Naval Safety Center in Norfolk, Virginia as a Master Chief (E-9) Master Diver, retiring in 1996.

During her six years as a Navy diving instructor, Bonnin trained more than 1,000 divers, shaping that very small community for decades.

Mary Bonnin was inducted into the Women Divers Hall of Fame in 2000.

She had three sons, and reportedly kept diving for practice torpedoes while eight months pregnant with her first.

She hosted a great sub-Reddit and made a great podcast appearance on Bottom Dwellers a few years back.

And so we remember,

In Waters Deep– Eileen Mahoney 
In ocean wastes no poppies blow,
No crosses stand in ordered row,
There young hearts sleep… beneath the wave…
The spirited, the good, the brave,
But stars a constant vigil keep,
For them who lie beneath the deep.
‘Tis true you cannot kneel in prayer
On certain spot and think. “He’s there.”
But you can to the ocean go…
See whitecaps marching row on row;
Know one for him will always ride…
In and out… with every tide.
And when your span of life is passed,
He’ll meet you at the “Captain’s Mast.”
And they who mourn on distant shore
For sailors who’ll come home no more,
Can dry their tears and pray for these
Who rest beneath the heaving seas…
For stars that shine and winds that blow
And whitecaps marching row on row.
And they can never lonely be
For when they lived… they chose the sea.