Wife describes losing husband - Maui, Hawaii

[Bob DBF]

“Emergency cord pulled” issue I have is this action most likely did not cause a uncontrollable rapid ascent. At only 2 atmospheres back in the late 1960’s these cartridges on bcd or horse collar vest’s barely inflated enough to cause type of rapid ascent described.

Correct, however those things were phased out some time around the ‘90’s, or so, as my best guess. Either there was some old gear being used, a misunderstanding in the quote, or the writer was having flashbacks.

Is there a medical event that quacks like narcosis? What could make someone swim off like that?

He could have seen something more interesting to him, not necessarly fueled by narcosis, or he was having some kind of issue, real or imagined, and that seemed like a good solution.

There's a theme this incident brings to mind. A recurrent criticism of the dive industry by a few has been that recreational diving is billed as 'safe,' without enough emphasis on how dangerous it is or can be. Since the people educating the public are the ones selling dive courses and dive gear, it's an understandable concern.

I'm with @Marie13 on this, the instructors that train local divers that I have met have no problem pointing out the dangers involved in the sport. My OW instructor made it plain that he didn't want any of "his" divers dead on the NorCal coast because he neglected to prepare them for the dangers. Warm water is selling the pretty fishes, as opposed to perspective client going parasailing instead, pointing out the dangers is not good for business.

"The sharks, and the instructor diverting people’s attention to them before buddying up, “disrupted the whole process,” she said." That ought not to 'disrupt the whole process.' Of course a guide will point out the sharks.

This, right here, seems to be the start of a lot of issues. A dive proffessional says it's better to give up the buddy system so he can get his crowd down on his schedule, the divers listens to the professional, and things start going wrong.

Everything conspires to "disrupt the whole process", the idea of dive training is to first track your air, depth, time, and buddy before anything else, as that is how one stays alive underwater, then you can add the fun inbetween the reality checks.



Bob

 

[Hiszpan]

Pharmacist here, working in the Commonwealth country 1.5 hour flight from your Eastern shores. I can see my US supplier having Scopolamine patches readily available in stock, so I am assuming it is sold in US in the pharmacies without issues with supply.
I do not order from them as we get ours from UK at a cheaper price.

I personally recommend them to tourists who go on fishing trips while vacationing here. I had many positive feedback about it's efficacy. I recommend them as a less-drowsy option than the variety of brands of tablets, containing dimenhydrinate, meclizine and others.

Quick search on the internet got me this:

Effects of transcutaneous scopolamine and depth on diver performance

Quote: "Transdermal scopolamine is an effective anti-motion-sickness medication that has less CNS side effects at normal ambient pressure than orally ingested agents. To see whether it has an effect on performance at depth, 24 healthy sport divers were exposed to depths equivalent to 5 m (1.5 ATA) and 36 m (4.8 ATA) in a dry recompression chamber, breathing air and wearing a skin patch containing either scopolamine or inactive placebo. Patches and dive depths were presented in a counterbalanced, double-blind experimental design. Tests of sentence comprehension, simple arithmetic, and manual dexterity were used to evaluate psychometric and cognitive performance. Drug side effects were recorded. The Bennett Hand Tool Dexterity Test was evaluated for its suitability for repeated measures testing, and found to be robust. Manual dexterity and sentence comprehension were significantly impaired at depth whereas arithmetic skills were not. No significant effects on diver performance from transdermal scopolamine were seen. Certain side effects such as blurred vision were more common with scopolamine than with placebo. The use of transdermal scopolamine as an antiemetic during diving operations deserves field evaluation."

PDF with full evaluation also available at that the above link

Verdict: I would recommend using the patches over oral antihistamine-based sea sickness meds before diving

 

[spoolin01]

I try to cut people slack because I need slack cut for me so often, so here are a few thoughts in defense of this woman.

I hear and acknowledge all the comments about what doesn’t make sense in this story, but . . .

Being an attorney does not automatically make one dishonorable or overly litigious.

It has been 20 months since her husband died. Has she filed any law suits?

She herself went well beyond recreational limits, probably ascended at at unsafe rate, and suffered a medical emergency as a result while dealing with the heartbreak of losing her husband. It’s not surprising she doesn’t have a coherent recollection of the event.

It is the reporter’s job in a human interest story to make the subject sympathetic or at least relatable, so a good part of the pathos could be from the writer’s slant.

Unless she proves otherwise, let’s assume she really is, as she said, trying to live gracefully with the hole in her life.

She may be every bit the sympathetic character one would hope for. But I also am constantly reminded that when I watch media content, I'm not an eavesdropper, not an observer to events being portrayed, and not even much a consumer of information. I'm the target for some degree of manufactured content and directed manipulation, in large part. You can say just as easily that a sudden newspaper report of an eight month old accident is not automatically simply journalism, doubly so for an odd reprint a year later on some frankly inscrutable website.

