Coroner's findings in 5 scuba death's

[ScubaFishee]

Diver0001,
It concerns me because she didn't know how long it had been since they started the dive.
Would it not be a wee bit of problem figuring out when you should end the dive if you didn't know when you started the dive?

Kracken, I definitely understand your point of view. However, when I read her statement, I interpreted it to mean that she couldn't tell you definitely NOW how long into the dive it was that her buddy notified her she was low on air.

From that, I can't necessarily draw inference whether she was or was not aware of her dive time when these events occur.

Throughout my dives, I am aware of my time, but even so, I can't necessarily remember and tell someone (hours, days, weeks or months) after the fact how far into the dive a specific event happened.

 

[Diver0001]

Diver0001,
It concerns me because she didn't know how long it had been since they started the dive.
Would it not be a wee bit of problem figuring out when you should end the dive if you didn't know when you started the dive?

OK, that's what I suspected but I'd say it depends on how you dive. You probably learned (as I did) diving on tables. For those of us who started using computers after years of using tables knowing your bottom time at every moment is just second nature. I also use my bottom time as a navigational aid, but that's another tangent entirely.

However, there is a whole new generation of divers now. Ones who never dived on tables, ones whose computers
display NDL in the middle of the screen and bottom time in some little corner where it's not in the way..... :11: These new generation divers know when to end a dive because either (a) pressure is getting low or (b) the computer says the NDL is approaching. I don't know if you have a computer but I guarantee you that by "riding" the computer (ie, just looking at pressure and NDL) you can make a dive without any notion at all of the your bottom time.

I would also submit that some "new generation" instructors use their computers like that and once again, although I'm not saying that this is the *best* way to dive, her comment made me think she was riding her computer and it didn't strike me as strange that she didn't know the bottom time.

R..

 

[The Kraken]

I'm so redundantly anal the I look up my butt just to make sure I put my head up there to begin with.

I dive a computer but I always plan the dive based on the tables.

 

[DBailey]

Kracken, I definitely understand your point of view. However, when I read her statement, I interpreted it to mean that she couldn't tell you definitely NOW how long into the dive it was that her buddy notified her she was low on air.

Was it that she couldn't tell at that point in the dive, or that she couldn't recall exactly when being debriefed?

 

[aquaoren]

I agree that Ms. Barrington's decision to continue diving when diving was clearly contraindicated by her lung condition was the root cause of the accident.
The buddy's actions were not appropriate but were secondary to the cause of the accident.

The regulatory implications of the suggestion for an annual med exam for divers are a little scary. A flight physical makes sense for pilots given that they are capable of carrying passengers and crashing aircraft into schools, churches, etc and killing innocent bystanders. However in the US a private pilot is only required to get a physical every 2 years. And more importantly, the underlying argument does not really apply to diving as divers don't carry passengers and are not a threat to any innocent bystanders. In essence the only person who would be protected by a annual med eval would be the diver and the diver is already in a position to know their health condition and make the choice whether to dive or not.

Ms. Barrington clearly knew she should not have been diving but dove anyway. Had legislation requiring a medical vertificate been in effect, the lack of a current medical certification may have kept her off a chartered dive boat, but it would not have prevented her from shore diving or from diving off a freind's vessel. So at best it would have just changed the location of her eventual fatal accident.

Considering the buddy system, would it not endanger anyone, who dives with a such a person?

 

[SDAnderson]

I'm so redundantly anal the I look up my butt just to make sure I put my head up there to begin with.

ROTFLMAO. Not a pretty image but funny.

On a more serious note:
The victim (Barrington) should not have been diving, knew she should not have been diving and chose to dive anyway. Although most of us regard her decision as reckless, I'm not happy with the idea of taking the right to make that decision away from her and giving it to the state. Call me ornery, I guess.

Some questions:
As a general rule, aren't in-water DM's are presumed to be acting as guides and to have supervisory responsibilites for the entire group? In my experience it's fairly normal for an in-water DM to buddy with weak divers and solo divers in the hope that the DM will be able to keep something of an eye on them, but that DM still retains supervisory responsibility for all of the divers.

