Diver dies in Richmond, TX while cleaning water tank

[Superlyte27]

Most people I know that have worked in water tanks don't drink municipal water. Just FFT
And the hatch provides adequate light as long as the tender isn't craning over it blocking the sun. This wouldn't be considered a cavern, because he can surface anywhere and have air. You can view in the picture the green hose that he could have climbed out with. It was tied at the hatch and down at the bottom of the tank.

 

[Garth]

I think everyone is assuming that this job is hard... I'm not saying it's easy but it doesn't sound comparable to dangers seen with cave diving. To me it sounds like the guy didnt really know how to dive. Drysuit or not if you cant dive you can't dive. If you only have ten dives you likely have not dealt with many issues underwater.
Whether it's the companies fault for letting someone in the water who doesnt know how to dive I don't know. A cert doesn't mean someone is good and comfortable underwater.

 

[Garth]

My point is I think people should stop comparing this to cave diving. It's a matter of the divers skill and experience that effected his performance and existence.

 

[DandyDon]

Yeah it's not like cave diving I don't think. This case sounds like an inexperienced, overloaded with new tasks, no help when there should have been - easy for panic to set in.

The lawyers and courts can decide the blame. I hope other divers learn to avoid a lot of this.

 

[Superlyte27]

Well, honestly, if this forum is meant to prevent future deaths... Here, i'll sum it up.

Don't take a job you are not qualified to do (or in recreational arena, don't do a dive you are not qualified to do)

If you are a company, do a better background check and ensure the diver you are getting is the diver you've hired. Or, if you knew what you were hiring and he died, shame on you, hope you lose everything.

Lastly, and this goes for every diver EVER, YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOU! IF YOU DIE, IT WAS YOUR CHOICES THAT COST YOU YOUR LIFE. Blame whomever you want, but had you been man enough to say "hey, I can't do this", you'd still be alive. We all have internal alarms, use them.

Guys, there is no mystery here. This was no different than being in a swimming pool sucking leaves out with the vacuum. So it was a bigger pool and a little bit deeper. 8' or 30' he was in the wrong place. He was not qualified to do this dive. But, this dive is barely different from being on a reef in the Keys. For any one of us, there's 10 things we could have done differently. He didn't do any of them. There were 3 fast exits to the surface, less than 15' apart. Vent Pipes, Ladder, 4" hose, etc. He had bailout. He could have dropped a weight belt.

 

[Cave Diver]

Cave diver- would you consider tis to be a "Cavern" type environment? Overhead but a little light a perhaps an airspace but certainly some special skills needed?besides, of course, experience with drysuit and practice with the cleaning equipment to prevent task overload.

No. I consider an "overhead" as something that physically blocks you from reaching the surface. That does not apply in this case.

 

[webjr]

Something just occurred to me... If these tanks are sometimes known to have toxic gases in the air spaces, shouldn't we start considering these to be "overhead environments" ? Not that it would have mattered in this case...

 

[Cave Diver]

Something just occurred to me... If these tanks are sometimes known to have toxic gases in the air spaces, shouldn't we start considering these to be "overhead environments" ? Not that it would have mattered in this case...

Hmmm... Interesting point. Under those circumstances, I would say yes to Tracy's previous question.

 

[Superlyte27]

I guess it would be possible, although I've never encountered it.

 

[dhaas]

This whole incident is very sad......

The limited amount of water cooling tank work I've done (very shallow, able to always have air pocket to come up) was on surface supplied gear as shown below.

This one was in 60F water maybe 8' deep after you went down the ladder from the building above.

4 days of 8 hours / day sucking sludge from a lime plant cooling tank. ZERO viz sucking out 3' -5' of collected silt first. Then we connected 8' sections of over 160' of pipe with rubber flex sections to the river nearby bringing in the water in a 36" pipe to the chamber.

Oh joy

Try finding the little hose clamp tool to re-connect those sections after it came off your harness in 3' of muck in zero viz

Point being, the guy I worked for was an Ocean Corp trained commercial diver and we NEVER put each other in harms way. ANY reason you're uncomfortable or not know exactly what to expect or do, get out......

It's simply grubby work that happens to be taking place underwater......

A bit too old for this stuff now

dhaas