Lessons to be learned-Death in Palau

[jbd]

I know the 7 to 8 knots sounds high and it may well be 4 to 5 knots. I just remember thinking how absolutely insane it sounded in whatever current speed was mentioned---it still seems like they said 7 to 8 knots'cuz I remember also thinking that it was a dang good clip for a small sailboat.

Watching the video, I have to admit it did look like fun although it was obviously pretty tough. One of the divers had trouble getting hooked although she did manage eventually.

 

[jbd]

for basic CPR

The original post indicates that the nurse upon boarding the big boat assessed that effective CPR was happening. Fluids and food bits in the mouth could have been from regurgitation possibly caused by gastric insufflation.

 

[donacheson]

detroit diver once bubbled...
I may be a purist here, but I don't think ANY damage is acceptable to the reef.

The hook only confines the damage if the user is proficient in using the hook. The new "reef hook" specialist will attempt to hook whereever they can, including live, healthy corals. And when they miss, which is highly likely, what else do they tear up on the pass?

I don't like to see any damage to a reef, either, but if I've ponied up a several thousand for a week's worth of diving in the South Pacific, I'm not going to not plant a reef hook, especially in a place like Blue Corner in Palau where the top edge of the wall has been and continues to be extensively damaged by divers hanging on with their hands. I never saw Blue Corner in it's most pristine days, but even in the early '90's the top of the wall well back from the edge where divers hang on with their hands was pretty barren.

As for inexperienced "hookers", I'd agree they flounder about a bit, but not more than any inexperienced diver with buoyancy control problems. Using a reef hook isn't that difficult and I don't think it warrants a PADI specialty. However, that's said from the viewpoint of a diver who had a few hundred dives under his belt before using a reef hook for the first time.

Most divers seem to get their hook in a firm spot immediately and even if not, the hook merely rattles lightly across the reef until retrieved and planted again. I don't recall having seen much damage done by hooks, certainly nothing like I've seen done by hands and fins and bodies to corals and sea fans in Grand Cayman and Cozumel and elsewhere.

 

[WreckWriter]

jbd once bubbled...
I know the 7 to 8 knots sounds high and it may well be 4 to 5 knots. I just remember thinking how absolutely insane it sounded in whatever current speed was mentioned---it still seems like they said 7 to 8 knots'cuz I remember also thinking that it was a dang good clip for a small sailboat.

Watching the video, I have to admit it did look like fun although it was obviously pretty tough. One of the divers had trouble getting hooked although she did manage eventually.

Getting hooked is the easy part!

Frightening. I've got around 1000 dives and I would balk at this, I can't imagine someone with 100 trying it.

WW

 

[jepuskar]

I have a feeling the more digging I do (no pun intended) the more aggravated i am going to become.

http://www.dolphinscuba.com/Trips/trip6.html

 

[jbd]

certainly this type of diving is something that should be tried in easy currents first. I may have tried this dive if I was there provided I have done it in gentl currents and kind of worked my way up to this level. Had I tried this dive I would make one attempt at gettting hooked(nothing attached to me though) if that failed then drift, shoot the sausage and ascend to be picked up. Wouldn't have worried about a lost fin.

 

[donacheson]

chickdiver once bubbled...
WW

I've done the dive that started this thread- Peleliu Wall, the current does rip through there all the time. About 10 years or so ago an operator LOST divers ont hat wall, in fact, it wasnt allt hat unusal an occurance when Iw as living in the Westpac. Divingint hese typesof current situations is, imho, an iffy proposition even for the most skilled divers. I know I have called the dive from surface on at least one occasion after seeing the ball go under by 2 feet!

You're probably talking about the group of divers (5 Japanese and a dive guide as I recall) who died in early 1994. That situation was entirely different from this most recent one. The 6 divers died after their boat failed to find them following a drift dive. I also recall that 3 were found on the surface a couple of days later, dead of exposure. I never did read of the findings of an inquiry, but as a result of those deaths the boats were required to have two engines, a radio, and a trained boatman aboard. In short, I don't think it was caused by diver inexperience.

 

[WreckWriter]

donacheson once bubbled...
I don't like to see any damage to a reef, either, but if I've ponied up a several thousand for a week's worth of diving in the South Pacific, I'm not going to not plant a reef hook....

<snip>

Using a reef hook isn't that difficult and I don't think it warrants a PADI specialty.

These two statements are meant as jokes, right?

Actually, that was a joke because I know you were serious. I'm amazed but I know you were.

Tell me something, in all your hundreds of dives, have you ever done ONE which wasn't under someone else's guidance?

WW

 

[chickdiver]

Don
Right incidence, although I wasnt implying that that particular incident was caused by diver inexperience. I was, rather, using it to illustrate the lack of responsible action taken by many operators int hat part of the world (and many others).

 

[snuggle]

just got home and started to read other post on this thread and came to mike ferrara,s post and i do have to say that the post really bothered me when he said that we may never know what finished her off but she didnt do anything that she should of..no kidding mike..why would you say something like what finished her off..lets have some danm respect here for this lady who died..in that post i really didnt care for you imo..when you wrote about maybe she was just busy doing unproductive things out of panic andthe words what finished her off was distastefull to her and to her familly..i may get slammed for this post but right now i dont care if i do..a little respect for her please and remember her family in your prayers everyone..we werent there so we will never know what happened or why she did what she did...lets give this thread a rest please..