Deep Air survey

[WreckWriter]

Popeye once bubbled...
Got any around 140 ft?

I don't, not off the the top of my head. They're out there though, but then again so are the ones in 20' and 30'.

You cite the Bibb as an example. I'll agree for the most part she's a good example but I'm sure you heard about the fatility, almost double fatality, there a few years ago. A friend of mine got badly bent on the rescue. Narcosis related? Maybe.

WW

 

[Popeye]

WreckWriter once bubbled...


I don't, not off the the top of my head. They're out there though, but then again so are the ones in 20' and 30'.

You cite the Bibb as an example. I'll agree for the most part she's a good example but I'm sure you heard about the fatility, almost double fatality, there a few years ago. A friend of mine got badly bent on the rescue. Narcosis related? Maybe.

WW

1 death, -possibly- narcosis related, out of how many thousands of tourist divers in that same few years?

The odds are staggering.

And even if you did make this a trimix dive, with an END of 100 ft, what good would it do the guy that you mentioned that was badly narced at 100 ft?

Helium isn't a parachute, and nobody dives narcosis free.

My point is arbitrary limits, WW.

Divers should educate themselves, and train for their individual limits.

 

[Popeye]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...
As for the DAN report here I will reference the January (I think is was Jan) issue of dive training. They did a good piece concerning the dan report . They came to the same conclusions and stressed the same points that I do. It will be easier reading for you than the report itself.

You've cited this vague article before, how about an exact month and title, please. I don't take Dive Training, but will go out of my way to get one just to see this article.

I don't have any trouble at all reading the DAN accident analysis.

I've discussed it extensively elsewhere. If you get to the point where you could actually provide some actual facts and figures, I'd be glad to listen to your interpretation, and share mine.

 

[WreckWriter]

Popeye once bubbled...
1 death, -possibly- narcosis related, out of how many thousands of tourist divers in that same few years?

The odds are staggering.

And even if you did make this a trimix dive, with an END of 100 ft, what good would it do the guy that you mentioned that was badly narced at 100 ft?

Helium isn't a parachute, and nobody dives narcosis free.

My point is arbitrary limits, WW.

Divers should educate themselves, and train for their individual limits.

Hundreds, not thousands. Bibb isn't dived by many shops or very often because of the magic 130 number. You're right though, odds are still good.

I really do see your point, just don't have a good answer.

WW

 

[MikeFerrara]

Popeye once bubbled...


1 death, -possibly- narcosis related, out of how many thousands of tourist divers in that same few years?

The odds are staggering.

And even if you did make this a trimix dive, with an END of 100 ft, what good would it do the guy that you mentioned that was badly narced at 100 ft?

Helium isn't a parachute, and nobody dives narcosis free.

My point is arbitrary limits, WW.

Divers should educate themselves, and train for their individual limits.

One isn't enough you want more?

You are correct trimix doesn't eliminate narcosis but it is a very handy way of reducing it to a level that no one disputes is manageable.

Divers need to dive within team limits not just individual limits. Since the effects of narcosis vary person to person and also dive to dive for the same person it is very tricky to predict a team's ability to manage a given problem. Every dive I have ever been on except one where narcosis was an issue it was someone else who had the problem. However I was diving with them and it was my problem too. Those problems would never have existed if trimix was used for the dive. The best way to deal with any problem is to avoid it.

How do you train to manage narcosis? Overlearn emergency procedures? That's part of it but you lose reasoning ability and that's what avoids problems. I have never seen any evidence that says you can train for that.

Many dives especially those done following a guide can be done narced on your butt because there is no thought required. A diver can swim and breath while very narced. Many dives require little more than swimming and breathing so we can get away with just about anything. The problem comes in when more is required of the diver.

Perhaps you can tell us a little about the training and education you keep mentioning and how it enebles you to reason through a NEW problem under the effect of narcosis. Have you taken any classes from Hal Watts? It has been explained to me how he trains divers to deal with narcosis but I haven't gone through the process.

Can you reference a study that suggests divers can learn to reason under the effects of narcosis? So far your only argument is that lots of divers do it.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Popeye once bubbled...


You've cited this vague article before, how about an exact month and title, please. I don't take Dive Training, but will go out of my way to get one just to see this article.

I don't have any trouble at all reading the DAN accident analysis.

I've discussed it extensively elsewhere. If you get to the point where you could actually provide some actual facts and figures, I'd be glad to listen to your interpretation, and share mine.

The January 2003 issue the article is titled "Links in the Chain" The article includes among others these numbers from the DAN report for 2000 (the most recent)

Of 728 incedents

More than half involved procedural problems on the part of the diver.
4% running out of gas
5% unspecified equipment problems
8% missed decompression
nearly 25% reported rapid ascents
More than 40% percent of those injured reported difficulty maintaining buoyancy

The dan report gives seperate numbers for fatalities and incidents/injuries but the numbers show the same trend

Give me a little while and I'll pull numbers on the involvement of deep dives.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Page 57 of the DAN report shows that about 50% of the female fatalities were on dives to between 90 and 119 feet. While most may not think of this as deep in terms of narcosis I contend that it is too deep for many recreational divers. The same page points out that most fatalities seem to happen on the first day of diving and all but eight were on the first dive.

