Rescue diver, theory vs practice

[kadleck]

LDS can organize a "Rescue Day" on off season, coordinating with the local emergency services and centers ...

It sounds expensive for public safety services but really everybody (especially EMS, Police, Istructors, DMs and Rescue Divers) wants a chance to train and correctly done it should be worthwhile and enjoyable for all.

Press coverage should benefit all involved. The "Rescue Day" can be instituted on a yearly basis.

This is exactly what is being started in Dubai, as I stated in another thread. The real benefit is actually to the emergency services, who are very keen to take part; including helicopter evacuation! As you say, they need training opportunities too.

The intent in Dubai is to involve more than one LDS in this (which clearly makes sense - the coast guard are less likely to be keen if they had to repeat the event multiple times), with quarterly Rescue Diver review/update classes offered by each, culminating in an annual 'mega-review' in which multiple LDS take part, including actual calls to and response from all relevant emergency services.

 

[Diver0001]

Ok I'll try to address some of this.

Two divers in full gear were sent out .... How fast did they get there compare to sending 2 snorkelers to evaluate the situation. You did not know then which diver was in distress !!!

This is one of the main points I was trying to make. We did debate breifly if one of the two divers should go with a snorkel but decided against it, primarily because the divers on the surface didn't look like they were in trouble and we "guessed" (correctly) that it was a missing diver situation which would require two divers in scuba and not one in scuba and one with snorkel.

It was an important judgement call that saved us a lot of time. The take-home message here is that your *first* moment to "evaluate" the situation is before *anyone* gets in the water and not after the first snorkeler arrives at the scene. Of course you could "guess" wrong but the one-size-fits-all solution of just blindly responding to everything that happens by sending a snorkeler first, which I know some instructors teach, is something that I personally think is akin to shooting the gun first and then aiming at the target second. This thread is about the differences between theory and practice. In theory always sending a snorkeler first might sound like a pretty good idea. In practice blindly sending a snorkeler without first engaging the brain might cause you to actually *lose* time.

Having said that, if I had had more divers available I would have sent two in scuba AND one or more with a snorkel right away. Given that we only had two divers ready to do anything we had to make a choice and we chose wisely.

The 2 divers immediatly descend ..... Leaving those 2 divers at the surface by themselves !!!

Correctly handled. At this point they were pretty sure that there was an unresponsive diver on the bottom and to have done anything else would have meant that the diver on the bottom would have spent more time down there. Furthermore, the divers on the surface, although clearly in a state of emotional distress, were responsive and not injured they were sent to shore and I was standing on the shore watching them swim in.

The 2 divers decided to SPLIT UP and continue searching !!!! Isn't this asking for trouble ?

Another judgement call. This one is certainly more debatable. I was one of those divers and I don't have any particular issues with diving solo. I wanted to go back to where we had started searching in (18 metres) and try in a different direction but my buddy only had 80 bar pressure left. At the time this happened we were in about 10m of water so I suggested that he remain at that depth and search for a few more minutes while I went back and he agreed so we split up. Is this potentially dangerous? yes and I certainly wouldn't teach this becasue we tell rescue divers to be very careful that they don't become victims themselves..... Having said that, it *did* mean that we were able to keep at least one more diver searching on the bottom for an additional 15-20 minutes. I would think if you're not completely at easy with diving solo then you shouldn't do that but like I said it was a judgement based on my knoweldge of my own diving abilities and the fact that the other diver with me was a DM who was already in the water solo when I met him. Still.... this could have gone pear shaped and I'd be writing something else about it right now so I do hear the criticism of this call.

First priority was to get to the 2 divers at the surface to rescue them. Diver #1 was clearly signaling he/she was in distress and Diver #2 DID need assistance ( the passive panic diver that everybody missdiagnosed ) I think 2 skorkelers should have been sent in, and assist in getting those 2 divers back to shore.

The first priority is to evaluate the situation as best you can not to just jump in a "rescue" the people who raised the alarm. Were they relaxed and happy? No. but they were certainly capable of making their own way to shore and had we taken time to escort them to shore first then we would have missed our chance to recover the victim alive. Diver #1 was dealt with by people on shore once she was out of the water and we screwed up our handling of Diver #2 when he was out of the water. That much is clear. Would it have been better to send snorkelers to the two divers on the surface? yes. But I didn't have snorkelers available at that point yet and I was busy calling the EMS and I needed to stay put until I was sure they were able to find us. By that time the two divers on the surface were out of the water.

If I understand correctly, the one person in charge left the accident area ?

Yep. Big misser. The one person who still knew what was going on under water left the area. Major screw up. He got focused on teh victim and lost track of the task he was there for. This is one of the things I wanted to get out there. In theory people don't lose task focus but in practice the state of the victim can be very shocking and can cause people to forget what they were doing. I hope that if you ever find yourself in a similar situation you'll remember reading something about that and keep your task focus or remember to watch others and help them keep theirs.

