Ritz-Carlton didn't voluntarily pay 17.5 million if the thing had no merit. Read the article, there was no judge or jury. They settled. I'd need to know a lot more than the article provides before forming any opinions on it. Perhaps if it was your wife or husband that was a quad., and there was true negligence on the part of RC, you wouldn't be so disgusted by it. Perhaps you might even think it wasn't enough.
The $17 million dollar dive
- Thread starter AltonK
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I agree 100%. There's too much of this in our society. I read about an employee at an office xmas party in Toronto who drove home drunk and lost her ability to walk for life. Her boss argued repeatedly with her and even offered to call her a cab but she refused. He was considered liable and she won a huge settlement. I feel bad for her but she's an adult and she made a poor decision. Why does someone else have to suffer for this kind of thing? Granted if these divers were brand new it changes the situation.
wrecNcaver
Contributor
We are all assuming that these were people that went through a full B0W course. Sound like it may be a case of a resort course gone very wrong. Just a thought.
I was talking to an instructor that said out of 10 divemasters at a busy resort in Mexico 8 of them regularly took charters on spike dives to depths of 200+ feet. He said that they did many other illegal things. Money talks he said. If your charter gave you the money and asked you to do anything you do it. He started to work for them, but left within a few days after discovering the goings on.
IMO - It is most likely that the man in the article was doing a resort course.
IMO - It is most likely that the man in the article was doing a resort course.
The article gives us little facts, but the thing that jumps out is this:
RC's own attorney says there was clear negligence, and that THEY were very pleased with the settlement amount. For RC's own attorney to say that, there must have been MAJOR negligence on their part. Defense attorneys just don't make comments like that, unless the negligence is so clear, that it can't be denied (and even then they would rarely admit it).
RC's own attorney says there was clear negligence, and that THEY were very pleased with the settlement amount. For RC's own attorney to say that, there must have been MAJOR negligence on their part. Defense attorneys just don't make comments like that, unless the negligence is so clear, that it can't be denied (and even then they would rarely admit it).
FredT
Guest
The negligence was there, but ws it the Ritz who was negligent?
According to at least one account I"ve read the Ritz had a contract with a "scuba outfit". This scuba outfit droped very green divers on a reef way beyond normal depths, and dropped one of them first and alone. The "alone" diver went to the bottom as instructed, but the rest of the crew didn't show (good for the rest of the crew, bad for DM.) Ritz management was not on the dive, or to my understanding was a Ritz employee.
The alone and well stoned diver hung out for almost 20 min, then did a polaris imitation. After 4x the NDL for that depth and a rocket ascent a DCS incident was unavoidable. The fact that O2 was not on the boat is a red herring. As bad as the fellow had to be bent it would have made little or no difference to the outcome. That he even survived to the surface is the miracle of the decade.
I expect it the Ritz settled to avoid seeing a jury with no clue how diving works, not because the Ritz was negligent. Without a doubt the Ritz's CONTRACTOR was neglignet, but a native Jamacian contractor has no $s, so it sounds to me like someone did a deep pocket hunt, then legally extorted $ for the victim of someone else's error. More likely culpable targets would be the "instructor" who "taught" this fool, and the boat crew. Of course the lawyer couldn't even make his fee from THEIR pockets!
Compensation of the injured may be a desireable effect, but extortion of a questionalble target isn't the way to go about it.
FT
According to at least one account I"ve read the Ritz had a contract with a "scuba outfit". This scuba outfit droped very green divers on a reef way beyond normal depths, and dropped one of them first and alone. The "alone" diver went to the bottom as instructed, but the rest of the crew didn't show (good for the rest of the crew, bad for DM.) Ritz management was not on the dive, or to my understanding was a Ritz employee.
The alone and well stoned diver hung out for almost 20 min, then did a polaris imitation. After 4x the NDL for that depth and a rocket ascent a DCS incident was unavoidable. The fact that O2 was not on the boat is a red herring. As bad as the fellow had to be bent it would have made little or no difference to the outcome. That he even survived to the surface is the miracle of the decade.
I expect it the Ritz settled to avoid seeing a jury with no clue how diving works, not because the Ritz was negligent. Without a doubt the Ritz's CONTRACTOR was neglignet, but a native Jamacian contractor has no $s, so it sounds to me like someone did a deep pocket hunt, then legally extorted $ for the victim of someone else's error. More likely culpable targets would be the "instructor" who "taught" this fool, and the boat crew. Of course the lawyer couldn't even make his fee from THEIR pockets!
Compensation of the injured may be a desireable effect, but extortion of a questionalble target isn't the way to go about it.
FT
the diver (new or old) made a very stupid mistake.......It will cost him for the rest of his life......;-0 :boom:
hcs3
Guest
don't resort courses only allow a 30 foot depth? it said they planned on going to 60 - 70 feet. makes me think they were OW certified...
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