Deep Sea Detectives - Andrea Doria episode

[MASS-Diver]

So, was it just a gut feeling that lead you to think they were going to die on that final dive? They looked pretty sqaured to me. Did you think it was going to be a freak accident?

As you posted these guys have tons of experience, and Chatterton worked for many years as a commerical diver (he was almost killed on 9/11 but pure luck kept him for being at his job - doing commerical work ont he water under the towersthat day).

 

[mwilding]

Sea-Jay - please elaborate. That just sounds WAY hokie that you are getting gut feelings about people's dive plans that are narrated for a tv audience...

 

[pipedope]

in crumbling wrecks are *very* low percentage dives.

I don't like second guessing without all of the information so I won't speculate on if it would have likely been a sucess or a disaster. I wasn't there.

Face it, she is falling apart and it is probably not safe to do penetrations any more. But that would be a determination that would have to be made by people with lots of expereince and based on good survey data made on site just before the dive. Last years data may not be good enough anymore.

 

[Laser]

MASS-Diver once bubbled...
[B They looked pretty sqaured to me.

[/B]

And the dive plan was squared away?

 

[MASS-Diver]

Laser once bubbled...


And the dive plan was squared away?

Seemed OK to me...Chatterton and his support team go one way, Richie and his guys go another. From what I heard on the show their plan seemed OK. What was problem did you pick up on?

 

[SeaJay]

Well...

I'm not a psychic, and I'm not claiming to be one. I don't really believe in that stuff anyway.

I don't believe in ghosts.

The only thing I know for sure about God is that I don't know him/her/it; but I am open. There was a time when I was convinced of Christian beliefs, and there was a time when I was convinced that there is no God. But for years now, I can honestly say that the more I research into the God phenomenon, the more I know that I simply don't have a clue... And that I won't until I'm dead. Heck, I might not even know then. But I am suspect of those who say they know all about God.

I am not a spiritual person. I do not believe in magic. I am as down-to-earth as any one individual can be.

But I will tell you that I have been present in many cases where an individual has died, and there is a certain chain of events which occurs "in the wake" of an individual's death. And after many experiences with it, I can tell you that this "chain of events" does not start when the individual dies.

The "chain" begins before they die.

Those who have experienced it enough times may begin to pick up on it.

And I was picking up on it even before their last dive. It was really obvious when they were "flapping in the breeze" on their descent on that last dive... So much so that they aborted the dive.

Perhaps there are individuals in that dive team that have learned to sense death... Perhaps that is why they aborted the dive.

Those who haven't learned to sense this yet may confuse "sensing danger" with "sensing death." They may say, "Ohhhh... You meant that it was dangerous." Well... Yeah, sorta. But the 'Doria's always been dangerous. So what made that dive any different?

Well... It could be described as a "level of danger," but that's not entirely accurate either. It's more like a "level of danger" combined with "to what degree has the danger been managed" combined with, "what are the chances" thinking. It's sorta a culmination of all of the above... Along with forethought and "what if" thinking... With a healthy dose of the consideration of the person's intentions. Those who have done this sort of thinking long enough begin to notice a pattern of certain characteristics and the occurrence of death.

...That's about as scientific as I can get on the topic. It's not magic... Although some might call it "karma" or "mojo" (as in "bad mojo going on here.") Sometimes the ingredients of a "bad mojo" situation aren't really definable, and sometimes it's tough to explain to someone why you don't want them diving that day, or walking across the street right now, or getting in their car and driving right now.

...So I really can't tell you what, exactly, was wrong. I could talk to you about dive style and their equipment choices and their dive plan and all of that stuff... I could tell you how stupid it would have been to get that far into a deteriorating wreck and all of that... But heck, I could also tell you how statistically stupid it was to dive the 'Doria in the first place... But none of those account for the whole picture. Those things alone won't cause death. Those things aren't the reason that I was smelling death.

The "scent" was so powerful that I could even sense it through a "made for TV," edited show. I'd bet my regulator that if they'd had made that dive as planned, one of the divers would not have come back alive.

...And that's all I can really tell you about the feeling. I've come to learn to trust it, though. I'm glad they had to abort that dive.

 

[Soggy]

Have you recently been put on any medications?

 

[SeaJay]

No. Are you recommending that I should be?

I remember racing motorcycles with a buddy of mine... He was a sponsored Honda racer, and he was smaller and lighter than I was. His "crotch rocket" style street racer was lighter and more agile than mine was, although my bike was bigger. I used to taunt him on the straights by opening 'er up and playing, "catch me now" with him. His skills were nothing shy of spectacular, and exceeded mine in every way.

One night I took off when we hit the straights, on a road out in the Arizona desert that was dark and clear and hot and free of traffic. I remember that out there, the stars shone so brightly that you'd swear you were standing on the edge of space.

We played "catch me," signaling to each other all sorts of vulgarities, calling each other names and referencing how slow the other was. I'd kick it down a notch and blast forward, shifting from fourth gear to third at more than 140 miles per hour. (The bike had six gears - think about it for a moment.) Tucked behind the screen in a bubble of whirling air, I could not have been happier. Both of our eyes scanned the horizon for rabbits and coyotes, which wouldn't stand a chance at this speed. I remember by bike beginning to top out at nearly 200 miles per hour, and I remember his headlight getting smaller in my rearview. His smaller bike had tremendous advantages in quickness and agility... But he couldn't touch my top end. My hysterical laughter was completely drowned out by the sound of the air tearing open around me. At this speed, we were covering more than three miles a minute - the length of a football field in less than two seconds.

