Teen diver dead - Catalina Island, California

[Steve_C]

Have dove with a parentless juvenile once. Was taking an SSI night diving course. It overlapped with a nav course and was at a local quarry. Dive one was first half of nav course. I did not do that dive. Second dive was second half of nav course and first half of night course. A father-daughter team came back from dive 1 with father's nose bleeding. He had pushed through a sinus issue and done some damage. He was out of dive 2. This was not my LDS in the sense that I rarely dove with them, but had known the staff for some time. They knew I was working on a PADI DM with an instructor they knew. I volunteered to be the girl's buddy for dive 2. I knew the quarry well. I focused completely on watching the young girl as we swam. She lead and I followed close beside within 6 ft. Viz was 10-15 ft. I was just her buddy with no official standing.

I will also say that while she did ok she was like a lot of new divers "on a mission". Totally focused on her compass and the task at hand. I could have probably turned into a walrus and she would never have noticed. Don't recall her ever checking her air. Normally I would have checked with her on that during her dive but it was fresh tank, only a 20 minute dive, only 25 ft deep, and I was very close.

 

[yle]

... making California dive boats the most lax operations in the world (which is why I'm in love with them).

Eric, I like the way the dive boats are run here also, but I wouldn't characterize them as "lax." That implies that the crew is "lazy" and uncaring. But my experience has been just the opposite.

I regularly take students out on boats like the Great Escape to Catalina or Anacapa. The crews on our boats know how to play a supporting role: they let us get our work done with our classes, but they're available to support us with logistics. And while I've never witnessed it personally, I've heard plenty of anecdotal evidence that the crews are very good when they have to respond to an emergency.

I think it's a good environment in which to introduce students to their open water dives: there's no DM holding their hand, taking care of their gear, telling them where to go and how to do it. Everyone is expected to take responsibility for their own dive.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Eric, I like the way the dive boats are run here also, but I wouldn't characterize them as "lax." That implies that the crew is "lazy" and uncaring. But my experience has been just the opposite.

I regularly take students out on boats like the Great Escape to Catalina or Anacapa. The crews on our boats know how to play a supporting role: they let us get our work done with our classes, but they're available to support us with logistics. And while I've never witnessed it personally, I've heard plenty of anecdotal evidence that the crews are very good when they have to respond to an emergency.

I think it's a good environment in which to introduce students to their open water dives: there's no DM holding their hand, taking care of their gear, telling them where to go and how to do it. Everyone is expected to take responsibility for their own dive.

Lax may have been the wrong word. Yes I know they care and are right there when they need to be.
What would be a good word instead of lax?.... maybe libertarian or liberal in regards to freedoms, and figuring that divers who board their boats automatically know what they're doing and are given a much wider latitude to plan and run their own profiles and gear choices/protocols etc.
They give divers the benefit of the doubt figuring they know what they're doing instead of babysitting them until they prove they know what they're doing, which is a very cumbersome and intrusive way to run a boat with all the DM's needed and all.
California law must be such that they are only a taxi and once in the water you are solely responsible for yourself and your own safety. Maybe it's that if they did put a DM (or several) in the water with divers then it would pile more liability on them because then they have made a commitment to look after people underwater. I don't know, I'm just speculating.
As it is, if they do their job as it is expected topside and someone dies underwater, it's not their problem, they have no direct control over what happens under the surface.
The problem lies with the person who should have been looking after the teen.

 

[rhuntley]

4.) When a 15 year old books with a dive boat, what extra paperwork/requirements are involved over an adult? Just a signed consent for him to dive? Does he have to bring an identified supervising adult? Does some adult have to go on record as 'responsible' for him?

In my personal experience, I've only been required a signed parent consent; half the time I haven't bothered getting a parent to sign it because the charter didn't check. I've done charter dives without being even asked to see a certification.

 

[Bonuss]

This is just a very sad outcome for a parent to hear. I started diving my boys at 14 & 16 in the 90's and my late in life son at 15, two years ago. It is, or should be, a quite different mindset with young people. (there more easily distracted, can have a historically low SCR, then dart around and increase it more than I etc). It sounds like cascading issues. I'm very sorry for the family's, and those that were around this accident.

 

[wgw04024]

We are having a discussion right now in another thread here on SB dealing precisely with this issue.

Link?

 

[glassbottom]

Link?

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/7523918-post1.html

 

[DandyDon]

Somehow scuba charter boats have completely fallen off the radar making California dive boats the most lax operations in the world (which is why I'm in love with them).

