Two Scuba divers killed by a speedboat

[DennisS]

A boater going into the sun cannot see those little flags that stick up about 1 1/2 foot if there is any chop. My advice get a BIG flag on a 4-5 ft shaft. Why they sell those little floaties is beyond me, they meet the legal requirements in FL but that's about it. Boaters can't see them when shore divers are out there. On the other hand there are morons who just don't care, I've always thought about 25 foot of 1/8" breakaway cable on a secondary floats.

 

[Tom Winters]

You can avoid all these boat traffic problems simply by moving to Hawaii where the state enjoys the lowest per-capita ownership of all 50 states. Once you're out of the harbor or away from the boat launch areas, you're pretty much on your own except for offshore Waikiki.

 

[LeadTurn_SD]

You can avoid all these boat traffic problems simply by moving to Hawaii where the state enjoys the lowest per-capita ownership of all 50 states. Once you're out of the harbor or away from the boat launch areas, you're pretty much on your own except for offshore Waikiki.

You're pretty much right.... but even here on the Big Island you need to be careful:

The owner/instructor of our local dive shop told me of an incident a couple years ago in which he had a group of students doing skills in relatively shallow water, with a innertube dive flag overhead. A boat pulled up next to the flag, stopped, turned off it's engine, and dropped anchor! The anchor and chain dropped amongst the divers, but amazingly no one was hit. The instructor surfaced, and "explained" the significance of a dive flag and almost clobbering submerged divers to the clueless boater, along the legal and civil liability (and the boater's personal safety) if one of his student-divers had been injured. In this case, the boater really did not know what a dive flag was or that divers were beneath him, was horrified that he had almost injured someone, and apologized profusely.

I think most boaters here do understand what a dive flag is, and in general tend to be really courteous... but you still have the knuckleheads.

Safe Diving!

 

[Ayisha]

I think many boaters think sausages and floats are water toys that needed to be rescued and given back to the kids on the beach.

The analogy to over head diving is interesting.

We treat diving in Lake Simcoe, the Niagara River and some parts of the St Lawrence River in Ontario as essentially overhead environments as well due to boat traffic. People have been hit and killed by boats or sea-doos, even with a diver down flag. Unfortunately, the flag often does seem to be an invitation to boaters to come closer and investigate what it is.

I wonder if only relying on boaters to take a safe boating course or to be taught what the flags mean is enough, when a safe boating course is not mandatory everywhere. Perhaps there should be some new universally recognizable flag that does not require being taught? Perhaps there should be a poster with a diver down flag with an explanation at boat launches, marinas, boat shows, etc.? Just a thought.

 

[Splitlip]

great idea.

 

[DandyDon]

We've even had boats enter our Casino Point Dive Park, which is ringed by buoys with warning signs and roped off. I once had two of them go right over my head in 10 ft of water. It would be nice if they required a person to actually have brains if they are going to drive a boat... and to keep off the mind alterants. Yesterday we had a jet skier heading full bore toward the boat. He stopped about 25 ft away. Many people have no clue what an alpha or dive flag means.

I was on the King Neptune there once, up toward Twin Harbors - had to wave off the Boy Scouts who were approaching. Isn't their reason for being in that boat to learn boat safety?

Another time on Key Largo's Molasses Reef, probly the busiest dive site in the world, saw a sail boat come thru - and you can't hear them from below. He came close enough to hear me calling him every name I could think of, and asked me what I was upset about. He was out of reach.

I want a grenade launcher.

 

[=C=]

We got a ticket for surfacing in Slapy Reservoir without a marker. 200 crowns each. With bonus "wow a cop on a jet ski" looks from everybody.

 

[OceanObsessed]

A boater going into the sun cannot see those little flags that stick up about 1 1/2 foot if there is any chop. My advice get a BIG flag on a 4-5 ft shaft. Why they sell those little floaties is beyond me, they meet the legal requirements in FL but that's about it.

I totally agree with you on this. Store bought floating dive flags are a complete joke. I used to use one and I can't tell you how many times I have had boats run right over the top of me and hit my flag too. I made my own giant dive flag that files higher and uses a larger size flag. I use a similar giant flag (without the float) on my kayak too. I don't get buzzed nearly as much these days.

Also, boats running directly upwind or downwind cannot see flags ahead of them very well. When I see boats approaching I grab the flag and hold it up higher out of the water and wave it. That usually gets their attention.

 

[SteveAD]

A boater going into the sun cannot see those little flags that stick up about 1 1/2 foot if there is any chop. My advice get a BIG flag on a 4-5 ft shaft. Why they sell those little floaties is beyond me, they meet the legal requirements in FL but that's about it. Boaters can't see them when shore divers are out there. On the other hand there are morons who just don't care, I've always thought about 25 foot of 1/8" breakaway cable on a secondary floats.

The arguement that boaters can't see the flag is voided by the number of morons who home in on the float and even try to pull it on board.

I dive with a flag ONLY because of the *******ed up LAW that fines me if I don't have one but doesn't penalize a boater that hits my flag so long as he is only traveling at headway speed. The prop on a slow moving boat is still spinning fast enough to turn a person into hamburger.

As many have mentioned I treat all dives as an overhead environment. I enter the water leave my flag anchored as soon as I hit about 10 feet of water go off and enjoy my dive and don't come anywhere near the surface until I am back to my flag and coincidentally closer to the beach than boats are likely to go.

The vast majority of boaters either don't know or don't care what the flag means, and sadly the majority of flag laws and law enforcement are focused on the diver that the flag was created to protect rather than the boater who has been the threat from the start.

I just thought of a new float design that places a hand grenade on top of the flagpole. Before surfacing the diver, while still at depth, can remotely pull the pin and detonate the grenade, giving us a window of time that we know there are no idiots overhead. This might finally teach the boaters that it is not a good idea to approach a divers flag.

 

[OceanObsessed]

I just thought of a new float design that places a hand grenade on top of the flagpole. Before surfacing the diver, while still at depth, can remotely pull the pin and detonate the grenade, giving us a window of time that we know there are no idiots overhead. This might finally teach the boaters that it is not a good idea to approach a divers flag.

Or just tie a thick 50' polypropylene line onto the float of your flag and let it float on the surface. If it ends up wrapped around a propeller then they will know to keep away from flags in the future . Gheez, why didn't I think of this years ago ??