Coast Guard Cutter Healy Deaths

[MikeFerrara]

I have to say something about using dry suits for buoyancy control.

Lots of divers are taught to do this. Are CG and/or Navy divers taught that?

If you are nearly neutral it works because about the time you relieve squeeze by adding air to the suit on descent, you are neutral. However, if you are heavy, whether because of balast or just big tanks with lots of air, it doesn't work well at all. If you have very much air in the dry suit and get in a head up orientation (out of trim) it will just burp out the neck seal and DOWN YOU GO!

 

[Rick Murchison]

I have to say something about using dry suits for buoyancy control.

Lots of divers are taught to do this. Are CG and/or Navy divers taught that?

If you are nearly neutral it works because about the time you relieve squeeze by adding air to the suit on descent, you are neutral. However, if you are heavy, whether because of balast or just big tanks with lots of air, it doesn't work well at all. If you have very much air in the dry suit and get in a head up orientation (out of trim) it will just burp out the neck seal and DOWN YOU GO!

Whatever they may be taught, having the BC's disconnected was a violation of standards and procedures.
Rick

 

[MikeFerrara]

Whatever they may be taught, having the BC's disconnected was a violation of standards and procedures.
Rick

I didn't see it in the report but I wonder if they might have been short an inflator hose and just pluged the BC inflator into the dry suit leaving the bc inflator without a hose?

 

[Rick Murchison]

I didn't see it in the report but I wonder if they might have been short an inflator hose and just pluged the BC inflator into the dry suit leaving the bc inflator without a hose?

I suspect that's why they didn't hook up the BCs (indeed, I can't think of any other reason they wouldn't hook 'em up). It is a violation of standards and that was stated in the report.
Rick

 

[Uncle Pug]

"The investigation uncovered a chain of events and decisions which, had any link been broken, this tragedy would not have occurred,"
~ Vice Adm. Charles Wurster, commander of the Coast Guard's Pacific Area,

 

[Doc Intrepid]

Another possibly relevant quote, regarding another possibly relevant tragedy:

"When the worst comes, it's from the recognizably human combination of honest mistakes, carelessness, refusal to consider the worst and sheer bad luck."

Charles Taylor
http://archive.salon.com/april97/sneaks/sneak970422.html

 

[Scared Silly]

I read the full report. Wow what a series of mistakes. Sad that this had to happen. I think the BOI report pretty much sums it up noting a series of failures from top to bottom.

 

[Seadeuce]

Very sad to see fellow divers die in any sphere. Condolences to the family.

Good to see that a report of this magnitude is released. The CG at least have their priorities correct in trying to ensure there will be no recurrence.

One lesson for us rec. divers is the misunderstanding of buoyancy, as shown in the report. Following a dive with that ended with a rapid ascent, Lt. Hill sought to avoid a repetition of same by effectively doubling the weight carried.A mistake in understanding that is not uncommon in rec. diving circles.

I am surprised at the ommission of any mention of a rupture to the eardrums of either or both divers.

If there was a rupture, then the severe vertigo that would follow would have had a debilitating effect on their ability to coordinate any jettisoning of weights.

Similarly, if there was no rupture, it would mean that they were too busy equalising on the rapid descent to take the appropriate measure of trying to jettison some weight.

Just a thought.

Seadeuce

 

[mikerault]

After coming out of the Navy Nuke program where everything has a procedure and you darn well better follow them, reading this report horrified and angered me. First off why were they ever allowed to do training dives in gear not PM'ed since 2002 in water over 1400 feet deep with improper training, experience and obviously bad supervision. Weren't the tenders told the dive was to 20 feet? Didn't they notice the lines not going horizontal? Let's see the slope would be 0.1 if they were moving at 20 feet deep horizontally and had moved 180 feet away (20/180). Geesh I am glad to see the officers that failed these coasties got fried. They shouldn't be commanding a row boat.

I'll shut up now before I say something I'll regret, but the above is a good taste.

Mike

 

[Tom Winters]

Reading this reminds of the Kara Hultgreen report.