Legal liability of dive buddy

[redacted]

While I understand what you are saying, The paper I posted show that there is a degree of liability assumed when you accept to be someones dive buddy. EVen if you are accepting it in name only. WHat that other person says makes some sense, what if the buddy system was never taught or expected. We were all expected to be self sufficent. Interesting.

How does one accept or reject being a dive buddy? What does silence mean?

 

[jimmy71]

If the boat believes two of you have been assigned as dive buddies, then you have agreed to the duties assigned to "dive buddies." Even if neither of you intend to follow that duty and are buddies in name only.

example:

Boat policy is that anyone who dives from the boat without solo cert is paired with a dive buddy or a buddy team. Boat asks If everyone has a buddy and to identify the buddy for them. You do not have a buddy and thus must say so. Everyone already is paired off so the boat says you at now grouped with two other divers.

Conversation between the divers: Hi new insta buddy, we take a lot of pictures and really do not want to change that idea.

You: That is OK, I dive a lot and really do not care what you do, I have a pony and regularly dive solo. All this means is that we agree and jump in teh water around the same time. No one will care.

Group: Sounds good to us!

The dive happens and you are never seen again. Your FAMILY sues.

Court day:

Court to boat: Did he have a buddy?
Yes we make all diver dive with a buddy.

Court to buddy group: Did you agree to be his buddy
Group: Yes, but we agreed on the surface to be so in name only
court: Then why did you agree to be his buddy?

Court: When did you loose sight/location of your new insta buddy?
group: ABout 5 minutes into the dive.

Court: ANd what have you been taught is teh proper procedure if you lose your buddy?
Group: Look for X amount of minutes and then surface.

Court: And what did you do?
group: FInished my dive as planned.

The paper I posted that while the court decisions often also place liability with the dead party, everyone shares the blame. Three people involved. 33% blame for each. Family gets 1 mil. The living divers pay 333K each.


Solution to all this and something I have learned is that when the Boat tries to tack on an insta buddy to my group. Just say No or that you would rather not. They will say OK and place them with someone else. YOUR issue is solved. I never realized or had seen the liability in this situations before. Now that I do, I am going to make a point on avoiding them. Any agreement you may have with your instabuddy on the surface does not mean jack when his family is suing you down the road.

I do not know what to say about silence. I assume you are asking what one might think the liability may be if people assume you are dive buddies and you just do not correct them?

jimmy

 

[redacted]

If the boat believes two of you have been assigned as dive buddies, then you have agreed to the duties assigned to "dive buddies." Even if neither of you intend to follow that duty and are buddies in name only.

example:

Boat policy is that anyone who dives from the boat without solo cert is paired with a dive buddy or a buddy team. Boat asks If everyone has a buddy and to identify the buddy for them. You do not have a buddy and thus must say so.

I doubt if I have to say or do anything.

What the boat believes may well be in error.

 

[k ellis]

If the boat believes two of you have been assigned as dive buddies, then you have agreed to the duties assigned to "dive buddies." Even if neither of you intend to follow that duty and are buddies in name only.

example:

Boat policy is that anyone who dives from the boat without solo cert is paired with a dive buddy or a buddy team. Boat asks If everyone has a buddy and to identify the buddy for them. You do not have a buddy and thus must say so. Everyone already is paired off so the boat says you at now grouped with two other divers.

Conversation between the divers: Hi new insta buddy, we take a lot of pictures and really do not want to change that idea.

You: That is OK, I dive a lot and really do not care what you do, I have a pony and regularly dive solo. All this means is that we agree and jump in teh water around the same time. No one will care.

Group: Sounds good to us!

The dive happens and you are never seen again. Your FAMILY sues.

Court day:

Court to boat: Did he have a buddy?
Yes we make all diver dive with a buddy.

Court to buddy group: Did you agree to be his buddy
Group: Yes, but we agreed on the surface to be so in name only
court: Then why did you agree to be his buddy?

