Scuba Deaths

[plot]

I was told by the marketing director for a large SCUBA company that "tec" divers make up 7% of the "market share" or population of divers as a whole. Based on the accident data from DAN (and the percentage of "tec" divers), it would seem that "tec" divers have a lower % chance of incident than Rec SCUBA divers.

More 'dangerous' diving, but more training and alot better grasp of their limitations... normally alot better dive planning and better gas management too, along with more practice on how to handle a bad situation should one arise. Hopefully they're more in tune with their gear and up to maintenance on it too.

I could definatly beleive "tec" divers have a lower incident rate... but I'd be surprised if they had a higher survival rate for a given incident simply becuase of the places they end up (ie: lost in a cave).

 

[serambin]

For there to be a "death-rate" the total number of dives during the period of recorded deaths must be known.

I´d say that both the number of deaths and the total number of dives are unknown. So if you claim that .0029% of dives end up with a fatality how can you (or DAN) support that number with facts? Did you report your dives to DAN last year? did anyone you know? .0029% may be a good "guesstimate" or it may not be, there´s no way to know...

Diving is dangerous and potentially fatal. It is a proposition those that dive need to accept and make their peace with (or ignore if that´s what you want to do). As long as you take whatever precautions you deem necessary in your diving, why should you care if a bunch of other people die? Unless you dive the way they do, their deaths do not indicate the risk of your diving...

ymmv

You do not need to now all the dives in the universe to arrive at a probability you only need a sample. The sample quoted in my response was 'of the dives reported to DAN'. This is a valid approach to a rough estimate of an event occurring.

Stan

 

[Thalassamania]

You do not need to now all the dives in the universe to arrive at a probability you only need a sample. The sample quoted in my response was 'of the dives reported to DAN'. This is a valid approach to a rough estimate of an event occurring.

Stan

Correct, and if you can show that the block effect due to DAN membership is statistically insignificant you can creditably extend that value to a larger community.

 

[Daner]

My definition of sport would include persperation and no pain no gain. Those who shore or technical dive have some logistical challenges but once we are in the water the vast majority of recreational diving does not include much in the way of physical activity. Diving is a recreation not a sport.

You have obviously never put on a 2 piece 7mm wetsuit in 25C (mid 80s F) sunny weather on the deck of a boat. Talk about persperation and pain.

 

[diver 85]

Welllll... if you wanna get technical (and do a proper statistical analysis), since the vast majority of diving deaths were cardio-vascular related, you would have to include the ages of the football players, their physical conditioning, and frequency of involvement in the sport, as well as the corresponding ages of the divers, *their* physical conditioning, and how frequently they dove. Might change the outcome a bit...

Bottom line, I think we all know there *are* inherent dangers in diving. You're not going to have an OOA emergency kicking a field goal, or embolize scoring a safety... However, heeding the proper precautions, and remembering your training, I don't think it's any more hazardous than extreme skiing or tornado chasing...

I'm thinking you need to learn what the word embolus, embolism, embolize( take your pick) means.....If you step on a garden hose hard enough, it now has embolized....In the heart, lay people call it a heart attack; if it happens in the brain, lay people call it a stroke; if it happens in the eye, we call it an occlusion....So yes, a person can have an embolism while scoring a safety.......

 

[BKP]

I'm thinking you need to learn what the word embolus, embolism, embolize( take your pick) means.....If you step on a garden hose hard enough, it now has embolized....In the heart, lay people call it a heart attack; if it happens in the brain, lay people call it a stroke; if it happens in the eye, we call it an occlusion....So yes, a person can have an embolism while scoring a safety.......

Absolutely... and if your larynx is crushed during a particularly hard tackle, you can suffocate (which is essentially an out-of-air emergency).

However, on a scuba diving forum, I'm thinking it's a safe bet that the less pretentious of us out there understood "embolize" as it relates to diving, as opposed to a land-based heart attack (or should I refer to it as a myocardial infarction, lest no one understands otherwise...).

 

[diver 85]

Absolutely... and if your larynx is crushed during a particularly hard tackle, you can suffocate (which is essentially an out-of-air emergency).

However, on a scuba diving forum, I'm thinking it's a safe bet that the less pretentious of us out there understood "embolize" as it relates to diving, as opposed to a land-based heart attack (or should I refer to it as a myocardial infarction, lest no one understands otherwise...).

I

I knew that you knew what you meant(or I hope so) but many here don't.....Give them a rescue diver certification & they think they are DeBakey & Cooley incarnate.....GEAUX TIGERS............(& btw, I didn't even bring up someone choking & resulting in an OOA situation on land-my oh my)........

 

[wreckchick]

In Thal's foolball comparison, there is no mention of non-life-ending injuries. I would bet there are a whole lot more sprained ankles and blown-out knees that would count as injuries. The problem with a relatively low impact recreation like scuba is we don't really have a correlate for a sprained ankle. What we end up with is non-injuries (close calls), injuries (chamber visits), and deaths. If I tweak my elbow hauling tanks, I surely don't consider that a 'scuba injury' and wouldn't report it to DAN, but neither do we report the close call incidents either. The only things that really rank notice are chamber visits and fatalities. I would still guess that per unit of measure, there are a lot more football player injuries requiring a hospital visit than in scuba.

My 2 psi,

Rachel

 

[waynel]

Yep. Guy playing Football or Rugby or something has a stroke or heart attack, they don't call it a "Rugby death." Same thing happens to a guy 90 feet down, it's a "Scuba death." I'm not saying it's not dangerous- it clearly is dangerous. But- in the last year, here around Seattle, I know of 2 different Scuba deaths that most defenitely were Scuba deaths, and they were both totally avoidable- 1 was a woman who ran out of air at ~ 100 fsw and refused to buddy breathe, shot to the surface and embolized, and the other death involved some thrill seekers doing a "bounce dive" to ~ 200 fsw on AL80s- one of them never came up.....these were both completely avoidable deaths. I just don't think it's that dangerous, if you play by the rules......at any rate, it's a heckuva lot safer than driving to the dive site.

Exactly. I've researched several sites dealing with injuries and deaths on sites dealing with sky diving, motorcycling, scuba diving, hang gliding, etc. The number one "killer" of any recreational sports, hobby, whatever you want to classify these activities? Number is: riding a motorcycle. What is even more interesting is that the number of cause of death (including motorcycling) was simply not following recommended safety guidelines and/or inadequate training. Example: more sky diving deaths occur because of an improperly packed chute as opposed to equipment failure on the chute itself.

I have absolutely no hard facts to back up my opinion, but I would estimate that more "scuba deaths" are really health related (e.g. heart attacks). I've been on this board since January and it seems that the vast majority of deaths reported and discussed are health related deaths. What I found especially interesting is that opinion is shared by many SKY divers. By the way, I think we have a much better chance at survival in the water than sky divers do falling through the sky. If that reserve chute doesn't open, you have what...zero chance? Just an opinion, not fact. Before someone rips me...again, IMO, NOT A FACT.

 

[VKdiver]

My wife wants to climb Everest. Personally I don't want to live the rest of my life without lips, ears, a nose and toes. I'd rather dive, knowing the risks.