Lessons to be learned-Death in Palau

[triton94949]

What should she have done? Should she have tried to control her panic, kept breathing and just waited for some help? If she didn't have a mask, could she have done a slow ascent and stop without being able to see her gauges clearly? (this is of course if she didn't have the entanglement issue to deal with). What would have been the best course of action?

Good question, MM777. These are the kind of questions we should always ask after an incident.

What should she have done?

The dive plan for Palau dives like this is normally:

1) Descend quickly with the DM
2) Follow the DM to a sheltered spot on the reef
3) Hook in and hold on
4) Let go if needed
5) Surface and swim towards the boat

That would have been the dive plan. These are advanced recreational dives. The best advanced recreational diving in the world.

So she lost her mask, somehow. I always have a spare with me, due to tech deco training habits. I would have replaced my mask with my spare.

Yes, you need to know how to continue to breathe when your mask is off. That is a basic skill.

If you lose your mask, and you dont have a spare, and your buddy is not nearby, then you need to begin your ascent. Good luck trying to read your depth gauge. [There is an advanced way to do it, by cupping your hand across your eyebrows, and exhaling bubbles into the cup while you look down, forming an air pocket. But you won't learn this in a modern basic open water class.]

Bottom line, the basic skill set was not up to the advanced recreational dive. And as is common in about half of all diving fatalities, there was buddy separation as well.

My God bless the unfortunate victim, she is gone now. She was dependent on her diving buddy, and that became a fatal strategy this time, since both of them seemed to be diving beyond their skills on this Palau current dive.

 

[jakubson]

I noted your post see my later comment, but someone else wrote they would practice "on" their safety stop.

Picky, picky, picky. I apologize for my lack of precise language.

But really, if you do it at the end of your stop, then you are technically still "on" your safety stop.

 

[erichK]

On recreational no deco dives once at surface stay there, if youve done damage doing another stop wont help

Actually, there's some discussion around this one. I've seen instructors/divemasters (in both cases, they were both):

1) In the case of a diver who'd made a rapid but controlled out-of-air ascent and cleared the problem on surfacing, quickly assess the person then tell him to descend again to a five meter deep shelf and "Poke around for 15 minutes or until you get down to 200 PSI". Seemed to work fine: there were no lasting effects.

2) In the case of a diver who had surfaced breathing off his (the divemaster's) auxillary reg and come up with a slight deco obligation (2 min's I think), direct him to to go down to 12-15 feet breathing off the auxillay of a diver who had lots of air. again, there were no ill effects.

Both of the people who gave this direction were very experienced instructors so probably knew what they were doing. In both cases conditions were calm and other divers accounted for, and the person was rational, reported no symptoms, and showed no signs of lung or other trauma. It was possible also to watch their behaviour/condition pretty closely.

I know that it's a controversial issue, but sometimes re-imersion in the water right by the ladder may be a reasonable alternative to waiting to see if symptoms develop in a conscious, rational, and so far uninjured diver, provided it can be done quickly and safely.

Obviously, the strong current and likely surf, as well as patient condition would have contrindicated this for the poor Palua victim, had she been able to get herself off that damned hook and to the surface. And often, as you say, the damage (embolii etc, ) will already have occured and signs and symptoms will indicate that oxygen and first aid treatment and urgent medivac are the best solutions.

 

[triton94949]

Actually, there's some discussion around this one. I've seen instructors/divemasters (in both cases, they were both):

1) In the case of a diver who'd made a rapid but controlled out-of-air ascent and cleared the problem on surfacing, quickly assess the person then tell him to descend again to a five meter deep shelf and "Poke around for 15 minutes or until you get down to 200 PSI". Seemed to work fine: there were no lasting effects.

2) In the case of a diver who had surfaced breathing off his (the divemaster's) auxillary reg and come up with a slight deco obligation (2 min's I think), direct him to to go down to 12-15 feet breathing off the auxillay of a diver who had lots of air. again, there were no ill effects.

Both of the people who gave this direction were very experienced instructors so probably knew what they were doing. In both cases conditions were calm and other divers accounted for, and the person was rational, reported no symptoms, and showed no signs of lung or other trauma. It was possible also to watch their behaviour/condition pretty closely.

I know that it's a controversial issue, but sometimes re-imersion in the water right by the ladder may be a reasonable alternative to waiting to see if symptoms develop in a conscious, rational, and so far uninjured diver, provided it can be done quickly and safely.

Obviously, the strong current and likely surf, as well as patient condition would have contrindicated this for the poor Palua victim, had she been able to get herself off that damned hook and to the surface. And often, as you say, the damage (embolii etc, ) will already have occured and signs and symptoms will indicate that oxygen and first aid treatment and urgent medivac are the best solutions.

The issue is controversial.

You certainly would NOT want to go back down alone. The last person whom I read about who did that died.

Even with a buddy who is an instructor, resubmerging is falling out of favour.

Generally speaking, dive boats normally always have oxygen on board. The safest thing is to get back in the boat and breathe oxygen for about an hour. And then do not dive for at least 24 hours, if not 24 days, or 24 weeks. It all depends on the circumstances and symptoms.

Therefore the "if back on the surface stay on the surface" is currently generally accepted as correct.

The topic of this thread has meandered away from the issue of "what should she have done." I believe the key things would have been to be more comfortable breathing without a mask, and to have an extra mask, and to wait to dive the currents of Palau with her buddy until the two of them were more experienced divers.

