Who has performed a rescue?

[lermontov]

I recovered a friend from the bottom, whose head had been split by the props of a boat exposing his brain. Not a good day. We knew he was “too over due” to expect a good outcome when we began the search and I told the others I am not doing CPR on a dead guy before we splashed. I think they thought it rude. I was upset bringing him up and looking down into his skull on the ascent, but I was much more freaked out by a close call which occurred several years earlier..

I was a DM on a boat in Florida and it was a rough day and we had a “kid” DM trainee with us and just two women customers. The one women had trouble with her gear so she didn’t gear up – so the three of us dove.

A drift dive in 75 feet of water. We jump in and she begins to swim down head first, moving smartly. I am taking a more casual approach and just sinking butt first, holding a floatline and watching her. Not really paying attention to the DM trainee.

We have been sinking descending for maybe 30-45 seconds and she is at a depth of maybe 50 feet. I am just 8 or 10 feet above her and I see her starting to sweep her head back and forth in a somewhat nervous manner. I think, “oh crap, she is looking for me, doesn’t see me and is getting scared”.

I have been watching her intently. So I immediately flip over, swim down alongside her and gently touch her shoulder so as to avoid startling her. It takes me literally 5 or 7 seconds to flip and spin and dive to a position next to her. I am in sink mode, negatively buoyant and relaxed.

She looks over to me and spits her reg.

I am 2 feet from her face and immediately remove the reg from my mouth and push it to her lips, she rejects it pushing it away with her hands. She is kicking wildly and waiving her arms.. total panic.

I instantly grab the reg and shove it to her lips.. she rejects it again. And we continue to sink toward the bottom in 75-80. I dropped the dive hook as some point, probably right away, thinking the trainee would grab it – which he did.

So now I am at a loss, what to do.. we are deep, sinking and she won’t take a reg that I know is working perfectly. I might have offered it to her a third time.

She was a small, young women and I have a strong upper body. I grabbed her with one hand by the back of the head and pressed my regulator onto her lips – hard and I floored the purge button. I could not see her face at all - it was completely obstructed by a huge cloud of bubbles and I am completely freaked out. There was nothing she could do to refuse or oppose my actions.

So I have both hands fully occupied and we are both heavy.. I start kicking like a mad man.. determined to get her to the surface ASAP.. with or without an air embolism. I am dragging her by her chin and the back of the head. I swim for a short duration, maybe 10-15 seconds 30-40 feet and realize I have a problem.

I was so relaxed and rested when the initial problem occurred, that I never secured my own regulator.

I am somewhat of a freediver and those (dangerous) instincts kicked in I guess. So this whole time, I have simply been holding my breath – I had zero urge to secure a breathing source for myself – I was completely concentrating on the victim, Suddenly I feel a pain and fullness in my chest, so I exhale and drop the hand from her head for a moment and get my octo in my mouth and resume the sprint to the surface.

I just keep the reg blasting fully and swim with 100% effort. It is weird how your mind works in a real emergency, because all I could think about was how pissed the captain was going to be when I hit the surface and start screaming “HELP!”. We hit the surface, we have been down maybe 75 seconds.

The boat is driving away and quickly turns and I grab her inflator and press it… NOTHING. I inflate my Bc and I am holding her and almost too scared to look for a bloody froth from her mouth. The boat arrives super fast and as we shove and pull her somewhat limp body onto the platform, I reach up and turn her air on.. thinking it might help a little with the lawsuit if she dies. I know he buddy doesn’t notice.

Once on board, the captain immediately checked her air – finding it on and I had to tell her (the captain) that it had been off and I turned it on while she was on the platform getting out.

We get her on the boat, pick up the DM trainee who ascended soon after and the victim is FINE.

In fact, I am worse than her. I am shaking from adrenaline and doing everything I can to not cry like a baby. I have some mild lung/chest pain and a weird cough for a day or so. I think I over pressurized my lungs.

We were done for the day.

On the way in, we got to talk and I asked what happened? She had been certified OW the week before and had bought all new gear for this weekend. She had a brand new 3500 psi tank. Somehow her tank was turned off on the boat, not by me – probably by her.

So she entered the water with the SPG reading 3500 and did a great duck dive and was swimming down. She said she was doing great and reg was working perfectly for about 4 breaths. When I noticed her head going side to side, she said she was getting zero air and did not believe it was happening. She said she told herself the gear is all brand new and the tank is full and she deluded herself into thinking that she just needed to suck on the reg, rather than look for help. Thinking it is new – it couldn’t fail.

Even though she exhibited only a few moments of nervous behavior, she said by the time I tapped her shoulder, she said she was just so freaked out that she could not use a regulator.

I got to dive with her the next weekend and she was happy and confident and I had to tell her (and her husband) that she came pretty close to getting killed. She said that a few years prior, she was in an auto accident and drove her car off a cliff and through a guard rail and the cops and EMS were amazed that she was not killed.. said she was not even hurt from the fall and roll. Seemed like a nice girl.

Before this incident, I helped pull a diver from the ocean and did CPR on him while hundreds of people (including his sister and buddy) watched. He died and was only like 18 yrs old. That was not a good day. I have done at least one other memorable rescue and many "assists" here and there.

great story - tense just reading it

 

[Erich S]

I think that dumpsterdiver takes the cake so far for the most successful and unsuccessful rescues.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I think that dumpsterdiver takes the cake so far for the most successful and unsuccessful rescues.

Thanks but the pictures of the sting ray spine embedded in flesh is pretty hard to beat.

I had a funny "rescue/assist" that was in a potentially deadly situation that is somewhat amusing, but I want to read about some other rescue attempts..

 

[Resqdivemedic]

I made a rescue during my advanced class. We had just surfaced from the deep dive and a female diver next to me began to panic and started going under. I immediately grabbed the shoulder strap of her BCD pulled her to the surface and inflated her BCD. After calming her down with assistance from the instructor we towed her to shore and ended the day.
Being a public safety diver I have recovered many individuals who were beyond the window for resuscitation. My first call after being certified as a PSD was a missing swimmer at a local reservoir. It took 8 minutes to get to the scene, I dressed on the way in the back of the rescue. After arriving and determining the point last seen, I finished dressing, entered the water and began the search. Located the victim in 3 minutes. Brought him to the surface and loaded him into a boat who took him to shore. I exited, dressed down except for my wetsuit, and helped with CPR and advanced life support measures. Unfortunately he did not survive probably due to the warmer water and prolonged submersion time. I think he was down a total of 28-30 minutes before being located. One funny aspect to this was I was standing in the emergency room after handing over the victim and there was a big puddle forming around me on the floor. I worked the whole call in a wet wetsuit. Talk about getting stares from the hospital staff.