Sometimes you have a *very* good idea where to start the search...
I had just finished taking Rescue with a good buddy of mine, and we threw in a Search & Recovery course while we were at it (since we got to be taught by a couple seasoned public safety divers who certainly knew their stuff). Anyway, skip forward about a week and there we were out on a little boat in Toledo Bend. (My buddies' dad, Mr. John (to me), wanted to see what it was like.)
I had a brand new flashlight-sized handheld depth finder gadget that I was trying out to see how useful it would be for me in my canoe. Wouldn't you know it, when I went to put it down, it slipped out of my hand and bounced right off the back of the boat. (Isn't it always the brand new gear that gets lost?) I shrugged and said, "No worries; it floats." At the same time, Mr. John, who was already in the water, pikes over and starts chasing it down.
I looked at my buddy and said, "Well, the manual says it floats..."
A minute later Mr. John pops back to the surface and says that he chased it but lost sight of it as it plunged to the bottom. (Apparently, one little clip is enough to make it negative.) About that point, I'd basically written it off, as I didn't want to ruin their dive, but Mr. John turns to the two of us and says, "Well, didn't you just do search and recovery?" I looked at my buddy, and we just shrugged a "Well, why not?" to each other.
We dropped down toward the bottom and found a conveniently leaning tree trunk on which to leave Mr. John, and I handed off my spool to my buddy, took the free end, and started a simple search pattern. On about the third sweep, I saw a bit of not-tree, not-silt at the limit of visibility. Indeed, it was the device... floating a few inches above the clip, which was buried in the silt.
I grabbed it up, clipped it off, and returned along the line to my waiting divers, and from there, we made an enjoyable dive. (Although Mr. John would say it had no visibility and was positively freezing, he suffers from Cozumelitis.) Needless to say, I was quite happy that I had not lost a brand new device on first use, and my buddy and I were entertained by the ease by which we'd applied what we'd learned in S&R (although we didn't have nearly so many tree bits in class).
I had just finished taking Rescue with a good buddy of mine, and we threw in a Search & Recovery course while we were at it (since we got to be taught by a couple seasoned public safety divers who certainly knew their stuff). Anyway, skip forward about a week and there we were out on a little boat in Toledo Bend. (My buddies' dad, Mr. John (to me), wanted to see what it was like.)
I had a brand new flashlight-sized handheld depth finder gadget that I was trying out to see how useful it would be for me in my canoe. Wouldn't you know it, when I went to put it down, it slipped out of my hand and bounced right off the back of the boat. (Isn't it always the brand new gear that gets lost?) I shrugged and said, "No worries; it floats." At the same time, Mr. John, who was already in the water, pikes over and starts chasing it down.
I looked at my buddy and said, "Well, the manual says it floats..."
A minute later Mr. John pops back to the surface and says that he chased it but lost sight of it as it plunged to the bottom. (Apparently, one little clip is enough to make it negative.) About that point, I'd basically written it off, as I didn't want to ruin their dive, but Mr. John turns to the two of us and says, "Well, didn't you just do search and recovery?" I looked at my buddy, and we just shrugged a "Well, why not?" to each other.
We dropped down toward the bottom and found a conveniently leaning tree trunk on which to leave Mr. John, and I handed off my spool to my buddy, took the free end, and started a simple search pattern. On about the third sweep, I saw a bit of not-tree, not-silt at the limit of visibility. Indeed, it was the device... floating a few inches above the clip, which was buried in the silt.
I grabbed it up, clipped it off, and returned along the line to my waiting divers, and from there, we made an enjoyable dive. (Although Mr. John would say it had no visibility and was positively freezing, he suffers from Cozumelitis.) Needless to say, I was quite happy that I had not lost a brand new device on first use, and my buddy and I were entertained by the ease by which we'd applied what we'd learned in S&R (although we didn't have nearly so many tree bits in class).
) $.50 an hour to the pay check. Away from work it's $60.00 an hour including travel time both ways. That adds up to Ka-Chunk and we're to be had cheap. 
