Bad News From Santa Rosa Blue Hole

[vincent54]

“Apparently something went horribly wrong, and he started to panic,”
Something went horribly wrong. Why say he panicked? No one was with him or witnessed the event. One of the forum entries mentioned zero vis. After reading about Mr Thompsons credentials, panicking sounds doubtful. He may have, but it's disrespectful to print it in an article with absolutely no basis. Whomever wrote that should retract and apologize.

 

[BDSC]

Thompson and another experienced diver Mike Young dove into Blue Hole on March 26, Gallegos said. They planned to have Young enter the cave and Thompson stay outside in a safety role, but Thompson decided to enter any way, Gallegos said.'

This is what jumped out to me in this story. They had a plan but for some reason Mr. Thompson didn't follow the plan. Perhaps we will never know why he decided to enter the cave instead of staying outside but you can't help but wonder if everything would have worked out OK had he stuck with the plan.

 

[Ayisha]

“Apparently something went horribly wrong, and he started to panic,”
Something went horribly wrong. Why say he panicked? No one was with him or witnessed the event. One of the forum entries mentioned zero vis. After reading about Mr Thompsons credentials, panicking sounds doubtful. He may have, but it's disrespectful to print it in an article with absolutely no basis. Whomever wrote that should retract and apologize.

It appears that was a direct quote of the Police Chief Jude Gallegos:

Experienced diver accidentally drowns exploring underwater New Mexico cave | Fox News

“Apparently something went horribly wrong, and he started to panic,” the chief said.

 

[DandyDon]

It appears that was a direct quote of the Police Chief Jude Gallegos:

Yeah, I doubt that the team is ready to discuss this yet, so the news is quoting whoever they can get to say something - accurate or not. I'm sure more information will be released from the team in time. The claims and stories we're getting now are designed to attract attention.

 

[dmoore19]

Expert diver dies in Blue Hole caverns in New Mexico

This link has pictures and video.

It also has a link to the Passings thread here on Scubaboard.

 

[scagrotto]

It appears that was a direct quote of the Police Chief Jude Gallegos

That excuses the reporter but the chief still said it, and there's no rational basis since there were no witnesses. Even if the apparent increase in tension on the line was caused by Thompson pulling "extremely hard" we still don't know why he did that. I'd hope that a police chief would be better at reaching conclusions based on the available evidence.

I've also got a bit of an issue with the "horribly wrong" claim, but I guess that's because I'm looking at it objectively and wondering what the (first) problem was. We know what the outcome was, and therefore that something went wrong and Thompson couldn't solve the problem(s). We also know that sometimes even a fairly mundane problem ends up being very serious, and most fatalities start with one mistake/problem but result from a series of mistakes/problems. I don't expect a reporter to really understand that, but "something went horribly wrong" just strikes me as a sensationalist cliche.

you can't help but wonder if everything would have worked out OK had he stuck with the plan.

Maybe it will turn out that it was a medical event or there's some other reason that he died while he happened to be in a cave, but if he died because he was in a cave the answer to that question is pretty obvious. That doesn't mean his decision to change the plan was bad, only that the result was.

 

[KevinNM]

That excuses the reporter but the chief still said it, and there's no rational basis since there were no witnesses. Even if the apparent increase in tension on the line was caused by Thompson pulling "extremely hard" we still don't know why he did that. I'd hope that a police chief would be better at reaching conclusions based on the available evidence.

I doubt you have been to Santa Rosa. It's a very small town. Pop 2800. There are 7 police officers on the department (as best I can tell). They don't have a lot of crime to solve, much less complex crime, and when they run into complex cases they bring in the sheriff or the state police. There also seem to be very few divers in Santa Rosa itself (lots of local kids swimming, but very few local divers.). What he's saying is almost certainly pretty much directly from the interviews of the participants and what conclusions they drew, and from what I understand they are qualified to draw conclusions from the facts they know. It's unfortunate that they couldn't recover the CCR unit, but such is life.

 

[DandyDon]

I'd hope that a police chief would be better at reaching conclusions based on the available evidence.

We are talking about a town of 2,744 at the 2000 census. The council and police force may well be better than many others of that size as the town and many citizens depend on tourist business, but still.

I don't expect a reporter to really understand that, but "something went horribly wrong" just strikes me as a sensationalist cliche.

The story had relatively sensational makings from the beginning in several ways, but since it broke late in the week, then much of the news industry took off for the weekend, there wasn't as much news competition as if it'd broke earlier in the week.

They had a plan but for some reason Mr. Thompson didn't follow the plan. Perhaps we will never know why he decided to enter the cave instead of staying outside but you can't help but wonder if everything would have worked out OK had he stuck with the plan.

Maybe, but the sources for those claims are questionable too. We may never know what he was thinking exactly, but when better sourced reports become available - we may well see a different story.

 

[rjack321]

Saddened to hear of another one lost. I don't want to speculate on the cause.

Does anyone know the water temp on the bottom there? Dry glove conditions? Or wet glove or bare hands?
And what type/size of line was being used?

 

[DandyDon]

Does anyone know the water temp on the bottom there?

Lows 60s F, top to bottom with the constant flow there. I wear neoprene gloves but have dived with thinner at times.