Search for four missing Divers off coast of North Carolina

[TravelGas]

 

[johndiver999]

I beleive the water conditions were 4' swell, the surface water temperature was dropping rapidly. 4 lives depending on your ability to swim only 300 yards when you have that type of Navy background, I would think would be doable. I would be willing to bet my life that I could do it.
Yes drop gear = hold my gear, I will be back with the boat.

Not sure how you could reasonably estimate the surface current from that sort of distance in choppy seas. If you have a strobe and lights and someone on the boat is expected to report you missing, it is a safer bet to simply stay together, retain your buoyancy devices and pray. The surface water temps are probably not that much of an issue if you are wearing exposure protection.

 

[TravelGas]

If you click on the NBC Story, he mentions the current. Details were lacking, but it sounded like there was no one in the boat ? If there was someone in the boat, then maybe he only had to close the distance. I would hope that out of the 4 divers at least one would have a whistle, or at least the Navy diver I would hope would have a whistle. I have always had a Fox40 zip tied to my inflator hose.

 

[FishWatcher747]

4 hrs from the 1st spotted at night until the last spotted sounds about right if they all got separated while floating. So the CG picked them up one at a time in somewhat of a drift line I'm guessing.
The un-written rule among spearfisherman is to lock your fish stringers together after 1hr of floating. But you could use your necklace loop, your wetsuit zipper leash cut off, your spg retractor, etc. Anything to lock 2 divers shoulder to shoulder because one of you is going to stop finning to stay next to the other. So the un-written rule is 1hr float > tie off to each other.

Well if they were picked up separately and that is why it took 4 hours from first sighting to rescue it might have been a good idea for the 3 people without the strobe to tie themselves to the guy with the strobe.

 

[johndiver999]

LOL anchoring 40 miles off shore, leave nobody on boat and go spearfishing with 16 yr old son?? I would be more worried about the wife than any sharks in the dark.

 

[Johnoly]

I will be back with the boat.

No watch person remaining on the boat,,is that true??? Who called the CG? This rescue is incredible.

 

[Chrisk919]

I often carried a small smb in my thigh pocket for marking deco if I blew off the line, and a larger one bungeed to my BP for deployment on the surface. The big one was never used other than training.

One note...I got one employee or visiting instructor at mermet springs really worked up deploying a DSMB for a deco stop. They found the owner to report it and Glen said something to the effect of "this is a training quarry. if they are controlled enough to deploy it from depth, there's no emergency". I don't like to work people up, so I tell folks now before I do it.

That's actually a good note. I realized I need more practice deploying DSMBs (after a trip to Playa/Cozumel where the divemaster had *me* deploy first all the time to call the boat), and was thinking of practicing at my safety stop in one of the local quarries, but I didn't think about the potential for upsetting anyone by deploying it in the quarry.

 

[Billg68bg]

You may be on to something. The story kind of contradicts itself. How were they reported for "not resurfacing" if nobody was with them to report it? But then they report the boat being found in a separate location.....from USA Today:

"Four divers who were reported missing Sunday afternoon off Cape Fear, North Carolina, have been found alive, the U.S. Coast Guard said Monday.

The Coast Guard and Navy found and rescued the four divers about 46 miles southeast of Cape Fear River, authorities announced on social media.

The four men were reported missing to Coast Guard officials around noon Sunday after they were diving off a leisure boat called "Big Bill's" and did not resurface, authorities said.

Officials from Coast Guard sectors in Wilmington, North Carolina, and Charleston, South Carolina, were notified and launched a search. The boat was found roughly 63 miles east of Myrtle Beach."

Not sure, but maybe they set a return time or contact time with someone and passed that time? Speculation, but may fit for this reported scenario.

 

[Chrisk919]

LOL anchoring 40 miles off shore, leave nobody on boat and go spearfishing with 16 yr old son?? I would be more worried about the wife than any sharks in the dark.

Well, they said "40 miles east of Myrtle beach (SC)" - which isn't as far from shore as it sounds because of the way the NC/SC coast runs. It's just that the general (non-NC/SC) public isn't real good at interpreting someone being "south" of a shoreline on the east coast. (screenshot for illustration)

 

[TravelGas]

No watch person remaining on the boat,,is that true??? Who called the CG? This rescue is incredible.

No watch person remaining on the boat,,is that true??? Who called the CG? This rescue is incredible.

NBC journalist reporting is so bad, we cant even determine if there was anyone in the boat. There are lessons to be learned from this incident. I am not impressed with the decision making of the Navy diver.