Diver missing in Ontario

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During my diving instruction, it was drilled into us... use your common sense.

If you go out on a dive even with the most experienced divers are you a lemming that you just follow along.

I have been diving in this area before, just looking at the water there will tell you about the currents in the river.

Yes I do blame the people he was out with, but in the end he had the choice to say no
 
During my diving instruction, it was drilled into us... use your common sense.

Problem with this on its own is that Common Sense needs to be based on something. You can look at a river and picture a smooth bottom with nothing to get entangled on if you have never dove a river. This was a NEW diver so he was still building on common sense. Without experience you cannot have common sense.
 
My opinions may seem a little harsh to some, but in the end you are responsible for your actions.

No one forced him to do it.

Yes he followed along, yes the other people should have warned him, but in this case just looking at the river in that area should have been the first clue. The water is boiling with the current.

When I dove there, some people standing around watching us get ready questioned our diving there, but our plan was to stay together ALWAYS, we were joined with buddy lines, and if we were separated, even for a few seconds, surface. If we ended up having to walk home, we all walked. This worked on more than one outing.... and yes we all had to walk home a few times.

Again you are responsible for your decisions, in this case the ultimate price was paid.... sad but true.
 
Man, I wish I were a good diver like you.

As to whether new divers are lemmings with more experienced divers in their first few dives after OW; the short answer is... yes. Most divers with "common sense" know this.

The purpose of the A&I sub forum, as far as I can figure, is not to slam dead divers and boast how we would never make such stupid errors ourselves. That belongs in the Stroke sub forum. It is to look at incidents and see what went wrong so that lessons can be learned to prevent similar incidents in the future.
In this case the lesson to be learned is not to take inexperienced divers on dives beyond their capacity and leave them there alone. We need to assess a dive based on the least experienced members ability and not our own (unless of course we are the least experienced). Trying to "ultimately" blame the deceased in this case negates the glaring lesson to be learned and is like blaming a blind man for being run down by a driver who runs a red light. After all, everyone should be aware of their surroundings shouldn't they?

My opinions may seem a little harsh to some but I believe, in the end, we should be responsible for our opinions.
 
That belongs in the Stroke sub forum.

How the heck did I miss that forum? I would have thought I would have been invited to be a forum leader by now :D.
 
Man, I wish I were a good diver like you.

My opinions may seem a little harsh to some but I believe, in the end, we should be responsible for our opinions.

I may not be a "good divier" but after 30 years, I must be doing something right because I am still here.

My opinions, are just that, my opinions, these days all people want to do is assign blame to others.

My statement is only that you are responsible for yourself.

Years ago there was a near death at Toby because a 18year old girl said she had enough experience to do a ~ 100 foot dive. She wanted to go because her boy friend was going. She almost died, but was saved by some quick thinking by others.

People said how could this happen .... she should not have been allowed to go this deep ( basic C Card only).

They tried to blame everyone but the girl, when as I said before is responsible for her decision.

This could have resulted in more than one death, but did not. If you lie about your ability and put others in danger am I still to blame and be responsible and supposed to watch your back?
 
If you lie about your ability and put others in danger am I still to blame and be responsible and supposed to watch your back?

So what do you know about this incident (topic of this thread) for you to accuse the diver of lying about his experience?
 
I've been following this thread since day one. Does anyone yet know (factually) what really happened to this diver? Did he die because of a health issue, narcosis, equipment failure, physical injury, etc?
 
I may not be a "good divier" but after 30 years, I must be doing something right because I am still here.

That, in this case, is not the point. The two expereinced divers are also still here. The point is that, when buddying with another diver particularily someone on their first post cert dive, there is an obligation to be there for them and to make decisions that do not put them in harms way; and to consider their experience level when making them. That is the lesson to be learned. Everybody gets your point about personal responsibility but in this case, as it is described, it isn't really relevant.
Again, it's like telling the blind person they ultimately are responsible for their own safety when crossing the street and ignoring the driver who runs the red light. No right thinking person would analyse an accident scene that way if trying to prevent similar occurances in the future. They may warn the blind to be more diligent but the focus would be on the person running the light.


My opinions, are just that, my opinions, these days all people want to do is assign blame to others.

But aren't you blaming the deceased diver here?

My statement is only that you are responsible for yourself.

Fair enough, as long as you tell everyone up front that you are opting out of the assumed duties of a diving team. Otherwise, some divers may have a different expectation of group resposibility than you.
It's only half the equation in team diving. The other half is that by being responsible for yourself, you are able to assume responsibility for your team mate(s). Everybody brings their A game for the good of the whole, not just themselves. In this case, again from what has been described, the two experienced divers were responsible for themselves but abdicated responsibilty for the most inexperienced member of the team.

Years ago there was a near death at Toby because a 18year old girl said she had enough experience to do a ~ 100 foot dive. She wanted to go because her boy friend was going. She almost died, but was saved by some quick thinking by others.

People said how could this happen .... she should not have been allowed to go this deep ( basic C Card only).

They tried to blame everyone but the girl, when as I said before is responsible for her decision.

This could have resulted in more than one death, but did not. If you lie about your ability and put others in danger am I still to blame and be responsible and supposed to watch your back?

Interesting story but hardly germaine to the discussion. You can't even compare a basic C card diver to someone on their first post cert dive. And you can't compare a newbies error in judgement against the far greater error of the experienced divers who left the diver at depth alone.

And yes, as long as they believe you are their buddy and you don't correct them, and you are not putting yourself in immediate danger, you are responsible to watch their back. Is that really news to you? If you don't want that rsponsibilty don't be their buddy. But don't become someones buddy and then bail on them part way through the dive because their skill level doesn't match your own. Call the dive, quit the team and carry on solo if you wish. That's the responsible way to terminate an obligation to a buddy.

We could argue about this all day but I think I've made my point. I'm a solo diver who can get himself out of just about every situation I can think of in recreational diving (touch wood). However, I'm also at times a member of a buddy team and I do not use that mindset when diving with a new diver. I scale it down to what I percieve their level of ability to be. That's my responsibilty, not theirs.
 
To add to the situation - one of the experienced buddies was apparently the deceased's OW instructor. So is there a case to be made that the point of "diving within your limits in conditions similar to what you've been trained in" wasn't made, or wasn't made clear enough? I also wonder how many new divers who have heard the comment of diving within your limits and in conditions similar to what you've been trained in would suddenly question the instructor who said that when they are willing to buddy up on that dive? I am also curious if an argument could be made that there was a duty of care in this case even though the contract for training had expired at the completion of the training a few hours earlier?
 
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