Trespassing golf ball diver drowns - Texas

[CT-Rich]

Well if he ran out of air, I doubt he was asleep. My guess is he ran his tank dry and in a panic couldn't dump the golf balls and dive weights fast enough and drowned. He probably had a lanyard cinched around his wrist. dark and cold added the loss of dexterity. Very unfortunate, I guess it goes back to the old adage of you can drown in a glass of water.

 

[scuba5150]

Seriously? “What we speculate is that the water was so cold it probably sent him into shock and he went to sleep,”. That's a thing? If so, there should be divers sleeping all over the bottom of the lake here in Tobermory. It's friggin' Texas... do they even have cold water in Texas...?

Awesome speculation on the part of the good Sheriff, who is also, I presume, a Doctor in his spare time.

Condolences the family and all, and hopefully they'll get some answers to what happened here.

From the Mayo Clinic web site:
"As your body temperature drops, signs and symptoms of moderate to severe hypothermia include:

• Shivering, although as hypothermia worsens, shivering stops
• Clumsiness or lack of coordination
• Slurred speech or mumbling
• Confusion and poor decision-making, such as trying to remove warm clothes
• Drowsiness or very low energy
• Lack of concern about one's condition
• Progressive loss of consciousness
• Weak pulse
• Slow, shallow breathing

Someone with hypothermia usually isn't aware of his or her condition because the symptoms often begin gradually. Also, the confused thinking associated with hypothermia prevents self-awareness. The confused thinking can also lead to risk-taking behavior".

Sounds like the sheriff may, indeed, know what he's talking about.

 

[Bob DBF]

From the Mayo Clinic web site:
Someone with hypothermia usually isn't aware of his or her condition because the symptoms often begin gradually. Also, the confused thinking associated with hypothermia prevents self-awareness. The confused thinking can also lead to risk-taking behavior".

Sounds like the sheriff may, indeed, know what he's talking about.

I have delt with two cases of hypothermia and if I was not paying attention both would have stayed where they were until they ran out of air, I physically had to move them along and force them out of the water. Neither had any memory of the end of the dive, they said they were cold for a while and decided to tough it out and had no memory shortly thereafter. One was a novice, but the other was a reasonably experienced diver.

Oh yeah, it scared the crap out of me for a while, and I've never tried to tough out the cold since the first incident.


Bob

 

[descent]

This thread from March has discussion of hypothermia symptoms, some prevention & treatment options, and some cautionary tales.

Thicker Wetsuit and slower metabolism equals longer dive?​

 

[seeker242]

Seriously? “What we speculate is that the water was so cold it probably sent him into shock and he went to sleep,”. That's a thing?

That's what happens when people go into severe hypothermia.

divers from the sheriff’s office could only search for short periods of time, Gleason said. When the divers got out of the pond, their body temperatures had dropped to 94 degrees, Gleason said

94 deg is already hypothermic. Obviously, they didn't have the proper exposure protection. I would be surprised if the diver did have proper exposure protection.