Unknown Woody From “Dive Talk” DCS and Medical Journey

[SlugLife]

you make it sound like its a 50/50 chance -i suggest its more like ...you can do the same dive etc 1000 times and on the 1001 you get bent- if your following all the accepted parameters of deco diving and you get a hit its more of an anomaly than an expected outcome

I guess communication is hard sometimes, I never intended it to sound like 50/50.

 

[crofrog]

you make it sound like its a 50/50 chance -i suggest its more like ...you can do the same dive etc 1000 times and on the 1001 you get bent- if your following all the accepted parameters of deco diving and you get a hit its more of an anomaly than an expected outcome

The reality is that you could do the dive the first time and get bent, or do the dive 10000 times and not get bent, or anything in between. Probabilities don't care how many times you've done something before.

 

[billgraham]

And yes that happens and we are all prone to brush it off, so i am not too critical about the dleay in treatment, but more about the lack of preparation in general (emergency plan) and then in the emergency that had manifested to not start an inquiry to at least then be prepared..
But it all happens, what would be interesting from your example though is:
Did the diver in question chnage his behaviour after this incident? And did he refelect in hindsight and accepted some responsibility in the late treatment?
we all make mistakes and ideally smart persons don't learn from their own mistakes but from mistakes from others, howevere at least one should learn from their own mistakes and the latter is something i Lack to see with the Divetalk folks. I mean to be blunt after the Missouri incident you go on a dive trip to a remote location and yet have not set up a proper emergency plan? Really? does not sound like learning a lot and all that in public along with normalising such behaviour. The latter is my issue here..
Or how about equipment confirguation and gas choices after Missoury. Gus already had issues in a restriction due to non ideal equipment n configuration but yet gets in trouble due to equipment on this dive? the list goes on and and seems to show a pattern.. and that is really the issue here. Unfortunatley this is not about an isolated screw up event. And then the focus is even more on pointing fingers at DAN (which did screw up no doubt and hopefully this event will therefore help the greater community for DAN fixing certain issues), but I do not see much of accepting own responsibility here or any of a learning curve other than "of we should slow it down now" followed by "hahaha I do not even see how this will be possible" so unfortunately likely the next accident to happen and fingers crossed hopefully not being fatal at some point!

Skills like CCR cave diving erode when you're not using them. When I didn't live on top of the diving, I'd come for ten days and start feeling like I had my $#!& together on about day 8. My back stopped hurting, things felt easy again, and so on. These days I'm doing little open circuit cave dives and often I'll start my dive with some CCR divers gearing up on their first day of a trip. I'll come out and they are still trying to get it together, or replacing sensors because their rig flooded, or there are just bailout bottles and silt on the bottom because they are back at the dive shop replacing a hose, or the drysuit flooded, or fill in the blank. Don't assume that your brain, body and gear are all going to work flawlessly right where you left off on your previous trip--that never happens. I know everyone feels the pressure of "We are only here for X days and our goal for the day is to do this dive" but it's supposed to be fun and this is where the goal can start to eclipse the "fun" aspect. If you make the goal "to see pretty wet rocks" it's more achievable. If a couple things go awry, take your stuff off, fix them, relax, have a beer, whatever. The cave isn't going anywhere. Maybe "goal oriented diving" was more of a contributing factor than people are considering in this discussion. Like I said earlier on, let's talk about the diving part.

 

[Nitrogenius]

Yes and no. He basically quit technical diving and I doubt he'll ever do it again after that second experience - the first being a CO2 hit on his rebreather a year or two ago at around 230-260 feet. Sold the rebreather after that incident at his wife's request (or maybe demand - not sure) because it scared him so much. The DCS hit was something he said he'd get back in the water after, and as the days/weeks went by after the incident was over, his desire to get back in kind of waned. He admitted his part as far as things he should've done, or should've done better, and that it wasn't wise coming out to do a lackadaisical afternoon dive to 180+ feet on trimix without having been diving in the last 5-6 months and doing no prep (hydration, etc).

I hate it because he was one of my first buddies I was introduced to, and the reason for me getting into cave/tech diving in the first place... but I can't say I wouldn't cut WAAAY back and re-evaluate ****, if the same thing happened to me.

Sounds like learning effect to me, so great..

That said, their new family hobby is riding sport bikes - I'm not sure that's safer (and quite sure it's probably worse), but at least if he dies riding one of those it's likely to be faster and more violent than slowly dying of the bends... I can't say I don't see the logic there as having been shot while I was in the academy to become an LEO, and almost drowned (separate occasions years apart, needless to say) - I know which one I'd be more likely to pick as my demise if I had to choose.

Well also riding sports bikes one can execute rather risky or more reasonable.. So it all depends..
I have been riding sports bikes longer than I have been driving cars and I am still around to tell the story
As the saying goes there is old cave divers and there is pushy cave divers, there are no old and pushy cave divers.. Similar concept applies to riding bikes and pretty much a lot of other areas of life.