I hope you were not one of the 2 divers that split up !!! If something would have happened to you, you would probably still be down there !!!

I think we covered this.

 

[ItsBruce]

Thank you for sharing the experience and then responding to the comments. They are both good learning tools. (And thanks for being so clear and concise in your writing.)

Note: Emergencies never go as planned.

 

[shark_tamer]

Thanks Diver0001,

Well, we could go back and forth on "What if ... " for a while on this !!!!

You were actually on site and knew exactly how many skilled divers you had to your disposal to efficiently perform the rescue .. I WASN'T !!!

When things go wrong underwater, they go wrong pretty quick. The situation could have gone from bad to worst in an instant, but that was not the case here.

So we have learned that even if everything was not executed by the book, the main outcome was that the victim did get rescued.

Again, congrats and thanks for sharing this experience with us.

 

[Jayde323]

Here is something I don't fully agree with from my RD course. We were taught that if you find an unconcious diver on the bottom, that you want to make sure to hold their reg in their mouth as you surface them. This way, if they do attempt to take a breath, they won't get a mouth full of water and if there HAPPENS to be any air in their tank they can get a breath (expecially as you ascent and air expands). Why not stick your octo in their mouth instead? It will still accomplish the goal of keeping them from swallowing water, but if they do breath, you know for a fact there is air for them to breath. The 5 seconds it would take to do this seems like time well spent to me...

Well.... *IF* the diver's regulator is still in the mouth you certainly don't want to remove it and risk the victim breathing water if there happens to be any chance that they are still trying to inhale. That could cause you to drown a victim who otherwise might have been a lot easier to resuscitate, I would think.

I agree with Diver0001. You never want to risk getting water into the victim's airway (even if they appear drowned).

The second (and maybe more frightening senario) is you put your octo in the victims mouth. You are doing a controlled ESA. The victim becomes responsive. Now they start to panic and you are attached to them. They are not about to give up their air source and they bolt to the surface. Now you have put yourself in grave danger as well. You want to keep the rescue as controlled as possible. If you put your octo in their mouth, you are giving them all the control in the case they become responsive.

The time it takes to ESA with the victim will only be slowed down by trying to put your octo in their mouth and trying to hold it there. In my rescue class I was taught - when you find an unresponsive diver: 1) check their mask in case it is partially filled with water (if so remove it) 2) let the air out of their BC 3) Ditch the weights 4) ESA 5) get the victim buoyant and yourself buoyant 6) GET HELP 7) start rescue breaths and get victim out of the water.

But the most important rule of all: DON'T BECOME ANOTHER VICTIM

 

[ronbeau]

Here is something I don't fully agree with from my RD course. We were taught that if you find an unconscious diver on the bottom, that you want to make sure to hold their reg in their mouth as you surface them. This way, if they do attempt to take a breath, they won't get a mouth full of water and if there HAPPENS to be any air in their tank they can get a breath (especially as you ascent and air expands). Why not stick your octo in their mouth instead? It will still accomplish the goal of keeping them from swallowing water, but if they do breath, you know for a fact there is air for them to breath. The 5 seconds it would take to do this seems like time well spent to me...

In my NAUI Rescue Diver and Master Diver courses it was emphasized that if you find an unresponsive dive under water to use the following protocol:

If the second stage is out of the diver's mouth leave it out
If the second stage is in the diver's mouth take care to make sure it does not fall out on the way to the surface.

The explanation was that if the second stage is out of the unresponsive diver's mouth the act of putting it back into the unresponsive diver's mouth could force water into the diver's lungs creating more risk than leaving it out.

 

[Mako Mark]

Nice post Ro,

Rescue theory is just that, theory. No amount of theorizing can prepare you for the real thing. All you can do is the best you can at the time with the resources you have available.

Then analyse the hell out of it afterwards to see what you could have done if you had the benefit of hindsight.

As you have done...

 

[jeckyll]

Thank you for the detailed write up and especially the lessons learned!

 

[jeckyll]

For those of you who have learned from the thorough presentation of the original incident, I would highly recommend doing a search on threads started by Diver0001. When I found SB, 3 years ago, he was a frequent contributor, and his posts and threads were always of value.

Lynne,

When I read this I went back to my book marks.

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/ba...-managing-task-loading-matter-priorities.html

 

[DM Gary]

I have yet to take rescue but I will eventually. I'm sure it's similar to military training. You train and train for the worst of the worst till you're perfect at it. Then you find out that you can teach people what their supposed to do in a situation but you can't train everyone how to react under pressure.