Whidbey Island fatality - Washington state

[DandyDon]

Cause of death still pending for diver recovered from Pass | South Whidbey Record

A cause of death hasn’t been determined for an experienced diver who was pulled out of the water below Deception Pass Bridge May 4.

The man was identified as Richard Moore, 67, of Renton.

Island County Coroner Robert Bishop said Moore had a vast amount of experience diving throughout his lifetime and was very familiar with Deception Pass underwater. He had been diving “several times a week every week,” the coroner said.

Moore was with a group of people from Renton who traveled to Whidbey Island to dive. They went into the water at North Beach in the morning.

About an hour and a half later, people in a boat unrelated to the divers found Moore’s body floating underneath the bridge and transported him to Cornet Bay. Despite lengthy CPR, Moore was eventually pronounced dead at the docks, Bishop said.

The cause and manner of death is pending test results to determine if an underlying health condition contributed to the tragedy, the coroner said.

 

[Marie13]

Sad. I wonder if the buddies noticed him missing or if it was just a loose group. From what I’ve read PNW diving is often low viz.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

Deception Pass can be a wicked dive. Here's a map:

If accessed by land, it is done from Deception Pass State Park on the south side of the channel (north beach). People enter the water about 30 minutes before high tide slack, get blown east into the channel, get high tide slack, then get blown back out.

One of the risks coming back west to the starting point is sometimes eddies develop, so you can wind up fighting strong current on your way back to the beach (as you are close to the wall on the south side of the channel). I've been hit by up and down currents as well as side currents (north and south, while the channel runs east/west). Most times, it has been an enjoyable drift dive in two directions.

Viz at this time of year is hit and miss, mostly miss with algae blooms. Sometimes I see on local FB groups reports of good viz (15 to 20 feet).

 

[Marie13]

Thanks for the site info.

 

[DandyDon]

Sad. I wonder if the buddies noticed him missing or if it was just a loose group. From what I’ve read PNW diving is often low viz.

I flew up there once to dive those waters some. The locals I spoke with on a dive boat asked me what brought me to Seattle? They couldn't imagine me traveling there just to dive, but you see some sights there not seen anywhere else. The viz was limited indeed, and I had difficulties keeping up with dive buds.

I did not dive that pass. I did stop there driving back to photograph a yacht riding the tide thru.

I can only guess that the diver being so very experienced that no one in the group tried to cover him.

 

[Seaweed Doc]

From what I’ve read PNW diving is often low viz.

Very true. Especially in April/May when the plankton bloom is really ripping.

The eddies, as @wetb4igetinthewater mentioned, can be brutal. I mis-timed a dive near there. Calm at the start, strong downwelling at 80' so we started to ascend because, well, that wasn't cool. At about 65' we got blasted from the side and ascended like rock climbers, hand over hand with bodies parallel to the rock face and to the bottom. Ducked into a hole at 30' to rest. Popped out of the hole and got caught in a crazy upwelling. Couldn't dump air out of my BCD fast enough; despite trying to deflate all the way up, I could feel the air expanding in the BCD.

Ways I could have died and been found floating on the surface on that dive are multiple. And if they had current issues, buddy separation is a real possibility. (Though you think somebody would notice he hadn't returned to the beach?)

 

[Zef]

I used to live on Whidbey years ago when I was stationed at the naval air station there in Oak Harbor. I did some diving in a lake up near Anacortes on the other side of the pass but never dived the pass...at the time it was described to me as treacherous due to the eddies and down currents that exist there. I didn't have a boat and back then when I looked at the map, the fact that one could be blown out to sea by the current coursing through the pass was not all that enticing.

Instead of diving there we spent our time teaching our kids to skip stones from the beach below the bridge while pointing out the bald eagles riding the thermals overhead.

Whidbey is one of the most beautiful places we have every lived, and Deception Pass was a definite treat to have just a few miles from our house.

-Z

 

[Bob DBF]

Ways I could have died and been found floating on the surface on that dive are multiple. And if they had current issues, buddy separation is a real possibility. (Though you think somebody would notice he hadn't returned to the beach?)

They may have reported him missing, but found before the first news report, so it was irrelevant to the story written.

Also, I don't know the length of dive time which could be a factor, also I don't know if they would do a shore search before calling the authorities, if one had to exit other than at the designated point.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

They may have reported him missing, but found before the first news report, so it was irrelevant to the story written.

Also, I don't know the length of dive time which could be a factor, also I don't know if they would do a shore search before calling the authorities, if one had to exit other than at the designated point.

Not much shore at North Beach.

 

[Bob DBF]

Not much shore at North Beach.

I don't know the area, and I was referring to shore as where water meets land, not necessarily an actual beach. So if one was to land 500 yards from where expected could your buddies make a quick search if someone was slightly overdue, or would it be a 911 call?