Court: When did you loose sight/location of your new insta buddy?
group: ABout 5 minutes into the dive.

Court: ANd what have you been taught is teh proper procedure if you lose your buddy?
Group: Look for X amount of minutes and then surface.

Court: And what did you do?
group: FInished my dive as planned.

The paper I posted that while the court decisions often also place liability with the dead party, everyone shares the blame. Three people involved. 33% blame for each. Family gets 1 mil. The living divers pay 333K each.


Solution to all this and something I have learned is that when the Boat tries to tack on an insta buddy to my group. Just say No or that you would rather not. They will say OK and place them with someone else. YOUR issue is solved. I never realized or had seen the liability in this situations before. Now that I do, I am going to make a point on avoiding them. Any agreement you may have with your instabuddy on the surface does not mean jack when his family is suing you down the road.

I do not know what to say about silence. I assume you are asking what one might think the liability may be if people assume you are dive buddies and you just do not correct them?

jimmy

Im glad you brought this up as I was not even thinking of it earlier but the first thing that will come out of this is you accepted the responsibility and it starts before you even get in the water. Dive buddy check for example. Did you check your dive buddies gear before the dive? (Honestly I have been on several boats where people have insta buddies and never once have I seen anyone ask where the releases are and how the gear functions and how to release weights)

Oddly enough most divers in the last 5 years that I know of (Dont know about previous as I was not certified) these are things one has to perform to complete the course!

 

[TSandM]

You know, I find this whole thread unbelievably sad. I work in a field where liability is a constant specter, looking over my shoulder. Worse, it's real; in my profession, the average is that you will be sued every 7 years. I've been lucky until recently.

In contrast, the NUMBER of suits filed against dive buddies, compared with the number of dives completed or even the number of incidents, is extremely low.

I go to work on a regular basis, knowing what the odds are against me. I also dive with all kinds of people, some of them highly skilled, and some barely out of OW (I have insurance for the ones who are IN open water! ) When you start letting the remote possibility of a lawsuit keep you from enjoying a pleasant dive with a buddy, that's tragic. If you have doubts about the capacity of an instabuddy, set parameters for the dive within which you feel you can manage most if not any issues. A friend dove as a mentor with a new diver a few weeks back -- the diver lost his primary regulator, could neither retrieve it nor remember where his secondary was, and would not accept a reg from my friend. As a consequence, he took the shell-shocked diver to the surface quickly, and no one was harmed. (My friend has rethought diving with beginners, though, which is sad.)

If you want to dive solo, do so. But please don't use legal liability to legitimize your choice.

 

[k ellis]

You know, I find this whole thread unbelievably sad. I work in a field where liability is a constant specter, looking over my shoulder. Worse, it's real; in my profession, the average is that you will be sued every 7 years. I've been lucky until recently.

In contrast, the NUMBER of suits filed against dive buddies, compared with the number of dives completed or even the number of incidents, is extremely low.

I go to work on a regular basis, knowing what the odds are against me. I also dive with all kinds of people, some of them highly skilled, and some barely out of OW (I have insurance for the ones who are IN open water! ) When you start letting the remote possibility of a lawsuit keep you from enjoying a pleasant dive with a buddy, that's tragic. If you have doubts about the capacity of an instabuddy, set parameters for the dive within which you feel you can manage most if not any issues. A friend dove as a mentor with a new diver a few weeks back -- the diver lost his primary regulator, could neither retrieve it nor remember where his secondary was, and would not accept a reg from my friend. As a consequence, he took the shell-shocked diver to the surface quickly, and no one was harmed. (My friend has rethought diving with beginners, though, which is sad.)

If you want to dive solo, do so. But please don't use legal liability to legitimize your choice.

I must agree. In my line of work there is always someone being sued. Its part of the game of life with so many people we deal with. Someone always wanting to sue for being arrested, someone wants to sue because they feel they were discriminated on. The fact is if most people realized how likely one is to be involved in a lawsuit we would never have any police officers to work the streets. The reality is you learn about your choices in life and you continually learn to do it better at all times.

