I wanted to get this out myself before it gets picked up and the facts distorted.
My wife and myselft were together diving the wreck of the Cedarville in the Mackinac Straits in Michigan this last Saturday. She is OW, AOW and Nitrox certified, diving just over 2 years, with 94 dives experience. I am certified up through Trimix, have over 450 dives experience. We were both in dry suits and expecting a bottom temp of 42 degrees and NDL dive time of around 20-25 minutes.
There were six divers on the boat, we were the second team to enter the water. The dive master was in the first group.
All went as expected, there was a light current heading away from the boat, the water temp was warmer than expected, 50 degrees, and visibility was 30-40 feet. I was taking photos and she was staying within 4 feet of me at all times. At 9 minutes into the dive I snapped a photo and saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. She had dropped her regulator and was picking it up and placing it back into her mouth OK. This normally no big deal, but this time she spit the reg out right away and started choking, panicing and started trying to swim up.
I grabbed her reg and tried to put it back in her mouth but at this point she was panicing and fighting me. I lost hold of her reg so I then grabbed my reg and tried to put it in her mouth with the purge depressed and switched to my bungied backup reg. I held on to her and started swimming up from 73 feet.
Unfortunately I couldn't control the ascent very well with holding on to her and the trying to keep the reg in her mouth so I wasn't able to dump air as we came up. So we shot to the surface in about 30 seconds based on dive computer having a 30 second logging interval.
She stopped fighting me and went limp before we reached the surface and was vomiting and not breathing.
On the surface I towed her about 200 feet to the boat. We had been the second group of divers so only the captain was on-board at this time. While the captain held her head out of the water I got out of my gear and then ditched her gear and pulled her into the boat. She had a faint pulse so I did artifical respiration and chest compressions to try to clear some of the water she inhaled.
The dive master was in the first group and coming up she saw her gear floating away so she retrieved it but didn't know what was happened until she got on-board. She also works in the medical profession so she started cutting her out of the dry suit while I kept breathing for her. After a while she would start to take an occassional breath on her own and finally was breathing unassisted.
The last group in the water knew something was wrong when they spotted my camera on the bottom. They retrieved it and then they heard the banging on the hull and so aborted the dive.
We docked in Mackinac City where the Coast Guard and ambulance showed up. We took her to Cheboygan where they stabilized her. The decision was made to take her to Marquette since that is where the closest chamber was. They couldn't fly because of bad weather so she went by ambulance. We drove the 180 miles to Marquette General Hospital.
At the hospital they monitored her for an embolism and both of us for the bends. She did a 2.5 hour chamber ride Saturday night. So far I haven't shown any sign of the bends so I hope that means she is in the clear also.
Right now she is heavily sedated in the ICU with no damage showing on the x-rays or CAT scan. There is some lung damage so she remains on a ventilator but they are slowly reducing the oxygen levels while monitoring her blood oxygen levels.
The best we can determine is that she inhaled without purging the reg so aspirated lake water which started a choking/coughing fit which would lead to more water being aspirated. This may also be the reason she doesn't appear to have and embolism because she kept her airway open from the coughing. The short time period down (9-10 min), it being the first dive of the day probobly saved us from the bends although I'm sure my blood was fizzing pretty good.
What else could I have done? Once on the surface I inflated her BC and my wing but didn't dump any weights however she was floating fairly well out of the water and I was able to keep her head up.
Next, I didn't give her any rescue breaths on the tow to the boat; we tried to pull her aboard at first with all her gear on. It wasn't until I removed my gear and was able to get up on the swim platform that I first thought about getting the gear off.
Once on the boat we really needed sissors to cut the dry suit off, we were able to use a knife to cut the neck seal but sissors are quicker and safer for the diver and person using the knife in this type of a panic situation. Luckily one of the other divers had shears that openned up the suit quickly. The divemaster helped with removing the suit, encouraging me and letting me know I was doing the right thing which was a big itme in my mind - I was just hoping that I wasn't forgetting anything else I could due to help.
The dive boat either didn't have oxygen or no one could find it. Luckily there was a stage bottle of 50/50 with a reg on it that we were able to hold the purge button over her mouth once she started breathing on her own.
I'm sure others will find other mistakes but the important thing is that she is breathing and her prognosis is good for this stage. That CPR/AED and First Aid class I took last year come in very handy, I'm definately going back and taking the Rescue Diver class the next time it is offered!
Sorry this has gotten probobly too long but I wanted to ensure the facts as witnessed by someone who was directly involved got out before any speculation started.
Bob
