Packetsniffer / Jackson Blue

[Rick Murchison]

http://www.dothaneagle.com/dea/news/...ccident/37379/

Texas man drowns in Marianna diving accident

By Debbie Ingram

Published: September 20, 2008

A Texas man diving with a friend, drowned Friday in a diving accident at the caves at Blue Springs Recreational Park in Marianna, Fla., according to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office.

The body of Richard Mork was recovered Friday afternoon near an area called the Rabbit’s Hole, by dive team members with the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office and two recovery divers certified in cave diving.

According to a sheriff’s department press release, Mork and Dan Weyant, also from Texas, entered the water at around 12:30 p.m. The two traveled about 2,000 feet when Weyant noticed Mork became somewhat erratic in his movement. Weyant then swam over to his friend, discovering Mork’s respirator was out of his mouth.

Mork was unresponsive. Weyant told officials he used a secondary respirator to try and force oxygen into Mork’s lungs. His attempts to resuscitate Mork failed.

The 14th Circuit Medical Examiners office in Bay County was to perform an autopsy to determine exact cause of death.

 

[justleesa]

:depressed:...

 

[Rick Murchison]

:depressed:...

Yeah... not much more to say.
Maybe the autopsy or the exam of the rebreather or computer will reveal something that'll shed some light on this tragedy...
:depressed:
Rick

 

[Divin'Papaw]

I'm absolutely in shock. I had not had the opportunity to meet Richard, but I had heard many, many great things about him as a diver and a person from many others. What a horrile loss. I hope the autopsy or the examination of his equipment are able to shed some light on the accident.

 

[underwaterangel]

I hope they release what happened, not only for his family, but for those who knew him, to understand what happened. He was such a careful diver. It is such a tragic loss.

My heart goes out to family, especially his kids.

 

[Rick Inman]

Weyant told officials he used a secondary respirator to try and force oxygen into Mork’s lungs.

Yes, typical news-speak, just to let us know that the writer knows nothing about diving, and therefore all his information is suspect.

Resperator... oxygen...

He means, of course, regulator and bailout bottle.

 

[PerroneFord]

Based on what I know about Richard's gear, I really only have 3 questions I'd like answered, and 2 questions for Dan.

I just hope I get to ask them.

 

[Rick Murchison]

He means, of course, regulator and bailout bottle.

Richard was diving his Megalodon; Dan was on regular open-circuit gear. While it's not relevant to the mishap itself, I don't know whether Dan was using Richard's bailout bottle or some of his own gas in the rescue attempt.
Rick

 

[Dive-aholic]

What's known so far -

Richard and Dan were diving JB, Richard on his RB and Dan on OC. Just before the Rabbit Hole Richard began behaving different/erratic. Dan swam closer to see what was going on. He saw the loop had fallen out of Richard's mouth. Dan took a reg from one of Richard's bailout bottles (he had 3) and put it in Richard's mouth. He purged it several times to try to get air to Richard, but the air just kept coming out of the exhaust T. Richard was not responding. Dan finally made the decision to exit the cave and call for help (he was on OC). There were other divers getting ready to dive when Dan surfaced and they called 911 and Edd. The recovery took over an hour, with a scooter, due to the distance and equipment. On scene, the RB appeared to be functioning properly. All the sensors were good. The RB is in the possession of the EDU and they are checking it out in more detail. The remains are in Bay County.

There are some more details, but they don't really matter at this point.

I will add that with the increased flow in JB recently, the flow coming through the Rabbit Hole is up even more. I know getting through there on sidemount can be difficult with flow up. Add a few stages and the difficulty increases. Work of breathing increases. I don't know if this was the issue or not. We may never know what caused this to happen. Autopsy will likely reveal drowning and if the RB checks out, then we know all we're going to know.

I hope I haven't offended anyone by posting these thoughts. I see RBs in my diving future and am trying to learn as much about them as possible, especially concerning all the deaths involving them recently.

 

[The Chairman]

It's almost to the point, where a "black box" recording respiration and other data might be helpful. What a sad, sad loss.