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How does a diver go missing? How do they get left behind or how do they drift from the dive site? Certainly no captain sets out that day to lose a diver. I don't remember a single day in 18 years that I said to myself "I think I'll see how it is to leave a diver at the dive site today." None of my divemasters or deckhands ever said "That diver is such an a$$hole I think we should just leave them here."
So how do they get left behind, because it happens every year, it happens over and over, and it's the most visible dive accident that can happen, and one of the most preventable. I have no statistics, but it seems to happen most (or at least we hear about it the most) right here in the USA.
I drive a liveaboard. We're different than day boats, we get guests and get to keep them for a few days. We learn their names, we learn their diving styles, and we learn their air consumption. Of course, they are new to us when we get them, just like a day boat, but we have a lot more chances to lose one than a dayboat does.
I mentioned in another thread that I thought it was morally wrong to leave a diver behind. I questioned the operators morals and attitude. What I was really doing was calling out the Captain. It is unconscionable to leave a diver behind, and if you do, it means to me that you don't care enough about the diver to bother to recover them, or at least look for them. I stand by the assertion, whether it's on a liveaboard in Raja Ampat or a day boat in Miami, or a snorkel boat on the reef in Key West. Funny how the snorkel boats on the reef in Key West, all 6 of them, all carrying 149 passengers, all on the same little patch of reef can figure out how to do a head count or roll call or get their folks back and go home again, but a dive boat in Miami or LA or WPB can't get the simple concept of "take care of your passengers" down pat.
So how do divers get left behind? Well, you might think that the diver wants to go home, so we will rely on the diver to make sure that the captain knows they are on the boat. Well, you'd be wrong. Any system that relies on the diver to take an action to make sure they are safe will fail. When DAN came out with the DAN tag system, I said to myself and to DAN "That'll never work. It relies on the diver to take an action to show that they are doing what they need to do to keep themselves safe". It doesn't work. Divers will not act in their own best interests. I have a friend who runs a spearing liveaboard. all diving is "live boat", meaning hot drops, or the boat can engage it's propellers at any time. He gives a thorough safety briefing, thorough dive briefing, and then shouts at them as they are jumping off not to come up under the boat. Guess where the divers come up. Man, there is a 1000 horsepower meat chopper under the flat end, and people come up under the boat all the time. We tell our divers that if they come up away from the boat, and they are too tired to swim, raise their safety sausage and we'll come get them. We might get a sausage one out of ten times. So any system that relies on divers to keep themselves safe will fail. That includes roll call. Every day boat I've been on in the keys (every one) does roll call. Roll call relies on the diver to take an action. It relies on them to say "here". I watch this roll call. Sometimes I'll have my wife answer for me. Now, I'm 6'2" tall 300+# with flaming (fading to white) red hair down to my waist. She is 5'6", 145# blond. I don't sound much like her unless we're yelling, and I sure as heck don't look like her. Her answering for me at roll call has never been questioned.
So roll calls don't work. DAN tags don't work. The only thing that works is the Captain. Remember the captain I called out a while back? The Captain has to ensure everyone is on board. The Coast Guard (in the US) does not allow the Captain to delegate this. The Coast Guard holds the Captain responsible for every person on that boat. When the Captain is facing the ALJ, the excuse of "the deckhand (divemaster is not a recognized title) was supposed to count, or call, or check" doesn't fly. The Captain is responsible for every person on that boat, and if the boat leaves the dive site, it's because the captain didn't care enough to check that every person was on the boat. Because if they cared enough to do it, they would have done it. I'm not willing to lose my Captain's license because my deckhand didn't do their job, or I relied on a diver to do mine.
There are a lot of folks out there who don't like me. They don't like my boat, they don't like my wife, they don't like my crew. They think we have too many rules. They think that I take the fun out of diving. Perhaps it's true, because I think that fun comes in behind safety and cleanliness. I like to take liveaboard vacations. I typically don't like how they smell, and I'm always appalled at how safety is given lip service, but it's rarely apparent that safety is the most important thing in the operator's mind. It seems to be fun that is highest on the list. Oh, well, we had fun right up until the boat burned. Or, oh, well, we had a blast until we all had to go home because a diver got bent. Now, I can't prevent you from having a diving accident, and I can't stop you from getting lost, or drifting off the dive site, or having a heart attack, or getting eaten by a shark. But I can sure as heck not move the boat until you are back on it, regardless if whether you had fun or not.
