As a Seattlite who obtained her diving certification in the exact same spot as the accident yesterday, I have been following this news story and am disheartened to hear that the young woman passed away. My thoughts are with her family and friends, as well as the other diving students and instructor that were with her on this dive.
I've also been very curious in learning the name of the certification school involved, though that information has not yet been made public. During my certification process back in 2011, I had a very negative experience. The viz was terrible (about 3') and so were the currents. When doing our first line/skills dive, I can recall hanging on to the cable with all my might and not being able to see anything next to me until the instructor swam up and literally put his face in my face so that I could see his signals. That was Day 1. On Day 2, I was on my final check-out dive when I realized I was out of air at approximately 30'. I made this discovery not because of my gauges, but because I went to inhale and there was literally nothing coming out of the reg. I took another breath to make sure that I was out of air and remained calm enough to quickly assess my options: 1) signal to my diving partner (who was also brand new) that I was out of air, or 2) hope that the student getting his dive master certification was still behind me. I chose option 2 and was thrilled when I saw him right behind me. I made the sign for "out of air," he looked at me in disbelief, and then we executed a perfect emergency ascent with me breathing off his emergency regulator. I remember NOT remembering to manually inflate my BCD at the surface (he did it for me), and he was yelling with excitement because I had remained calm throughout and executed the emergency procedures flawlessly. They pulled me onshore, threw a full tank on my back, and tossed me back in the water to complete my check out dive.
After the dive was complete, the instructor asked me what happened. I told him I didn't have any air in my tank, and he said I should have switched it at lunch. I told him I had exchanged the used tanks for the new tanks over break, and he accused me of grabbing the wrong one. My dive buddy said "Absolutely not - I was with her and we were EXTREMELY anal about which we were putting in the trunk and which we were pulling out to use. You gave us a used tank." Then the instructor asked why I hadn't checked my gauges...and I told him it was because I had forgotten to, because we hadn't practiced the buddy check since the previous morning (and then, only once). As a new diver, I would expect an instructor to drill in the buddy checks before EVERY SINGLE DIVE and to also do a cursory check just to make sure. Diving was so new and there was so much to remember, that both my buddy and I forgot the most important parts.
I did fill out an "incident" report after, but they were pretty hostile and assured me it was my fault. Now this news hit, and I can't help but wonder what did - or did not - happen during the preparation leading up to this young woman's dive yesterday. I only know my experience - which was not great, but fortunately had a (very) happy ending.
Of course, fast forward to now and I've got +30 dives under my belts but have stopped diving due to anxiety/panic attacks the last several dives (has happened in 10' and at 70'...no correlation with depth). Sometimes I wonder if - despite my ability to remain calm in my out of air situation at the time - that experience has lingered with me more than I'd like to admit.