I don't see the need to stake out any particular take with any degree of conviction at this time.

 

[spoolin01]

At least as of several years ago, it was still possible to get scopolamine in pill form in the U.S. at what's known as a compounding pharmacy. Now, I wouldn't count on the average Physician knowing off the top of his head how to grab up the phone and order it, so if you've got a Family Doc. or similar who might be willing, do a little research to find out what's required.

But it could be done, as I've done it (granted, well before our 6-year old was born). Not all pharmacies are compounding pharmacies, but there's likely one in driving distance of many people.

Now that you mention that, I recall that option being discussed in some past threads. I could be mis-remembering, but I thought one benefit of Kwells in addition to discounted pricing, was not needing a prescription. Scopace was liked by a couple of friends who tried it, but not something I take myself. I'd still like to keep up on the availability of some pilled version.

 

[NothingClever]

It is the reporter’s job in a human interest story to make the subject sympathetic or at least relatable, so a good part of the pathos could be from the writer’s slant.

Scraps,

I agree with you and I think this article does not do Ms. Monday any favors.

I also agree with your perspective about attorneys. Shoot, one of my best dive buddies is senior counsel for a major corporation. Also, all my major work decisions in the past 15 years have required a formal legal opinion. Unlike many folks, I enjoy the company of attorneys because I appreciate their professional training and their special role in society (historically, one of the four noble professions). However, when an attorney immediately assumes a legal posture of victimhood and excludes the contemplation of personal responsibility, then it is difficult for me not to view their behavior as a dishonorable abuse of legal skills.

 

[Esprise Me]

I still don't see what this discussion of her state of mind or inclination to sue in the wake of the accident contributes to a discussion of how to prevent such accidents in the future, which is what I understand to be the purpose of this forum. It's entirely possible to believe that 1) dive ops could save lives by reminding customers of the dangers and stressing safety measures, 2) they should do so, because saving lives is a worthwhile goal, but 3) divers also ultimately are responsible for their own safety, so 4) dive ops who don't go the extra mile and aren't grossly negligent shouldn't be held legally liable. There are other ways of thinking about the word "should." For example, I think dive boats SHOULD be stewards of the environment their business depends upon by, among other things, using reusable cups, plates, and cutlery. That doesn't mean I go around suing those who use disposables, even though I am (gasp) a lawyer. It means I look for this information when choosing a dive op, and I note it when leaving a review so others can do the same. I might even suggest it to the dive ops directly. If anything, as a (gasp) lawyer I have an acute understanding that there's always going to be a big gulf between my personal line between right and wrong and the law's line between legal and illegal, and that even when you have the law on your side litigation tends to be an absolute ******* nightmare for all concerned. I still get to have and express opinions about what could and should be done; my profession doesn't transform those opinions into edicts. But maybe we could have a discussion here about whether she's right that 1) dive ops could save lives by reminding customers of the dangers and stressing safety measures, and whether it follows that 2) they should do so, even if we still believe 3) and 4).

 

[drrich2]

If so, we're back to which risks rate going over, and in what way. Let's take nitrogen narcosis, for example. While it seems the large majority of people can dive down around, oh, what would you guys say, 80 feet or so (?) without noticing any evident effects, there are some people who get effects shallower. Some effects, like intense anxiety, or mild mental dulling, aren't likely to cause someone to fin off into the depths.

So, going forward, on a typical day in warm water with good viz. diving with a group, at what depth would the risk of narcosis be high enough to warrant special mention?

If you have too low a threshold for for bringing up low risks, divers will blow it off, 'Yeah-yeah, blah-blah,' and your delivery will be useless anyway.

Couple of real world examples to have in mind. My first trip diving Jupiter, FL, it seemed the typical dive situation was '90 feet to the sand,' drifting slowly over that for a total dive time (if you used nitrox) of 45 minutes. The offshore wreck diving out of North Carolina I recall might say sand around 110 feet, wreck sits on that, I might spend the bulk of a fairly square profile dive around 80 to 90 feet or so roughly?

What would you have boat staff at those 2 destinations warn me about in terms of narcosis, variations of the bends, etc...?

Richard.

