Fatality off of Point Lobos, California

[tye1138]

Here's the thing ... do students understand why they're doing these drills? Do they do it just because they have to in order to pass the class? Or do they comprehend the reasons why these skills are taught ... and why it's important to get comfortable doing them? OW students lack context ... and the only context they'll have once class is over is what they got in class. That's the foundation upon which their skills will be built as they continue diving.

I agree with you straight up, they lack context. However, you can build in context in how you teach. Not in drills, but in artificially creating environments where they need to use certain skills. See if there instinct is correct.

I had a student last year struggled with mask clearing. We worked at it and eventually she got it OK ... but you could tell she dreaded doing it. I made her do it again and again. After a while she got mad at me and asked me what I was expecting her to do. I told her I expected to see her clear her mask like it was no big deal ... because after this class was done if she had to clear her mask I wouldn't be there ... and her buddy might not be either. Next time I signaled for her to flood her mask she pulled it off completely, put it back on, cleared it, gave me an OK, and then gave me a one-finger salute. I figured now she's ready ...

Funny story, I had the same thing happen with more then one of my students. One of them was so bad I had to spend a lot of extra time with him off the clock. When he finally figured out his weakness and how not to suck in water through his nose (his particular issue) all of a sudden, he felt comfortable.

Thats the sort of instruction we need today. We need teachers who are willing to take the extra step and make sure students are fully prepared for the great big ocean out there. Its sad to say, but in all honestly, there are a great deal of divers out there who probably shouldn't be diving. Just like there are millions of DRIVERS who shouldn't be driving, yet we still have hundreds/thousands of car accidents each day.

 

[Peter_C]

I have been reading the updates as they have come in.

My thoughts are, what is done is done. We all stand to learn something from this unfortunate incident.

My partner and I chatted a little bit about the skills and drills we perform, and why we do them. I often ask her to fill her BC with breath at the surface, and not use the inflator. We do air shares often, so we are both skilled in using the long hose (She comments often how she loves her bungee back up as she always knows right where it is). The gas planning is always discussed on shore or in the boat before entering the water. We discussed her quickly dropping her weight belt without looking at it next time out for practice (If out on the boat she clips her weight belt off to a tag line so it can be done). I often do like Bob said and drop mine on shore. We dive as a team, and stay close together.

Would I count on my 100lb g/f saving me...probably not, especially since she isn't rescue trained, but if I ran out of air, I know she would have a reg shoved into my hand in a matter of seconds. The only thing we can do is discuss scenarios and resolutions and try to never get into a bad situation.

 

[Ayisha]

Would I count on my 100lb g/f saving me...probably not, especially since she isn't rescue trained, but if I ran out of air, I know she would have a reg shoved into my hand in a matter of seconds.

You could count on your 100 lb gf to save you once she's rescue trained. I've written about this before, but when I did my Rescue course, I weighed 90 lbs and the person I had to rescue repeatedly for 2 days was a 305 lb DM told to make himself a dead weight and not help me. I swear it was harassment training. Another petite female and I had picked each other as buddies and the instructors weren't having it in case we helped each other. One of the instructors took pity on me and taught me ways to use leverage rather than strength to save this large man and bring him repeatedly onto shore in a variety of ways. To my surprise and probably almost everyone else's, it worked.

The moral of the story: even if she's petite, she can do it with the right instructor teaching her to use leverage rather than strength to effect successful rescues.

 

[TSandM]

I keep thinking about this incident, and in particular, this discussion of oral inflation.

I learned oral inflation in my OW class, as we all do (or should, anyway). I never practiced it afterwards. I practiced all kinds of other things, like air-sharing and mask off work, but I didn't orally inflate -- not ever, that I can recall. For one thing, I did all my drilling and classes in cold water, where I always had a dry suit for backup buoyancy. Then, when I took my Cave 1 class, the instructor was irritated with me for diving wet, and (I believe) decided to teach me a lesson by giving me a right post failure way back in the cave, when I was supposed to be dragging out my unconscious buddy. For anyone who is unfamiliar with the use of double tanks, failing the right post disables your primary regulator (so you go to your backup) and also your inflator, so you can't power inflate. I was suddenly faced with the need to tow my unconscious buddy AND manage my buoyancy without a working wing . . . remembering oral inflation came instantly, and I had no trouble executing it.

I think the difference is that I had done a TON of training on thinking my way through problems, even though we hadn't covered that particular problem and solution. I'd had failures and issues thrown at me that I had to analyze and solve correctly in quite a few classes before that cave one. This is, I think, where the problem lies. Students are taught how to do things that solve problems, but then we work extremely hard to make sure they never have any. Even in a Rescue class, the problems are fairly limited in scope (at least with most instructors), and the scripts are provided, so the students often don't have to come up with anything novel on their own.

The problem here probably wasn't unfamiliarity with any particular skill. It was unfamiliarity with analyzing and solving problems, and worse, perhaps, unfamiliarity with the IDEA of problems occurring during diving. If you don't expect anything ever to go wrong, then when it does, you may well be woefully unequipped to cope with it.