So what do you do in a situation like this one? You've got a newish diver as a buddy who has experienced some problems on the surface but who seems to be under control now and has run low on air long before others in the group. We aren't talking about some made-up hypothetical situation here - this happens hundreds (if not thousands) of times every day.

Buddies should end the dive together, DM's should remain with the group - uh oh. As the DM, should she leave the other divers on the bottom? Or should the entire group be forced to end their dive? Or should she send the LOA diver to the surface and continue the dive with the rest of the group? Three choices that don't reconcile, yet must. You could resolve the conflict by never letting the DM act as anyone's buddy, but what do you do with the solo divers that routinely show up, especially in vacation destinations?

Given the conditions: the bottom was at about 20 meters/65 feet, visibility was somewhere around 15 - 20 meters/50 - 65 feet, the LOA diver had 70BAR/1000psi of air, was it unreasonable to allow the diver to return to the boat on her own in this situation? Does it matter that the DM didn't send her to the boat alone but instead asked the victim if she was going to be able to return to the boat alone before making a decision?

Sometimes bad stuff happens. We should try to learn something when it does but also need to consider the costs associated with fixing the problem - are the many changes in SOP that would need to have been made to keep this victim alive justified? Personally, I think not.

 

[Diver0001]

Some questions:
As a general rule, aren't in-water DM's are presumed to be acting as guides and to have supervisory responsibilites for the entire group? In my experience it's fairly normal for an in-water DM to buddy with weak divers and solo divers in the hope that the DM will be able to keep something of an eye on them, but that DM still retains supervisory responsibility for all of the divers.

Yes this is common but in my opinion a DM in the water should never try combining the rolls of guide/supervisor and buddy. The rolls are incompatible.

So what do you do in a situation like this one? You've got a newish diver as a buddy who has experienced some problems on the surface but who seems to be under control now and has run low on air long before others in the group. We aren't talking about some made-up hypothetical situation here - this happens hundreds (if not thousands) of times every day.

As DM you hvae two options. You either ascend with your buddy (as you should) and leave the group, perhaps rejoining them once your buddy is on the surface where the people topside can take over, or you couple your buddy on someone else for the ascent (sloppy). This is exactly the reason why a DM in the water should never try acting as a buddy to someone in a group.

Given the conditions: the bottom was at about 20 meters/65 feet, visibility was somewhere around 15 - 20 meters/50 - 65 feet, the LOA diver had 70BAR/1000psi of air, was it unreasonable to allow the diver to return to the boat on her own in this situation?

Yes. You're a buddy or you're not.

Does it matter that the DM didn't send her to the boat alone but instead asked the victim if she was going to be able to return to the boat alone before making a decision?

Well....this solution is common but being common doesn't make it right. It's an avoidable situtation and the DM shouldn't allow themselves to get in this position.

 

[annie]

Sometimes a DM will have an uneven number of divers and may have to buddy with one of them. One way around that is to have other DMs available to dive as buddies to the solo divers that show up . . .it is my understanding that this was the case here, as the DM on the boat was the DM in charge and the DM diving was acting as a buddy.

If a DM is fulfilling both roles, I believe the key to managing this is to have as full an understanding as possible of each diver's experience, plan the procedure and brief the group, all in advance. Even if the DM is supervising and has no buddy, you might have the same issue if you buddied two solo people together and one person hoovered up their air.

What to do then? On reflection, I think I would plan the dive in such a way that we came back to vicinity of the boat early, I would bring up the OOA diver, instruct the group to stop and wait under the boat, go back down, resume dive in other direction / boat vicinity as buddy of other diver. That's *if* entire group needed in water supervision. There will be situations where you can let experienced buddy pairs continue their own dive while you deal with OOA diver. Thoughts?