 

[aviator8]

I still don't see what this discussion of her state of mind or inclination to sue in the wake of the accident contributes to a discussion of how to prevent such accidents in the future, which is what I understand to be the purpose of this forum. It's entirely possible to believe that 1) dive ops could save lives by reminding customers of the dangers and stressing safety measures, 2) they should do so, because saving lives is a worthwhile goal, but 3) divers also ultimately are responsible for their own safety, so 4) dive ops who don't go the extra mile and aren't grossly negligent shouldn't be held legally liable. There are other ways of thinking about the word "should." For example, I think dive boats SHOULD be stewards of the environment their business depends upon by, among other things, using reusable cups, plates, and cutlery. That doesn't mean I go around suing those who use disposables, even though I am (gasp) a lawyer. It means I look for this information when choosing a dive op, and I note it when leaving a review so others can do the same. I might even suggest it to the dive ops directly. If anything, as a (gasp) lawyer I have an acute understanding that there's always going to be a big gulf between my personal line between right and wrong and the law's line between legal and illegal, and that even when you have the law on your side litigation tends to be an absolute ******* nightmare for all concerned. I still get to have and express opinions about what could and should be done; my profession doesn't transform those opinions into edicts. But maybe we could have a discussion here about whether she's right that 1) dive ops could save lives by reminding customers of the dangers and stressing safety measures, and whether it follows that 2) they should do so, even if we still believe 3) and 4).

I do not cast aspersions upon lawyers as a group. I hold several as friends. I do think it is fair to assume they know how to work the levers of the system for their advantage, and that getting pulled into the legal, shall we say, the meat grinder, can destroy anyone, regardless of guilt. Having said that, I had commentary about what stood out to me. Those were the, "I didn't know", and "someone should have told me the implications" and " that if others would have done something different all this could have turned out differently" mentality of the reporting. I find those to be both false arguments and a self absolution, for the reasons I expressed.

In the end i did not add additional comment here because the article is:

1. Old, and probably never ended in litigation or @DandyDon would have found it!
2. Was just bad reporting and factually inaccurate as is almost always the case in diving accidents, and frankly any accidentally.
   
3. I was not there and only the people that were really know what happened
4. Even the people that were there can have vastly different recollections of what did happened.
5. The survivor could very well be a self reflecting individual that, as stated, was just trying to save others lives through sharing an experience.

The fact of the matter is we all speculate on these incidents and it is easy to do so, but none of us have the facts in their entirety. Very few accidents lend us the opportunity to actually speak with the victim and figure out what really happened (not just an outside observers recollection of what they think they observed and happened). Even worse most reports are filtered through witnesses who saw part of an entire event, and relayed that to a reporter who is hardly qualified to understand what they were just told, then it gets editorialized for sensationalism. How can we learn anything through that chain of events?

 

[Esprise Me]

@drrich2 good point. In the OP's case, it seems that while they weren't diving deep (on purpose), it was very easy where they were to go deep. I've done a lot of diving over hard sandy bottoms only 40-60 feet deep, where you're right, a warning about narcosis wouldn't be taken seriously. But in a situation like this, it seems worthwhile to bring up the incident pit. You're planning to go to 70 ft., which is just deep enough for a few sensitive individuals to get narced, but probably not enough for their symptoms to be obvious to others, or for the affected individuals to perceive their own impairment. Maybe there's a shark out there and you start swimming toward it, forgetting in your haze to check in with your buddy, and also forgetting to keep an eye in your depth gauge in the open blue water. And now you're getting deeper and dumber and maybe you're not even following a shark anymore, just swimming, swimming, somebody once said just keep swimming...

Yeah. That might be sufficiently foreseeable to remind customers who got certified maybe decades ago that it's possible to get a little stupid at this depth, and a lot stupid if you keep going down, so stay with the group and monitor yourself and others for signs of narcosis. It could be done with humor--tell the one about the guy who offered his reg to a fish-- and it could be brief. But perhaps in certain dive environments, it ought to be done.

I was surprised that the widow in the OP vaguely remembered learning about narcosis in her OW class decades ago but hadn't heard about it since. The fact that she remembers it being covered in class so long ago suggests to me there may be nothing wrong with her memory, which in turn suggests it really hasn't come up much in the sphere of her awareness since. It's hard for me to imagine that, but in thinking about it, my experiences differ greatly from hers. I've only been certified about a year, during which time I've been active on this board, especially reading A&I. I also read the book Diver Down and the Lessons for Life column it was adapted from. Incidentally, I also learned a bit about narcosis before I became a diver. I did Mock Trial in law school, and it so happened that our fictional fact pattern concerned a diver who died on a wreck and the grieving spouse as the plaintiff. There was a whole lot in there about narcosis and how the diver had been obviously impaired on the deeper dives leading up to the fatal dive and whether she should've been allowed to dive. It may not have been perfectly accurate in its portrayal, but it made me quite aware of the phenomenon. Obviously my experience isn't typical. If it's true that most OW divers learn about narcosis and then kind of forget about it because they rarely go deeper than 60 feet and nobody talks about it, I could see how a lot of people could be surprisingly ignorant but mostly get away with it. Appropriately placed reminders and warnings could perhaps mitigate this problem.

 

[Kimela]

I dive a Zeagle Zena and it has a sort of 'emergency cord'. If you pull the red handle it will pull the lacing out of my BC and my weights will drop. I wonder if this was the case here?