Incident at Gilboa - Oct 24/04

[Laser]

It's the only place that I've seen it to that magnitude.

Lake Wazee in Wisconsin is just as cold, 355 ft deep and gets a fair amount of traffic with lots of technical training going on. There's no one there to inspect deep dive plans or police things in any other way yet we don't hear of anywhere near the number of accidents there. I'm not sure I've ever heard of any for that matter.

Haigh isn't as deep but it sure gets the crowds but I don't think I've heard of any injuries there.

I can't think of any off the top of my head at Mermet either...again a fairly deep cold quarry.

That place in Joplin Missouri? I can remember one rebreather death and nothing else comes to mind yet it's far deeper than Gilboa with cave entrances (mine shafts) down there.

Gilboa seems to be the epicenter of the midwest.

From a management perspective, Mike does more than other quarry owners as far as I can tell. There's certainly nothing remarkable about the diving environment. The temperature is typical for the region and it isn't very deep. The number of divers isn't any greater than a couple of the other midwest sites.

I really think that it's just in the center of some of the worst diving and instruction that you could find anywhere. If those same divers were going to Wazee there would be a huge pile of them below the second ledge at about 215.

I've been to the quarries you mentioned Mike and never realized, but you are pretty spot on. I have seen some dangerous stuff at Haigh, but perhaps it's not deep enough to get the accidents that Gilboa has, as most seem to be on the deep side.
In fact I was at Gilboa with you last year when a dad and child chased the mom who was shooting to the surface from the plane. ( we discussed it at length over malted hops with Wagner and Popeye ). I was there during DUI days when a diver died, in fact I helped bring him in. I have not seen anywhere near the incompetence at Wazee. I'm not sure why Gilboa sees more than it's share of accidents. Maybe because so many use it for training. It's a nice site that can have great vis for a quarry when the bottom walkers are not around. Perhaps they need a better grasp on approving dives on the deep side.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I've been to the quarries you mentioned Mike and never realized, but you are pretty spot on. I have seen some dangerous stuff at Haigh, but perhaps it's not deep enough to get the accidents that Gilboa has, as most seem to be on the deep side.

Who knows. Maybe the deep water is just to easy to get to. At haigh you have to swim a long way to get to that one little hole.

In fact I was at Gilboa with you last year when a dad and child chased the mom who was shooting to the surface from the plane. ( we discussed it at length over malted hops with Wagner and Popeye ).

That was a fun weekend except for thcident. My wife and I were hovering just above them. We were passing through when we seen some divers wrestling on the wing of the plane. I headed over just in time to see them holding eachother as they fell off the wing of the plane and disappeared in a cloud of silt...while kicking toward the surface the whole time. When they finally started going up, they went quick and never dumped to slow down. I followed as fast as I was willing to go and when they were buoyant on the surface we went about our business. That was the dad and mom. I didn't realize til later that the third diver hanging with them was a kid. Except for us watching he was pretty much solo diving at the time. I ran into him later and he told me how his mother was screaming.

BTW, I still have some of that fruit flavored corn juice I got from Popeye. LOL