 

[Kinolee]

This all makes me wonder if DAN insurance is even worth having, TBH. I guess it is, because Woody got reimbursed for his expenses in the end (but would DAN do that for a regular Joe Shmo?)... but honestly the #1 thing I've learned from this incident so far is that I need an Amex. Honestly Amex should sponsor Dive Talk at this point. I'm sure I'm not the only one who signed up after watching their video...

 

[CT-Rich]

This all makes me wonder if DAN insurance is even worth having, TBH. I guess it is, because Woody got reimbursed for his expenses in the end (but would DAN do that for a regular Joe Shmo?)... but honestly the #1 thing I've learned from this incident so far is that I need an Amex. Honestly Amex should sponsor Dive Talk at this point. I'm sure I'm not the only one who signed up after watching their video...

Woody has been pushing hard on the Amex. I would say Dan is cheap enough that, despite not being perfect is worth it. I believe they have already made some procedural changes based on this incident.

 

[makar0n]

Woody has been pushing hard on the Amex

Makes one wonder why.

 

[CT-Rich]

Makes one wonder why.

they okayed emergency medical expenses when other cards said "No"?

 

[VikingDives]

This all makes me wonder if DAN insurance is even worth having, TBH. I guess it is, because Woody got reimbursed for his expenses in the end (but would DAN do that for a regular Joe Shmo?)... but honestly the #1 thing I've learned from this incident so far is that I need an Amex. Honestly Amex should sponsor Dive Talk at this point. I'm sure I'm not the only one who signed up after watching their video...

And herein lies the "Divetalk Problem."

Anyway, for those that are thinking AMEX is the cat's meow, I stumbled upon their platinum card agreement last night and you should take a look at what's (not) covered:

"Excluded Sports and Activities means boxing; cave diving; horse jumping; horse riding; hunting and hunting on horseback; professional sports; canyoning; caving; diving; mountain-climbing; steeple chasing; any form of motor racing; speed, performance or endurance tests; abseiling; American football; bob sleigh; bungee jumping; base jumping; canoeing; clay pigeon shooting; deep sea fishing; go-karting; hang gliding; heliskiing; hot air ballooning; ice hockey; jet biking and jet skiing; martial arts;micro-lighting; mountain biking off tarmac; mountaineering; parachuting; paragliding; parascending; paraskiing; polo; quad biking; rock climbing; SCUBA diving deeper than 30 meters; skidoo; ski-jumping; ski-racing;ski-stunting; tour operator safari (where You or any tourist will be carrying guns); trekking requiring climbing equipment and/or ascending above3,000 metres from sea level; war games/paint ball; white water rafting; yachting more than 20 nautical miles from the nearest coastline.

https://www.americanexpress.com/content/dam/amex/au/benefits/Platinum/PlatinumInsurance.pdf

I can't be bothered to watch the video, and if he paid out of pocket, great. I don't really care... Just pointing out that you platinum card isn't cave diving or deep diving insurance. YMMV.

 

[makar0n]

they okayed emergency medical expenses when other cards said "No"?

Perhaps. Or perhaps might have something to do with the fact that Youtube channels are run on advertising income. Guess we might never know.

And herein lies the "Divetalk Problem."

Anyway, for those that are thinking AMEX is the cat's meow, I stumbled upon their platinum card agreement last night and you should take a look at what's (not) covered:

"Excluded Sports and Activities means boxing; cave diving; horse jumping; horse riding; hunting and hunting on horseback; professional sports; canyoning; caving; diving; mountain-climbing; steeple chasing; any form of motor racing; speed, performance or endurance tests; abseiling; American football; bob sleigh; bungee jumping; base jumping; canoeing; clay pigeon shooting; deep sea fishing; go-karting; hang gliding; heliskiing; hot air ballooning; ice hockey; jet biking and jet skiing; martial arts;micro-lighting; mountain biking off tarmac; mountaineering; parachuting; paragliding; parascending; paraskiing; polo; quad biking; rock climbing; SCUBA diving deeper than 30 meters; skidoo; ski-jumping; ski-racing;ski-stunting; tour operator safari (where You or any tourist will be carrying guns); trekking requiring climbing equipment and/or ascending above3,000 metres from sea level; war games/paint ball; white water rafting; yachting more than 20 nautical miles from the nearest coastline.

https://www.americanexpress.com/content/dam/amex/au/benefits/Platinum/PlatinumInsurance.pdf

I can't be bothered to watch the video, and if he paid out of pocket, great. I don't really care... Just pointing out that you platinum card isn't cave diving or deep diving insurance. YMMV.

Wonder when we will see a first "Amex refused my scuba claim but Woody told me so" post.