As a golden rule you should always look at anything you do and consider the following. How would it look to an outsider? If you were to go to court for something how would you view your actions in both ways as in reconstruction and listening verbal. You should always strive to do the best you can do and be able to say yes I did the best I could do under any circumstances given.

As I said many lawyers opt to get a jury trial so they can get away from people who live and breathe legalities and then present to the jury a situation and attempt to convince everyday people that their client is trully a victim.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I used to take this stuff lightly, but that was before I decided to do a good deed and take a new diver out and try some mentoring.
It turned out to be the dive from hell which completely took me off guard because this guy was a friend of mine. That dive ruined our friendship and I haven't spoke to the guy since.

Nobody got hurt but it did involve a full on real life rescue from 60 feet taking a panicked and frozen diver up to the 15 foot level then having him come to and bolt on me.

Luckily he didn't get hurt and I didn't get sued. People can sue you or file a suit for virtually anything these days. It doesn't mean they will win anything but it's still going to cost you in attorneys fees for a defense.

I choose to dive alone mostly. If I dive with another person we are not a tight buddy team that sticks together, we are same ocean same day divers. I only dive with other people who are OK with this style, which most are because everybody I dive with hunts. We are basically solo divers that see each other once in a while underwater. Everybody is fully responsible for themselves and their gear, not the other guy.

I go on Southern California dive boats which allow solo diving if they know you and your skill level. I dive with a Socal club that is all veterans and everybody solo dives.

 

[TSandM]

ZKY, looking at your incident another way (and I recall when you recounted it), could you perhaps consider that taking this diver to 60 feet was an error of judgment?

I ask because, when I dive for the first time with someone who is novice and for whom I have no references, I don't even go that deep. We have a nice local site that maxes out at 40 feet, and that's if you can reach the far boundary. Anyone who can do that before turn pressure has passed a significant test of technique; the average new diver barely makes it out of the eelgrass region of the site. At that point, depth is never more than 20 feet, and I figure I can get anyone to the surface from there (and hope I can keep them breathing while I do it!) I don't take an unknown, novice diver to 60 very often, and only if I have a second experienced diver with a good gas supply to help me do the rodeo if required.

One thinker can mitigate most of the risks of diving, except panic . . . and the one time I almost scrubbed a dive with a novice was when I saw someone near panic because she fell down on entry. I went against my best judgment to go on to do the dive; it went fine, and the young woman in question developed into a very competent diver. If we all decide not to dive with such folks because of litigation risk, where will they be?

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I think what it boils down to is if you're not prepared to dive with someone, don't get in the water with him. All excuses and legitimate reasoning aside, if you're thinking of the dive as my dive rather than our dive, you're diving solo anyway ... regardless of who or where your dive buddy is. If that's the case, just make the commitment to dive without that person and be done with it. If you're not willing to make the commitment to have another person join you or your team, say so before the dive begins and be done with it. Because otherwise, you're setting an expectation that you're not really committed to ... and that's just increasing the potential for confusion and stress underwater ... and both of those are signficant factors to the very sort of incidents you're worried are going to happen. The best way to avoid that is to be upfront at the beginning ... before you put yourself in a place where it can happen.

A significant percentage of diving accidents occur because of decisions that were made before the diver(s) ever got in the water ... this is an example of one of those decisions. If you're going to get in the water with someone, then commit to the duties and responsibilities that implies. If you don't want to make that commitment, then don't get in the water with them. That, in a practical sense, is the best protection you can get ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Mike2Fst]

Jimmy, I feel the same about the whole dive buddy situation, although, should you be wearing a Shearwater dive computer, I may pay abit more attention to you should the "poopy hit the fan" as it should at least make it back to the boat. You should try diving Lake Jocasse sometime