Ken Kurtis
Contributor
This is an offshoot of the thread asking about fatalities at Casino Point (the Avalon Underwater Park). Capt. John Kades at the L.A. County Department of Coroner, the guy I report to directly and consult with most often, has done an excellent job of compiling fatality stats for L.A. County diving going back to 1994. (The pre-1994 records are a bit hazy but John is working on those.) Since I gave the "Why Divers Die" lecture to the Aqaurium of the Pacific Scientific Divers class last week and used these numbers, I thought I'd share them here as well. Bear in mind these are for Los Anegles County only. They do not include deatsh in San Diego, Orange, Ventura, Santa Barbara, Riverside, or San Bernardino Counties (collectively "SoCal").
Also understand that when a death occurs at sea, it is the first port-of-call that determines the "location" of the death. Hypothetically, a diver diving at San Migeul Island (Santa Barbara County) has a problem, is airlifted to the Catalina Chamber (L.A. County) and is pronounced dead at the Chamber. That becomes an L.A. County death. Same diver is pronounced dead on the boat, is not evacuated from the boat, and the boat heads back to its home port of Santa Barbara, it becomes a Santa Barbara County death. Same boat instead is based in Ventura and heads back there, it becomes a Ventura County death. So just because a death is tagged to a specific county doesn't necessarily mean the accident that caused the death occured within the boundaries of that county.
Here are the stats for Los Angeles County:
TOTAL FATALITIES 1994-2011 (18 years) - 81
AVERAGE FATALIES PER YEAR - 4.5
FEWEST FATALITIES IN A YEAR - 1 (1999)
MOST FATALITIES IN A YEAR - 7 (2002, 2009, 2010, 2011)
GENDER OF THOSE WHO DIED - 84% male (seems to fairly closely mirror the presumed % of male divers overall)
AVERAGE AGE OF THOSE WHO DIED - 39.9 YEARS OLD (Oldest - 78, Youngest - 15)
MEDICAL COMPONENT AS SIGNIFICANT FACTOR - 39.8% (not always cardidac but frequently is)
DEATHS WHILE DIVING ON CHARTER BOAT TRIPS - 25 (31%)
DEATHS WHILE DIVING AT CASINO POINT - 20 (25%)
DEATHS WHILE DIVING ON PRIVATE BOATS, FROM THE BEACH, ETC. - 36 (44%)
DEATHS FROM NATURAL CAUSES - 4 (it was their time and they happened to be underwater)
DEATHS WITH ALCOHOL/DRUGS AS A FACTOR - 3
DEATHS WHOSE CAUSE WAS RULED "UNDETERMINED" - 3 (a medically conclusive answer can't always be found 100% of the time)
DEATHS WHILE SKIN- OR FREE-DIVING - 6
DEATHS WHILE DIVING WITH REBREATHERS - 2 (they hapened one month apart in late summer 2006)
DEATHS OF COMMERCIAL DIVERS - 2
- Ken (Forensic Consultant - L.A. County Coroner)
Also understand that when a death occurs at sea, it is the first port-of-call that determines the "location" of the death. Hypothetically, a diver diving at San Migeul Island (Santa Barbara County) has a problem, is airlifted to the Catalina Chamber (L.A. County) and is pronounced dead at the Chamber. That becomes an L.A. County death. Same diver is pronounced dead on the boat, is not evacuated from the boat, and the boat heads back to its home port of Santa Barbara, it becomes a Santa Barbara County death. Same boat instead is based in Ventura and heads back there, it becomes a Ventura County death. So just because a death is tagged to a specific county doesn't necessarily mean the accident that caused the death occured within the boundaries of that county.
Here are the stats for Los Angeles County:
TOTAL FATALITIES 1994-2011 (18 years) - 81
AVERAGE FATALIES PER YEAR - 4.5
FEWEST FATALITIES IN A YEAR - 1 (1999)
MOST FATALITIES IN A YEAR - 7 (2002, 2009, 2010, 2011)
GENDER OF THOSE WHO DIED - 84% male (seems to fairly closely mirror the presumed % of male divers overall)
AVERAGE AGE OF THOSE WHO DIED - 39.9 YEARS OLD (Oldest - 78, Youngest - 15)
MEDICAL COMPONENT AS SIGNIFICANT FACTOR - 39.8% (not always cardidac but frequently is)
DEATHS WHILE DIVING ON CHARTER BOAT TRIPS - 25 (31%)
DEATHS WHILE DIVING AT CASINO POINT - 20 (25%)
DEATHS WHILE DIVING ON PRIVATE BOATS, FROM THE BEACH, ETC. - 36 (44%)
DEATHS FROM NATURAL CAUSES - 4 (it was their time and they happened to be underwater)
DEATHS WITH ALCOHOL/DRUGS AS A FACTOR - 3
DEATHS WHOSE CAUSE WAS RULED "UNDETERMINED" - 3 (a medically conclusive answer can't always be found 100% of the time)
DEATHS WHILE SKIN- OR FREE-DIVING - 6
DEATHS WHILE DIVING WITH REBREATHERS - 2 (they hapened one month apart in late summer 2006)
DEATHS OF COMMERCIAL DIVERS - 2
- Ken (Forensic Consultant - L.A. County Coroner)