What we DO know (second-handedly by people "in the know"), is that she went lobster hunting on the Blue Tang at a location known as the Hole in the Wall. She was diving 30% Nitrox. The Hole in the Wall is a 140' plus dive, less if one remains on top of the reef (but not by much).
Amid all the speculation, I feel compelled to share what happened that day. BTW, we're all guilty of speculation - I've been trying to figure this out myself. I had posted this on another board and am just copying it over - it was hard enough to write the first time.
Eve had called me early in the week to dive on Friday with a group of our friends that have been diving together for a number of years. All was perfectly normal and we were in a great mood with the 4 day holiday weekend looming. The seas were 2-3 ft rollers, nice and easy. Eve was her usual chatty self as we talked of dives we wanted to do, trips we wanted to make to the Mona Passage and the Solomon Islands, her aging cats and the possible coming storms out there. All was well. Nothing was amiss.
I was part of the first group on the platform as we set up to dive. Eve and Quinn were a little further up the boat and would have been coming in behind me. We were probably in 120ish ft when we first dropped as my max depth was 111ft and I was probably 10-15 ft from the bottom. I immediately started heading just west of north as I had a 33% mix. (Eve's was 32%). Vis at the bottom was maybe 30 ft but it was quite murky in the middle of the water column. I moved into 100ft and was hopscotching some blow outs looking for lobster when Eve and Quinn swam over me giving me her classic parade day, princess wave.
I noted about then that it was pretty sharky. There were several (6-7) dusky sharks that were about 10 ft long and fairly agitated. They were darting around, zipping back and forth. I had my speargun but elected not to shoot anything given the shark activity. Quinn was spearing as were several of the others in our groups so I'm sure that was the stimulus for the activity. There was even a 12 ft hammerhead in the mix.
I hooked up with Eve and Quinn and we all stayed together bouncing from hole to hole. Eve was doing the photog thing. About 35 minutes into the dive we came to our last blow out. Quinn shot a nice hog fish there, I tickled out a nice size lobster. Eve had come down into the blow out and took pictures, then assumed her hovering position over us as we completed our tasks. My bug ended up being an egger. I held it up in the net to show Eve the size and then the eggs. She had her gauge in her hand as we made eye contact. There was no indication of any issues. I took my eyes off of her to free the bug out of my net (it was caught on the horns) and watched to make sure the Quinn had his fish strung and spear gun back together. Maybe 30 seconds. When I looked up she was gone - just like that. Assuming the she had drifted into the murky water and started to ascend, I left Quinn to catch up with her. I never did. I looked for her blue fins, her white tank, her bubbles in the water column but saw none of that. Given the bad vis, I didn't think a thing about it. I figured we meet on the surface. I did a 5 minute hang and was on the surface in 41 minutes with 1200 psi in my tank. The boat was close by picking up divers - I thought Eve, but no. They picked me up and Quinn - just a few feet away- just a minute later. We realized that Eve was not on the boat and we did not see her surface signal anywhere. Other boats in the area were immediately called to be on the look out and the coast gaurd was called well before Eve was "offically" late or overdue. There were probably 6-7 boats, 2 planes and a helicopter searching within minutes. There were divers from other boats dropped in our drop location within 15 minutes of us realizing Eve was missing. We all did 2 more dives looking as well. It was a heart breaking day.
What happened? I wish I knew. It was just that fast. She was there and then she was gone. Having dove with Eve many times, I know we were pretty well matched on air consumption. She never gave any indication that there was an issue or that she was low on air. She could have gotten to us if there was an out of air emergency. Eve carried several signaling devices for both above and below the surface and was very experienced. She would not have hesitated to use them.
What can we learn from this? It could happen to any of us. It could have been me or anyone else on the boat. None of us are getting any younger. I hate like hell that it was my dear friend Eve.
I am truly devastated by her passing. It just doesn't make sense. I've analyzed and re-analyzed this so many times that I'm just sick. I am so grateful she was found. I hope in time there will be some more definitive answers to provide closure. I'm equallly grateful no one was hurt while looking for her. Incidentally, all of the coast guard, marine patrol and PBSO officials involved were very professional, efficient, respectful and sensitive to our loss. I really appreciated that too.
Her smile, her sense of humor, her wave, her many Eve-isms will be greatly missed. Our Seafish Girl, Mermaid and Dive Diva can never be replaced.
We've got a great group of experienced divers in this community who are all rocked by this tragedy. Thanks to all of you for your support and thanks to all of you outside the South FL area for your good wishes and condolences.
Take care, stay fit and be safe out there. I never want to go through this again.
