Clearwater, Florida fatality November 7

[kelemvor]

A guy who was a diver suffered a heart attack.

What else is there to add? Sad that he was five miles out as that definitely prolonged the wait for immediate care.

We've got to go that far out to get to any dive sites around here, unfortunately. Unless you want to dive on a sandy bottom and hope to see a fish swim by, or chum for hammerheads.

 

[PfcAJ]

Sorry, dead is dead. Most diving deaths that go to a medical examiner are listed as: asphyxia related to drowning.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

sure. That's correct. But someone there or close to the decease might have pertinent info.

 

[Kublai]

The initial article (only article I have been able to find, no updates yet) was basically an immediate release-- "Something bad happened, no details." I live in the Tampa Bay area and have met many local divers even if only for a morning trip and so I am concerned, first and foremost, on a personal level. But also, I am a Divemaster candidate and I have a professional interest-- did it happen on the way out, on the way back, or in the water? Were they aboard a for-hire vessel with a professional onboard/ in the water with the diver? Both? Were they on a private vessel? If the patient had to be removed from the water, then it sounds like from the limited journalistic detail in the single article I have seen that someone was able to get them out of the water and that they were still alive while aboard the vessel. Did the vessel transport the patient to the marina, or did the USCG make a rescue. So this is a dive forum and I am posting a thread on "incidents and accidents." I was really just hoping someone in the forum population might be able to point me to another news source so I could follow this story over the coming days and learn from it. I think that's why we visit this part of the forum, yes?

 

[wgw04024]

Well, I can only speak for myself, but I find this particular event less interesting than most of the others. Assuming the original few details were accurate....a heart attack out at sea, I don't think anyone is surprised by the end result. If he had it under water, I'm not surprised by that either. Heart attacks happen, there is alot less to learn from one of those, than let's say....'forgot to turn my tank on'. Just my thoughts.

 

[Jax]

We've got to go that far out to get to any dive sites around here, unfortunately. Unless you want to dive on a sandy bottom and hope to see a fish swim by, or chum for hammerheads.

Understand. I meant nothing other than it takes a long time to get to treatment when you are out there.

 

[CuzzA]

This is what I read about the incident on another board. There was no linked source; however, this is our backyard and I know the gentleman who posted it so it's a good source. The media report was useless as they almost always are. In fact one report I read had a bunch of jibbersish text in the report. As if the writer had their 5 year old type it.

They were apparently diving on a hookah. First dive was 80 feet for about 1 hour. Second dive was at 40 feet, but it is believed they didn't stay up top long enough after the first dive before going back down again. At some point during the second dive the hookah crapped out and stopped working, so both had to shoot to the surface. That's when DCS hit both of them and the 37 year old went unresponsive. He was pretty much DOA, but the second guy came pretty close as well.

Embolism seems more likely if death was nearly instant. Maybe a combination of both, who knows. You wouldn't catch me doing anything deeper than 20 feet in perfect vis with someone top side on one of those things. Come to think of it the only time I'd use those things is to clean my boat hull.

 

[Herb-alaska]

i personally do not dive hooka but i know several that do dive hooks for harvest diving. Hooka is not the problem but hooka must be combined with a bail out bottle for not if but when there is a air delivery failure. I ran their numbers really quick so i could be wrong but they were in deco after 26 minutes of the first dive with something like a 26 minute deco obligation, based on that profile so they very well could have had a bubble hit regardless of what happened to the hooka on the second dive if the story that you present is correct. Is it possible the second dive was actually trying to clear their deco obligation? the root cause was not following sound diving practice . Sad they suffered from the concept of hey I have air so I can't be out of dive time

 

[rjack321]

Do people really do deco dives on a hooka? 80ft for 60mins on air is alot of deco to do (30+ minutes) with no redundancy or accelerated deco gases. Sounds crazy but its was FL so who knows...

 

[lv2dive]

C'mon Richard, you are better than that!..."it was FL so who knows" - people do crazy stuff everywhere, let's not pretend FL has a monopoly on crazy diver practices! [emoji4]

Do people really do deco dives on a hooka? 80ft for 60mins on air is alot of deco to do (30+ minutes) with no redundancy or accelerated deco gases. Sounds crazy but its was FL so who knows...