So how do they get left behind, because it happens every year, it happens over and over, and it's the most visible dive accident that can happen, and one of the most preventable. I have no statistics, but it seems to happen most (or at least we hear about it the most) right here in the USA.
I drive a liveaboard. We're different than day boats, we get guests and get to keep them for a few days. We learn their names, we learn their diving styles, and we learn their air consumption. Of course, they are new to us when we get them, just like a day boat, but we have a lot more chances to lose one than a dayboat does.
I mentioned in another thread that I thought it was morally wrong to leave a diver behind. I questioned the operators morals and attitude. What I was really doing was calling out the Captain. It is unconscionable to leave a diver behind, and if you do, it means to me that you don't care enough about the diver to bother to recover them, or at least look for them. I stand by the assertion, whether it's on a liveaboard in Raja Ampat or a day boat in Miami, or a snorkel boat on the reef in Key West. Funny how the snorkel boats on the reef in Key West, all 6 of them, all carrying 149 passengers, all on the same little patch of reef can figure out how to do a head count or roll call or get their folks back and go home again, but a dive boat in Miami or LA or WPB can't get the simple concept of "take care of your passengers" down pat.
So how do divers get left behind? Well, you might think that the diver wants to go home, so we will rely on the diver to make sure that the captain knows they are on the boat. Well, you'd be wrong. Any system that relies on the diver to take an action to make sure they are safe will fail. When DAN came out with the DAN tag system, I said to myself and to DAN "That'll never work. It relies on the diver to take an action to show that they are doing what they need to do to keep themselves safe". It doesn't work. Divers will not act in their own best interests. I have a friend who runs a spearing liveaboard. all diving is "live boat", meaning hot drops, or the boat can engage it's propellers at any time. He gives a thorough safety briefing, thorough dive briefing, and then shouts at them as they are jumping off not to come up under the boat. Guess where the divers come up. Man, there is a 1000 horsepower meat chopper under the flat end, and people come up under the boat all the time. We tell our divers that if they come up away from the boat, and they are too tired to swim, raise their safety sausage and we'll come get them. We might get a sausage one out of ten times. So any system that relies on divers to keep themselves safe will fail. That includes roll call. Every day boat I've been on in the keys (every one) does roll call. Roll call relies on the diver to take an action. It relies on them to say "here". I watch this roll call. Sometimes I'll have my wife answer for me. Now, I'm 6'2" tall 300+# with flaming (fading to white) red hair down to my waist. She is 5'6", 145# blond. I don't sound much like her unless we're yelling, and I sure as heck don't look like her. Her answering for me at roll call has never been questioned.
So roll calls don't work. DAN tags don't work. The only thing that works is the Captain. Remember the captain I called out a while back? The Captain has to ensure everyone is on board. The Coast Guard (in the US) does not allow the Captain to delegate this. The Coast Guard holds the Captain responsible for every person on that boat. When the Captain is facing the ALJ, the excuse of "the deckhand (divemaster is not a recognized title) was supposed to count, or call, or check" doesn't fly. The Captain is responsible for every person on that boat, and if the boat leaves the dive site, it's because the captain didn't care enough to check that every person was on the boat. Because if they cared enough to do it, they would have done it. I'm not willing to lose my Captain's license because my deckhand didn't do their job, or I relied on a diver to do mine.
There are a lot of folks out there who don't like me. They don't like my boat, they don't like my wife, they don't like my crew. They think we have too many rules. They think that I take the fun out of diving. Perhaps it's true, because I think that fun comes in behind safety and cleanliness. I like to take liveaboard vacations. I typically don't like how they smell, and I'm always appalled at how safety is given lip service, but it's rarely apparent that safety is the most important thing in the operator's mind. It seems to be fun that is highest on the list. Oh, well, we had fun right up until the boat burned. Or, oh, well, we had a blast until we all had to go home because a diver got bent. Now, I can't prevent you from having a diving accident, and I can't stop you from getting lost, or drifting off the dive site, or having a heart attack, or getting eaten by a shark. But I can sure as heck not move the boat until you are back on it, regardless if whether you had fun or not.