Missing Diver incident

[cdiver2]

yeah, that's how i understood it: first dive at the rig, he gets separated
from his three buddies due to equalizing problems, comes up, tries to
get the boat's attention, fails, they take off, he's left behind.

see this story: http://www.cdnn.info/safety/s040428/s040428.html

chuck, i'm not sure i agree with you that the diver made a mistake
in not trying to swim back to the boat. swimming against any
kind of current for 400 feet would probably have exhausted him and he
would have made little headway anyway.

he should have had a safety sausage (apparently all he had was a whistle, which the boat couldn't hear).
the sausuage would have made it a lot easier for someone on the boat
looking in his direction to spot him.

still.... 400 feet away... hmmmm... he probalby still wouldn't have been
spotted.

he did continue to dive for about 15 minutes after having equalization
trouble and loosing track of his buddies. well... he should have followed
procedure for loss of buddy: search for one minute, then surface.

i bet you anything had he surfaced at that point, he would have been
close enough to be boat so that they could have heard his whistle.

he just waited too long (15 minutes) to get back to the surface.

From what I understand of live boating, boat comes to within 100' of the rig then its go go go. When everyone is off the boat it then moves a safer distance from the rig, if this is right where would the boat be when he surfaced the first time. This brings up another point was there a lookout on the boat or was the Capt managing the boat and doing lookout.

There was one report that said the boyscout saw him waving a sausage?.

I think I agree with you on he may not have been able to swim the 400' against the current and all the survival manuals tell you not to swim against it. If you exert yourself in the water you will lose body heat very rapidly then if you don't get picked up ...hyperthermia?.

 

[H2Andy]

hmmm... actually... come to think of it... with the fog and all, a sausage would
probably have not done him any good either after a bit.

i recall reading somewhere that he lost sight of the boat fairly quickly after
coming to the surface, but couldn't quite see it. they wouldn't have been able to
see him, sausage or not.

here's a three-part essay from CDNN. It appears rather factual and well
done:

http://www.cdnn.info/safety/s040807a/s040807a.html

http://www.cdnn.info/safety/s040808b/s040808b.html

http://www.cdnn.info/safety/s040809c/s040809c.html

 

[Groundhog246]

Well, I'm wrong about the order. it was rig first (been a while), live boat, (you can't tie to the rigs). Looking through the reports I see this

Fifteen minutes into the dive, at about 30 feet, pressure started to build in Dan Carlock's ears. He stopped, waiting for his ears to equalize, or ''pop.'' If he continued down without equalizing, he risked damage to his eardrums.

Carlock waited. The other three in his group continued without him.

It only took seconds for Carlock's ears to pop. Then he followed the bubbles from his group, passing downward into near blackness.

But soon the bubbles were gone.

At 108 feet down, still not seeing the others in his dive team, Carlock halted again. Where were they? he wondered. Still no bubbles in the inky water. He considered what to do, then decided there was just one choice. Carlock began the slow ascent to the surface.

Reaching a depth of 15 feet from the top, where thin light filtered down, he stopped for a routine three-minute decompression, to allow the body to adjust to the change in pressure.

When Carlock finally broke the surface, he was alone.

So they were 15 minutes into the dive, not he chased them for 15 minutes. He did chase them to 108 feet (probably a bit too far, but if he had bubble trail most of the way, I can understand). Then called the dive and did a proper ascent with safety stop. From my own experience, from 30 feet descending to 108 (approx 80 feet) would be about 90 seconds, which isn't much over the 60 you should search. A long way from the 15 minutes being tossed around.
And 400 feet up current? It would depend on the current, but if it was anything like the St. Lawrence on an average day, you'd not likely get there. He did have a safety sausage and a whistle. A Dive Alert horn might have helped. I've considered adding a hand held flare to my kit. Not sure how far that would go in the fog either though.

Perhaps we should all re-consider boat dives in fog? That would seem to be a major contributing factor to me.

 

[Bubble Blower 479]

The report I read stated that he had a glow stick and not a sausage. I wish we knew for sure.

 

[Chuck Tribolet]

The report I read stated that he had a glow stick and not a sausage. I wish we knew for sure.

There was a picture showing him holding the sausage the next day.

 

[takingadive]

I joined the forum largely to put my two cents worth in re Dan Carlock's decision to sue the diving company that left him behind. I have read many of your comments on the subject and feel you are way too hard on the guy.

By a miracle of sorts, I knew Dan Carlock back in the 1980's when he worked as a civilian engineer for the Army in St. Louis. He was a very likable Christian guy who I can assure you would never sue anybody without one helluva good reason.

There are many URLs that lead to discussions of his decision to sue, but IMO this one puts all controversy to rest.

http://www.cdnn.info/news/industry/i050127.html

The quote from his attorney is self-explanatory:

"He thought about it a lot and realized he could not live with himself if two or three years from now somebody floats up dead from the same situation, and he did nothing about it," Koepke said.

I don't see how anyone (especially you, the diving community) can argue with that logic. The guy has a conscience. Given this angle, the skin cancer issue is just a small contributing factor in what is clearly a justified lawsuit.

 

[dlndavid]

Hey takingadive, welcome to SB, who's arguing?

 

[Peter Guy]

I don't have any problems with him suing, although I do have some significant issues with the damages being claimed.

What are his damages? How was he, in fact, injured?

In any tort there are two questions that need to be answered -- Was there a negligent action? (and here that question is probably easily answered) and Did the negligent action result in an injury?

From the article you linked, I'd say I'd be be highly skeptical of the "injuries" suffered.