You don't have a passport do you? I have seen many operators that are just damned scary. California Ops seem to expect you to follow your training and take care of your diving as taught, but they do have suited DMs on deck ready for rescues and other emergencies.

In my personal experience, I've only been required a signed parent consent; half the time I haven't bothered getting a parent to sign it because the charter didn't check. I've done charter dives without being even asked to see a certification.

90% of the Ops I've dived with never ask to see my card. For the 10% that do, I show them my faulty, blank card that says nothing - and they never notice.

 

[scagrotto]

if the 14 year old was at 90 ft then that is a deeper than I would want a 14 year old of mine to be at.

It hasn't been all that long since the apparent consensus of the dive industry was that 90' is deeper than any 14 year old should be diving. 90' deeper, to be exact.

They dived to more than 100 feet, after which the adult diver surfaced in distress.

Well, the (second hand) report says he surfaced "screaming for help". If he'd just found his buddy unresponsive and wasn't able to effect a rescue I'd hope he'd be screaming for help at the surface. That's probably distressing, but I don't know that it would mean he "surfaced in distress". He could be fine physically, he might have a physical problem(s) as a result of surfacing too rapidly, he might have also had an (possibly related?) issue at depth, or he might be okay at first but deteriorate rapidly. Of course it's also possible that his surfacing had nothing to do with the other diver and that they had already been separated for some time.

After a while, they thought about the 15 year old boy looked for him

What's not reported as of yet, is if the adult diver said anything when he surfaced or why he got O2 and was treated at a hospital. There's also no report about how long it was before doing a role call and discovering that somebody was missing. That the missing diver was reportedly found within 15 minutes suggests that there wasn't a lengthy delay.

Are they looking for the weight pocket for accident analysis, or some other reason?

It's standard procedure for authorities to take possession of a diver's equipment after an incident, so I'd expect them to make an effort to acquire anything that the diver is believed to have had.Chance that overweighting was an issue, but the limited information we have doesn't suggest an immediate problem so I'll assume things went smoothly at the beginning. I expect they'll "analyze" it if they get it, but not being an expert I don't see what that's likely to reveal other than it is in fact his weight pocket.

 

[Ayisha]

5.) Have any of you ever been asked to buddy up with a minor you didn't know or have prior experience with?

Not sure if you are asking in general or only in California, but I was asked to buddy up with a minor I didn't know on a dive shop dive about 10 years ago. An instructor and/or DM are in the water buddied with someone but all other buddy pairs are wherever they want. It was a 14 year old boy in Penetang, Ontario where the water is warmish for here (50's or 60's F), very clear, and the shipwrecks are in around 50 feet depth. His mother asked the Instructor to take good care of her son, and he's only 14 even though he looks big, and the Instructor reassured her. Shortly after his mother left, the Instructor, whom I had never met, asked me to buddy up with the teenager. I was very concerned since I am not a dive professional but I said ok. He kept having uncontrolled ascents throughout the dive, and I kept going after him, grabbing him and bringing him back down. As the dive progressed, I started grabbing him before he got very far, since I knew he would do nothing about it. It was absolutely exhausting and I feared for his safety as well as mine. After the first dive of three, I told the Instructor that the boy needed an Instructor beside him and perhaps to help him to figure out buoyancy control. My buddy for the next 2 dives was fine and I actually enjoyed the dives. The boy continued to have uncontrolled ascents and even went to the surface a few times. He told us after the 3rd dive that he had a mild headache.

After the dives, his mother was waiting at the dock, and she actually gave him the keys to her minivan to bring it to the dock. He was allowed to drive "only in the parking lot", she said (our age to go for a driver's license is 16). She was chatting with me while he was getting the vehicle, and I told her that he was having uncontrolled ascents and was complaining of a mild headache, so she might want to monitor him a bit. Since she was an MD, hopefully he was in good hands if anything happened.

I don't think I would ever take on the responsibility of diving with an unknown minor again, even if they're supposed to be a safe, responsible diver.

I've been diving off Catalina Island on a liveaboard as well as a day boat, and I found that the ops were similar to most of the dives here (not the shop dive above), where there is normally no dive guide. There is a crew member who is prepared to assist a distressed diver on the surface and maybe even jump in if necessary, but does not accompany the dive. The boat is mostly like a shuttle service, with assistance entering/exiting the water if needed, and an emergency and dive site briefing. Most divers around here seem to like that, and it's what we're used to.