My buddy and I knew the road well - in fact, this sort of stupidspeed was something that we were uncannily familiar with... And this night was like many others.

At the end of the road, there was a curve - so gentle that it wasn't even marked for speed. We both knew it, and we both knew that we'd have to slip down into double digits to make it. More than a mile from the curve (about 20 seconds), we both sat bolt upright on our machines, letting the blast coming off of our windscreens nail us in the chest. The effect on speed was dramatic - in a matter of seconds, we slowed to 160. A downshift or two, and we were at 90. The gentle curve felt like a hairpin at that speed.

At the last moment, we both tapped our brakes to bleed off a few more miles per hour... But my buddy's bike stood up on it's nose and the rear tire lept into the air. I watched in slow motion as my buddy passed me to the outside of the curve, apparently completely content with the stunt we called, "high speed stoppies" - a sort of rolling, reverse wheelie. I remember thinking to myself, "Now? You wanna do stunts NOW?" My buddy was well known for this stunt, and he was a master at it.

When he hit that pole along the outside of the curve, his body exploded. It didn't register to me at all at first... Not until I wiped bone and brain off of my full face helmet did I realize that the wet feeling on my neck (the only exposed part of my skin) wasn't sweat - or even gasoline or oil from by buddy's accident.

I was the one that broke the news to my buddy's 7 year-old daughter that her daddy wasn't coming home. Not tonight, and not ever.

I struggled with that one for a long time, guys. And no, I don't streetrace any more.

I have yet to understand why someone so much more skilled than I - who was lighter and quicker and faster than me - bit it, while I simply rode it out. I banked my big bike and drove a peg into the pavement, stuck a knee out and throttled on to the exit of the turn. He was a sponsored rider. I was not.

Some day maybe I'll share my other experiences with death with you... This is the only case where I felt like I had a hand... If I'd throttled off just once and said, "You win," it would not have happened. I look at life differently now.

But the reason I tell you this is because I want to explain how one gets to recognize death as it comes at you. It's not a sense as in, "sight, sound, touch," etc... It's more of something that you develop over time after having been splattered - getting death on you - repetitively. You just start picking up on things.

...And I'm telling you - I'd bet my own life on it - that dive was headed one way... To disaster.

Consider this for a moment: The guy telling you this has run a motorcycle 200 mph in the desert at night. The guy telling you this scuba dived for nearly 12 years without a certification or any sort of understanding about scuba whatsoever. The guy telling you this climbs communications towers regularly - you know, the ones with microwave antennas on them - for a living. Last summer I was caught in a lightning storm while on one, at the 300' level. I am no stranger to risk; I am no stranger to death; and I am no stranger to stupidity.

But I am still alive.

And so is John Chatterton. That wasn't the way he was headed when he was headed down that anchor line.

"Medication?" Sure, man... I think I could use a good, stiff drink right about now.

 

[MASS-Diver]

Seajay, now that's a intense post, although I'd like a few more concrete reason why you thought Chatterton was a gonner. I guess I belive that certain people can sense when the crap is about to hit the fan when they are there in person, but, over the TV?


I've only seen a few people die myself (all in the hosptial where I work) and I've never really felt any vibes or anything (although certainly you pick on subjective stuff that someone is in bad shape), and, the only thing I've experinced in sadness and the feeling of being lucky to be alive, the whole life is short epiphany.

BTW, climbing communications towers, now that's nuts
you have my full respect there - those suckers are high.

 

[SeaJay]

(Sipping on a Mike's Lemonade)

Lol... Sorry. 'Guess I lost composure for a moment there.

I don't have a concrete reason. I'm sorry. Think of it more as a "Zen" thing and not so much of a "reason." You know... Like "women's intuition" and stuff. Try to concrete THAT one down. It's not really possible... But it doesn't make it any less real.

The closest thing that I could offer in terms of "concrete answer" would be an overall observation of the facts: Statistics regarding deaths on the 'Doria, statistics regarding the use of an Inspiration rebreather (specifically, the failure rate of them in regards to the recent world record dive), the fact that the wreck was completely unstable, and the fact that this dive was planned to involve a long, deep penetration into most unstable part of the wreck (the impact point). Add to that a strong current which was not able to be managed using his current skill level, the apparent lack of planning (maybe we just weren't privvy to it) and the fact that in three dives they planned to go places that no other diver had ever gone (so much for the "progressive penetration" theory - after all, they hadn't penetrated at all yet) and... Well... You can see that the chances of success were slim at best. What was worse was the fact that they didn't appear to have any sort of management plan for these risks. <-The "Big Picture"

...So there you have it. That's the "concrete" stuff. But that's not what I based my statements on. What I based my statements on was a feeling of "really, really bad mojo."

Sorry I don't have anything more creative than that. I'm glad they thumbed the dive.

Re: Communications towers: The largest is a whopping 1280 feet in height. It takes me nearly 4 hours to get to the top. Would make for a nice BASE jump, no?