Another lost to Gulf of Mexico oil rig spearfishing

[JohnN]

I belive this is in reference to a spear fishing club in southern Lousiana.

Hell Divers Spearfishing Club

Hmmm. . . From their Bylaws and Constitution:

Activities of the club will extend from simple diving to exploration
of the undersea to the recommended safe depth limits for sport divers. (2/11/85)

and

3. Only compressed air will be used for diving.

 

[Freewillow]

I would have also added air in my BC. Never been at that depth, and hope I will never will, but that's the best way to avoid exercice. With 500 PSI in your thank you want to go up as fast as medically safe.

 

[Bob DBF]

Hmmm. . . From their Bylaws and Constitution:

Activities of the club will extend from simple diving to exploration
of the undersea to the recommended safe depth limits for sport divers. (2/11/85)

and

3. Only compressed air will be used for diving.

To be fair the first quote was only a part of the first objective of their club:

1. To undertake all diving applications for scientific purposes or as a sport, using underwater
equipment. To encourage the sport of underwater spearfishing as a recreation and as a potential
source of diving knowledge. Activities of the club will extend from simple diving to exploration
of the undersea to the recommended safe depth limits for sport divers. (2/11/85)

Since it looks like it was written in '85, I don't see a problem.

Back in the day, the recreational limit had been set at 130 ([-]down[/-] up from 190' when I started) by agreement of the Agencies. However, advanced divers (not AOW) set their own safe limits as tech divers (who had yet to be given a name) do now. In addition, Voodoo gas was highly suspect at the time.


http://helldivers.org/constitution/HelldiverClubConstitution.pdf



Bob
----------------------------
Although it may be short, SCUBA has a history.

 

[DandyDon]

Is helldiver some "type" of diver?

And an interesting book, one I read when I first started diving: The Helldivers' Rodeo: A Deadly, Extreme, Scuba-Diving, Spear Fishing Adventure Amid the Offshore Oil-Platforms in the Murky Waters of the Gulf of Mexico: Humberto Fontova: 9780871319364: Amazon.com: Books

 

[FinnMom]

The book Helldivers Rodeo is full of dining stories with depths and express trips up and down the water column pretty much just like the incident description. That's what most of us are thinking of from the reference.

Storytelling aside, I suspect it's still true that them boys don't dive like us ord'nry folks.
As for getting away with it, us ordinary folk are generally no where near as young and as fit as these guys.

 

[Steve_C]

As for getting away with it, us ordinary folk are generally no where near as young and as fit as these guys.

They don't always get away with it as this thread shows

 

[oldschoolto]

with only the gear for a 110' dive, but he did it to try to save a buddy not because he thought he'd just skip down to 235' on a 80 and shoot fish.

This speaks volumes about Louis.... To go after a friend in need.... It was like watching a friend of mine chase a unconscious skydiver through 1000 feet.... And pull for them... He was under canopy at 200'.... :shocked2: My hats off to him... He pushed it as far as it was humanly possible to save him....

Luis did the same thing.... you are a very luck person to have a friend like that looking after you...

And yes... Mike failed to stay with the plan... There was a plan if you read the story... He paid with his life... That's the lesson to learn from this...

Jim...

 

[Hetland]

Does it make sense that he would inflate his BC to begin his ascent from 235'? Seems like that could result in a runaway ascent... Perhaps he was way overweighted and that was the only way? Perhaps his buddy was overweighted as well, which is why he ended up on the bottom? Is there something about how people dive when spear fishing that would be consistent with this? It seems like people would wear less lead since they are carrying a gun. I recognize that this is leading into speculation territory, but I think there is something to learned...

If weighted correctly to be neutral at 15', one would expect anybody in a wetsuit to be negative at depth. At that depth most wetsuits will have lost virtually all their bouyancy. Alternately the diver in question could just be in good enough shape to be negative without weights. Many possible reasons to need to add air to BCD in order to achieve neutral bouyancy. And as previous poster pointed out - do you really want to do any work at that depth, PPO and tank pressure?

I would have also added air in my BC. Never been at that depth, and hope I will never will, but that's the best way to avoid exercice. With 500 PSI in your thank you want to go up as fast as medically safe.

He was apparently at the bottom. I'd bet dollars to donuts that he was simply anesthetized by nitrogen and CO2. Sitting on the bottom, reg in his mouth, eyes open, oblivious. When his tank (I'm guessing an aluminum 80) neared empty, it became buoyant, and he floated to the surface.

There are physiological reasons you don't dive deep on air, and this is one of them. Oxygen becomes toxic, nitrogen and carbon dioxide become anesthetics.

Spearfishing just adds another task to a dive and somewhat eliminates the buddy system due to the inherent nature of the sport. It really is for the most part a solo dive in most cases.

While that is correct, this is not your typical spearfishing dive. I have hundreds of spearfishing dives under my belt, and I wouldn't set foot on a boat with folks doing these types of dives. This isn't the first, and probably won't be the last person killed doing this type of stuff. The last of his buddies that died (that I know of) was about two years ago. Diving on a less-than full AL80, and diving deeper than recreational depths.

They don't always get away with it as this thread shows

Nope. They need to set up a bulletin board at the launch that has the number of days since the last fatality.

 

[t4e]

He headed up to shallow stops after a relatively short first dive of the day and did some but not all the called for deco time. Why the extreme surprise? A risky change in dive plan, going from 110' to 150' and then 235' with only the gear for a 110' dive, but he did it to try to save a buddy not because he thought he'd just skip down to 235' on a 80 and shoot fish.

you seem very certain about the length of the dive and the deco he did, just curious where you getting all that detail from, certainly not from the article

to me when you "haul ass fort the surface" doesn't sound anything like any deco was involved, in fact he only mentiones passing David at 200' then when he reached 30-20' his tank was almost empty...but like UCFKnightDiver, i guess he just got lucky

 

[cerich]

sad the kid died, they dive in a VERY risky manner, as long as they know and accept that and the potential for death and worse...so be it. For young guys with more balls than brains they may not understand the real risks and I hope they live long enough to learn them.