 

[Crush]

People should learn to dive not with new gear, but with the gear I learned on at the YMCA. That way they will graduate having experienced multiple equipment failures first hand.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Would I count on my 100lb g/f saving me...probably not, especially since she isn't rescue trained, but if I ran out of air, I know she would have a reg shoved into my hand in a matter of seconds. The only thing we can do is discuss scenarios and resolutions and try to never get into a bad situation.

That's a good start, but you should be able to count on her.

Couple years ago one of my former students asked me to train his 12-year old daughter. Now, admittedly this kid had a leg up ... she'd been swimming since she was an infant and was more comfortable in the water than most OW students. But the final exercise of class was for her to bring her "unconscious" father up from 20 feet deep and tow him about 50 yards to the beach. It never even occurred to her this was supposed to be hard, despite the fact that her dad outweighs her by more than 100 lbs and was in full cold-water gear. She just did it ... including having to dump his weights and manually inflate his BCD.

If a little girl can do it, so should any adult who's going through that class ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Same.experience as Bob. Had two sisters, one 12 & the other 15. Neither weighed more than 110lbs. Had them bring their 6ft 200 lb dad up from the bottom, get controll of him "panicking", support him at the surface for two minutes and help dump his weights, and strip his gear as they towed him to shore. Again it took two hours of instruction in the pool to teach them how. Absolutely no excuse in my mind for taking this out of the OW class. Even worse and more egregious is making any diver wait to get these skills. Simply amazing that time and money are placed before safety.

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[Adobo]

Same.experience as Bob. Had two sisters, one 12 & the other 15. Neither weighed more than 110lbs. Had them bring their 6ft 200 lb dad up from the bottom, get controll of him "panicking", support him at the surface for two minutes and help dump his weights, and strip his gear as they towed him to shore. Again it took two hours of instruction in the pool to teach them how. Absolutely no excuse in my mind for taking this out of the OW class. Even worse and more egregious is making any diver wait to get these skills. Simply amazing that time and money are placed before safety.

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Given a choice, I'll take gas planning, knowing how to properly weight one's self and proper knowledge of when to omit an optional safety stop over skill with bringing up unconscious divers any day of the week. The former 3 are incredibly basic topics that are seemingly only barely touched if at all in open water classes.

I've got plenty of training bringing up unconscious divers (did it in at least 4 different classes subsequent to open water). If I have to use those skills, the day is already incredibly bad and likely started with an issue that should have been caught and resolved long before anybody was low on gas, out of gas or in a panic.

In the context of this incident, the buddy's inability to rescue the victim isn't what started them down this road. In my opinion, this started when they talked about the gas plan which I could only imagine was, "let's thumb the dive when the first diver hits 500psi".

 

[Peter_C]

That's a good start, but you should be able to count on her.


... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I am glad you all think size is not a problem. I am not sure I could save someone from depth and swim them into shore, while performing CPR, and somehow get a radio out and call the Coast Guard for help, and I have been rescue trained. I would do so with all my heart though. In rescue my instructor had me tow him 500 ft as I just measured from the wash rock to shore. I was breathing so hard, that actually performing CPR would have been hard. Then we had to run 1/4 mile up the hill to the pay phone which I believe is now out of service. I had to stop and remove the top of my drysuit as I was overheating so bad. Learned a lot during rescue, and it showed me just how physically fit one has to be.

Lets take a typical dive site which is one of my favorites Fort Ross. We start by surface swimming or scootering out 900 ft (I just measured it in Sketchup), then begin our dive heading further out. So lets say 1,200 ft out someone has an issue. We make it back to the surface, then begin the 20 minute swim back to the beach. Once back on the beach we reach a VHF to call for help (I carry a Nautilus in my pocket), cell phones quit working 30 minutes before arriving at the dive site, and get them oxygen (I always have a bottle ready thanks to my buddy I still owe a couple of boat dives to). About 30 minutes later an ambulance shows up, and hauls said person across the beach to the waiting ambulance. I would give anyone who could work on keeping someone alive in that situation super hero status. We even have a couple EMT's in our dive club to help should they be around.

Point Lobos is not as far at around 600 ft. Which is still one heck of a surface swim while towing someone, and even more so if trying to perform CPR. Throw in swells, current, and lots and lots of kelp, and the odds are not stacked in ones favor.

Sure makes teams of three a safer option. I am with Adobo, start by trying to never have the problem in the first place with proper planning and execution of said plan.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

That's why under certain conditions if performing rescue breaths is going to significantly delay getting the victim to the shore or boat, you don't do it. Try two rescue breaths when you first get them up. No response and the surf is up or there are other issues that would result in you getting so fatigued that you put yourself at risk trying to do everything, don't. Get the vic to shore and summon help. No one expects a diver to be superman. One other thing I teach when covering rescue in the OW class is how to utilize your buddy or other divers for help. I hate that some rescue classes will not allow buddy or team rescues. That is beyond stupid. I do show divers how to affect individual rescues but also how to work as a team. It is more likely that a properly trained team will come upon a person needing assistance rather than one of the team members needing it. So use your buddy. Draft other OW divers into being tow boats while you strat removing gear, giving rescue breaths, etc.

And to Adobo, those other things are also taught in some OW classes in addition to the rescue skills. It;s all part of the package for a safe, competent, and skilled diver. When you break the package up you might make more money, but you may also contribute to someone not coming out of the water. At least breathing and on their feet.