How many divers die each year?
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Everything is in our head, could not agree more with that one. The text of my entry has unfortunately not entered your head.
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I have spent my entire adult career minimizing the risk to the sponsoring institution of having eyeclass wearing, somewhat nerdy, eggheaded scientists do the sorts of things you love to able to strut about. It's just not that big a deal.
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There are risks involved in diving. A properly trained diver understands them and makes an informed choice whether or not to participate, and if participating, follows procedures known to minimize the risks. This applies to pretty much everything we do in life.
Solid statistics can help a cautious person make that decision, so the topic is a useful one, though I gather from this thread that solid statistics are not available. I consider the risks of properly-conducted recreational diving to be well within my tolerance, and lower than some other things I do, such as driving a car. Still, it would be nice to have solid statistics. It would help in conversation with people, often well-meaning friends and family, who think that some activity of mine is "too dangerous."
Solid statistics can help a cautious person make that decision, so the topic is a useful one, though I gather from this thread that solid statistics are not available. I consider the risks of properly-conducted recreational diving to be well within my tolerance, and lower than some other things I do, such as driving a car. Still, it would be nice to have solid statistics. It would help in conversation with people, often well-meaning friends and family, who think that some activity of mine is "too dangerous."
VooDooGasMan
Contributor
daniel if you want the solid statistic to the OP's ?, the answer is ALL OF THEM!!!!!!!
that is the answer to how many die eventually, not each year. 
I have a colleague who had a heart attack at 75 under and lived. They aren't always fatalities!
Back in my volleyball days, I marveled at the skills of Flo Hyman, one of the greatest players I have ever seen. One day she was substituted out of a game. She turned to encourage her teammates and then fell to the floor dead.
I spend part of each Winter in Florida. The place where I visit each year included a well known and incredibly skilled kite surfer. One day last year this 48 year old in peak physical condition finished a session, walked up on the beach smiling, and fell to the sand dead.
Not long after that a very long time and highly skilled diver was searching for Megladon teeth with a friend with whom he had done countless dives. According to the description in the SB thread, he was poking around looking for the teeth one minute, and the next minute he made a funny noise and then was dead.
People die on golf courses all the time.
If people are engaged in an activity, there is a possibility of death by heart attack. It happens. Of course, some people will say that if a heart attack happens while engaged in scuba, it would not have happened were it not for the lax training methods of the current era, but you will have to judge for yourself. If you read the annual DAN fatality report and go beyond the statistics and read the actual incident descriptions, you can make a pretty decent judgment in many cases.
I spend part of each Winter in Florida. The place where I visit each year included a well known and incredibly skilled kite surfer. One day last year this 48 year old in peak physical condition finished a session, walked up on the beach smiling, and fell to the sand dead.
Not long after that a very long time and highly skilled diver was searching for Megladon teeth with a friend with whom he had done countless dives. According to the description in the SB thread, he was poking around looking for the teeth one minute, and the next minute he made a funny noise and then was dead.
People die on golf courses all the time.
If people are engaged in an activity, there is a possibility of death by heart attack. It happens. Of course, some people will say that if a heart attack happens while engaged in scuba, it would not have happened were it not for the lax training methods of the current era, but you will have to judge for yourself. If you read the annual DAN fatality report and go beyond the statistics and read the actual incident descriptions, you can make a pretty decent judgment in many cases.
theduckguru
Contributor
When those associated with the dive industry discontinue the liability waiver requirements, I'll accept anyone's diving is really safe aurguments.
That's an excellent and amusing answer.
But it contains no useful information. As I said, all activities have risks, and lack of activity has risks. People have heart attacks in all imaginable situations. But not an awful lot of people drown on the golf course because they were so engrossed in looking at fishes that they lost track of their air supply. And not an awful lot of people die of DCS from taking an elevator up to the 20th floor of a high-rise building.What's useful to know are the relative risks of different activities. This cannot be derived from fatality numbers alone. It's a ratio of fatalities to person-hours spent in the activity.
I suspect (though I do not have hard numbers) that driving is the most risky activity I engage in regularly. I suspect that the sort of diving I do (recreational, no-deco, no overhead environments, staying well within the limits of a moderately conservative computer) is very safe by comparison. One of the scariest things I do regularly is hiking on a knife-edge ridge, but this amounts to a few minutes a year, out of many days of hiking.
Maybe it's just me (well, I know I'm not alone) but solid risk numbers for common activities would be interesting.
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