The report points out several other very interesting things like the number of dives in the previous year and the amount of training the injured divers had. Almost 100% of the female fatalities had between 0 and 19 dives in the prior 12 months. (page 53)

Page 52 about 30% percent of fatalities were divers certified for longer than 10 years. There is another big clump at 1 year and under and little inbetween

The report doesn't prove much about narcosis other than these divers don't need any but it sure seems to say something about the skill level of divers. IMO at least some if not most) of the blame should go to the way we train divers.

Every new diver that goes through my store sees this report. My purpose is to stress the importance of basic skills, continued training and frequent diving.

Buoyancy control seems to be far and away the big problem. That's also what will make you work harder at depth, retain more CO2 and have a hard time dealing with anything even without the slightest bit of narcosis.

IMO we are killing people by not insisting on good buoyancy control prior to issuing them a card and sending them on vacation to the Caribbean to do 100 ft dives.

 

[raybo]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...

IMO we are killing people by not insisting on good buoyancy control prior to issuing them a card and sending them on vacation to the Caribbean to do 100 ft dives.

Along with many of the other statistics you cite. I didn't get to read all of this thread, but went back a few pages. It absolutely amazes me how persistent the concept is that the skill level of the general divng public is even moderately adequate.

I am by no means a "very experienced" diver in terms of number of dives. But I was fortunately trained by someone who insisted that I understand very well the ramifications of diving irresponsibly. And I take the process of getting suited up very seriously every time. No matter where or what the conditions.

I don't find the statistical cite that a large % of accidents are early in a dve series, especially after a long hiatus.

I don't have the experience as an instructor to see divers on that regular of basis, but I can attest from my personal experience that it is extremely common for people to dive 15-20 dives on a vactation, and the entire "plan" process consists of listening to the divemaster tell them they are diving XYZ site, with a brief description of what they can expect.

Even before I took the rescue course (and much of the impetous to have done so) I saw many situtions where it was obvious an individual was struggling to maintian composure. No particular or common reason apparent other than the person seemed to be dealing with an unfamiliar situation.

IMHO, the one thing I see as lacking is an emphasis on the dangers of this sport. I know, I know... it's driven by the economics of telling people that and not being able to get more people involved. But how does that differ from the people that leave the sport after a near miss. You can bet they're going to pass that along by word of mouth. Especially if they perceive after the fact that it was a result of inadequate training.

But hey... I don't think they stress how dangerous it is to drive a car either. If you had people stand 20 feet away from one of those Insurance Institue crash tests, they'd get the idea real quick!

Back to the topic of deep diving. It's like snow skiing. You don't start out on the black diamond runs. Staying with that analogy, anyone who has much exerience with snow skiing knows that it takes years to get to that point. Not a one day lesson, unless you want to get hurt! It's incremental based on experience. The differnce is, with diving, it's much easier to enter the realm of higher difficutly without even realizing it. At least when you're skiing, you have to stand at the top and look down. (It's amazing how many people pass that up when all the can see is the first 50 ft, and the runout 1000 vertical feet below) In most case in diving, there isn't that distinct fight/flight., "Danger, Will Robinson" call made in you rmind.

My .03

 

[Popeye]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...
Page 57 of the DAN report shows that about 50% of the female fatalities were on dives to between 90 and 119 feet. While most may not think of this as deep in terms of narcosis I contend that it is too deep for many recreational divers. The same page points out that most fatalities seem to happen on the first day of diving and all but eight were on the first dive.

The report points out several other very interesting things like the number of dives in the previous year and the amount of training the injured divers had. Almost 100% of the female fatalities had between 0 and 19 dives in the prior 12 months. (page 53)

Page 52 about 30% percent of fatalities were divers certified for longer than 10 years. There is another big clump at 1 year and under and little inbetween

Okay, Mike, now put some actual numbers to the figures you just cited. I find it odd that you left them out. Don't forget to mention the percentage of natural medical causes. Nice of you to include your speculation with half the facts.

MikeFerrara once bubbled...
The report doesn't prove much about narcosis other than these divers don't need any but it sure seems to say something about the skill level of divers. IMO at least some if not most) of the blame should go to the way we train divers.

Well, here I thought we were discussing narcosis, while you were citing the DAN accident report as a supporting document.

Be sure to post the actual numbers, against the 8 million certified US divers.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Popeye,

The report is only usefull for certain things. Nobody knows how many active divers there are or how many dives are done per year. Also reporting is good in the US but from some parts of the world little or nothing is reported to DAN.

I didn't give total numbers because I was pointing out trends (causes of injuries). In the other post I did give the total number of injuries/incedents and the percentages though

See here from a couple of posts ago

Of 728 incedents

More than half involved procedural problems on the part of the diver.
4% running out of gas
5% unspecified equipment problems
8% missed decompression
nearly 25% reported rapid ascents
More than 40% percent of those injured reported difficulty maintaining buoyancy

Nobody knows what the injury rate per total number of active divers is. What I am cincerned with is the cause and wether or not it can be avoided.

Yes some are medical causes but modifying the way I teach won't fix that. That one is out of our control and I think if your going to have a heart attack your going to have it wether your in the water or in bed. For me it's a don't care.

I will be happy to talk about any number in the report that you want to. I made no attempt to present the entire report.

I think the report shows that deep dives seen to be a problem or that's all divers are doing.

I guess I don't care what the odds (deaths or injuries per num of divers) are because I believe that if we fail to avoid even one that is avoidable we messed up. The dead diver or their family will not excuse the poor training because theirs was th only loved one that got hurt.

Your not willing to discuss any data are you. You even suggest that I twist the DAN report? Yet you offer nothing at all.