 

[Divingnthedark]

The issue is controversial.

You certainly would NOT want to go back down alone. The last person whom I read about who did that died.

Even with a buddy who is an instructor, resubmerging is falling out of favour.

Generally speaking, dive boats normally always have oxygen on board. The safest thing is to get back in the boat and breathe oxygen for about an hour. And then do not dive for at least 24 hours, if not 24 days, or 24 weeks. It all depends on the circumstances and symptoms.

Therefore the "if back on the surface stay on the surface" is currently generally accepted as correct.

The topic of this thread has meandered away from the issue of "what should she have done." I believe the key things would have been to be more comfortable breathing without a mask, and to have an extra mask, and to wait to dive the currents of Palau with her buddy until the two of them were more experienced divers.

Breathing 100% O2 if available should be your first choice. About the original thread topic, knowing your experience level/limits prior to making such an advanced dive seems imperative at least to me. For example; I have complete tear of the ACL in both knees and would not put myself in that heavy a current until I get my knees fixed.
Just a thought...
Loretta

 

[Albion]

2) In the case of a diver who had surfaced breathing off his (the divemaster's) auxillary reg and come up with a slight deco obligation (2 min's I think), direct him to to go down to 12-15 feet breathing off the auxillay of a diver who had lots of air. again, there were no ill effects.

Deco obligation or safety stop??? Blowing two minutes of safety stop or even a computer enforced deco obligation after a recreational profile dive is most likely not going to harm you.
As triton said staying on deck and breathing 100% O2 will be prefered

 

[scubatwinned]

Good question, MM777. These are the kind of questions we should always ask after an incident.

What should she have done?

The dive plan for Palau dives like this is normally:

1) Descend quickly with the DM
2) Follow the DM to a sheltered spot on the reef
3) Hook in and hold on
4) Let go if needed
5) Surface and swim towards the boat

That would have been the dive plan. These are advanced recreational dives. The best advanced recreational diving in the world.

So she lost her mask, somehow. I always have a spare with me, due to tech deco training habits. I would have replaced my mask with my spare.

Yes, you need to know how to continue to breathe when your mask is off. That is a basic skill.

If you lose your mask, and you dont have a spare, and your buddy is not nearby, then you need to begin your ascent. Good luck trying to read your depth gauge. [There is an advanced way to do it, by cupping your hand across your eyebrows, and exhaling bubbles into the cup while you look down, forming an air pocket. But you won't learn this in a modern basic open water class.]

Bottom line, the basic skill set was not up to the advanced recreational dive. And as is common in about half of all diving fatalities, there was buddy separation as well.

My God bless the unfortunate victim, she is gone now. She was dependent on her diving buddy, and that became a fatal strategy this time, since both of them seemed to be diving beyond their skills on this Palau current dive.

Being a little picky maybe, but what you have said raises more questions... when I dove in Palau one had to have their own safety sausage - because of the currents scattering the group, diff air consumption, carrying a camera I tend to move slower - to release when you had reached your s,stop depth so the boat folks would know where you were and come to you, not swim to the boat.

There is no mention of these in the original post so can we assume that she did not have one??

If she had one could she not deploy this and mark herself?? If for some strange reason she had no knife to cut the line for the reef hook??

Maybe she was unconscious or dazed and totally panicked after recieving the bump/cut to the head causing her to loose the mask... causing her to drown. If this is true all the gear, spare or not would have helped her in this no buddy situation.

The fact that she dumped her weights seems to contradict the unconscious theory, but she could still have been dazed in a panick and dropped the belt... wet suite?? making it harder to pull herself down to unhook after loosing weights???

The fact that they were diving over their heads as you, myself and others have said is the cause of the incident not the equipment.

 

[detroit diver]

.........
The fact that they were diving over their heads as you, myself and others have said is the cause of the incident not the equipment.

She could have been diving WAY over her head and still ascended if it were not for that reef hook attached to her BC.

 

[triton94949]

...
The fact that she dumped her weights seems to contradict the unconscious theory, but she could still have been dazed in a panick and dropped the belt... wet suite?? making it harder to pull herself down to unhook after loosing weights???

The fact that they were diving over their heads as you, myself and others have said is the cause of the incident not the equipment.

As someone earlier pointed out, her dropping the weight belt underwater apparently made matters worse. The reef hook line would have then been so taught afterwards that it had to be cut in order to be released, since it was clipped to her B/C. Someone else besides me also pointed out that clipping the reef hook like to the B/C was probably the beginning of a chain of events that ultimately resulted in the fatality.

Releasing your weight belt underwater is taught as an EBA (Emergency Buoyant Ascent) in basic open water courses. Unfortunately there are times when it is not the remedy to the problem. In a perfect world, no one would ever drop their weight belt underwater. And in this case, it seems to have simply made matters worse.

Weakly trained buddy dependent divers, buddy separation, conditions exceeding the comfort levels of the divers, reef hook lines clipped to B/Cs, no knife available, loss of mask, failure to continue breathing on scuba after loss of the mask, no spare mask -- these all contributed in a big way.

Weakly trained buddy dependend divers are a given, these days, with certification requirements having slipped to the bare minimums that they have.

Should a dive operator screen passengers more thoroughly? This is the unanswered question.

 

[detroit diver]

...............
Should a dive operator screen passengers more thoroughly? This is the unanswered question.

If you really want to open up a can of worms, then the question should be asked:

Should the dive industry be promoting this sport as a no-brainer activity for everyone?