 

[fins wake]

Sometimes a DM will have an uneven number of divers and may have to buddy with one of them. []. . .it is my understanding that this was the case here, as the DM on the boat was the DM in charge and the DM diving was acting as a buddy. []Thoughts?

Yup, the DM-in-charge being on the surface is a bad idea. It's common in some countries, but it's not very useful under the surface when leading novice divers (which again is not the optimal way to enhance buddy skills etc, but which seems to be the norm in warmer climes).

Your suggestion as to what the DM below should have done is a good one BTW.

Incidentally, the reason I also think the DM below failed in her duties, is because of the rate at which the deceased diver used up her air. In combination with her previous mask problems, and her "doglike" following of the DM at every turn "just waiting for [the DM]", I think the signs of a stressful dive are all there. The sudden tapping on the shoulder at 70 bars is a typical giveway ...

So yes, this particular diver should have been escorted to the surface. She was clearly an accident waiting to happen.

That said, primary blame for the accident rests with the deceased diver herself. Prime responsibility rests with each certified diver, and in this case, her obvious covering up of her medical problems were to blame. As the coroner also found.

As an aside, I'd be careful about assuming the deceased actually was an experienced diver. 25 years a diver to many of us would imply at least a thousand dives or so. But I know many "divers" who were certified 25 years ago, who have had three or four dives every other year for the first 15 years on average. Then nothing. A grand total of some 50-odd dives, far apart and not conducive to good learning. The big break is a killer as well.

Also, a "cave" dive in a coroner's report could well be a dive in the light zone of a cavern. Something many OW divers do.

Of course, it's sad to speculate about a real-life deceased person, and even more sad to second-guess a real-life alive DM.

The purpose thereof is however of benefit to living divers who follow and participate in these fora. If that can save just one life in the future, our brain storming on this board is not in vain.

 

[Diver0001]

Sometimes a DM will have an uneven number of divers and may have to buddy with one of them. One way around that is to have other DMs available to dive as buddies to the solo divers that show up . . .it is my understanding that this was the case here, as the DM on the boat was the DM in charge and the DM diving was acting as a buddy.

HI Annie,

I have a slightly different take on what to do with an odd number of divers. Namely that you either create a 3-some or add another DM to the group to act as a buddy. Once again, if the DM is acting as a guide then it's unwise and complicated to also act as a buddy.

If a DM is fulfilling both roles, I believe the key to managing this is to have as full an understanding as possible of each diver's experience, plan the procedure and brief the group, all in advance. Even if the DM is supervising and has no buddy, you might have the same issue if you buddied two solo people together and one person hoovered up their air.

Not at all. If two solo divers are buddied up then they are buddied up. If one goes through their air faster than the other then they end the dive the way they started it. Together.

What to do then? On reflection, I think I would plan the dive in such a way that we came back to vicinity of the boat early, I would bring up the OOA diver, instruct the group to stop and wait under the boat, go back down, resume dive in other direction / boat vicinity as buddy of other diver. That's *if* entire group needed in water supervision.

If the entire group needed supervision then you'd be at an even larger disadvantage to try combining the rolls of supervisor and buddy. Your solution of taking a LoA diver to the surface and returning to the group is possible but not always practical and you lose supervision for the time you're away. If conditions and experience levels allowed it, what you could do is group all the LoA divers together in pairs and send them up with their new buddy.... The divers who are over could continue and would be buddied up with whoever is left. This can get a little tricky if the group is large but under some circumstances I would consider it.

And clearly if the group is too inexperienced that you can't leave anyone alone then the reality is that you can't be in two places at once and the whole group will have to end the dive when the first diver is LoA. In this case working with several DM's helps. In our guided diving we often have, for example, three DM's to a group of 10-12 and if the divers are very inexperienced it's 2:1.

There will be situations where you can let experienced buddy pairs continue their own dive while you deal with OOA diver. Thoughts?

Absolutely. If this is possible you'd be crazy not to let experienced divers carry on their own dive if they can and wish to.

R..