Boat ladder/hull danger

[Donnah]

I'm usually the last back on the boat. I don't like getting back on! I've seen people fall backwards off the ladder and almost take out another diver who is too close. I'd rather wait at 20 feet (assuming no current) until the gang fighting for the ladder is on the boat. I remember one dive in Roatan where a squall came up suddenly, the crew kept throwing out lines that ended up under the boat, and the waves were getting higher every minute. We all held hands to keep together and waited for the situation to sort itself out. Finally two guys -- strong and experienced divers -- managed to get on the boat. One stood on the ladder and the other hauled people into the boat. When we got back, we looked at the radar. There was a small system right above where we were diving. Everything else was perfectly clear.

 

[Wingy]

While i have no experience with a Carolina line which i presume is a rope dangling for divers to hang onto I second Donnah...im usually the last to get back on the boat. Id rather kick back til everyone has stopped scrambling around and fin back away from the boat for a while until I can judge rise and fall of ladder and tides without getting a fin in the face from another diver. I guess each boat works differently and has a different procedure but I have a very healthy respect for props, hulls and ladders. Ive had a rusty ladder snap on a longtail in thailand leaving me dangling by one arm in fairly decent seas...luckily by the hand I wear one glove on. Im reasonably flexible so was able to swing one leg up onto the side of the boat to be hauled in. Lesson learnt, check ladder when in doubt and dont pay the boatman til he gets you home alive.

 

[Akimbo]

…The 14 person boat was rocking and jumping up and down from the waves, and the Carolina line was tangled up in the boat ladder and ran up close to the underside of the boat. I feel like the ladder could've been a giant knife that couldve sliced my head open or the bow could've done some major damage. Is this something that's a real danger? …

Simple answer, hell yes!

This type of trauma is more likely to be blunt force than slicing. I personally haven’t heard of head injuries that immobilized divers, but have I have suffered lots of bruised tissue and ribs. Several commercial divers required first aid and being taken off the dive rotation during my time in the North Sea.

I wish diver lifts were more prevalent in North America like they are in the UK. I think there is only one in North Carolina and one in Canada. A third is under construction primarily for disabled divers in Monterey.

JT'S NEW LIFT PLATFORM 5-1-11 - YouTube

God's Pocket Resort - Boat Elevator - YouTube

Freedom Dive Program | Monterey Bay Veterans, Inc

Generally, fooling around getting your fins off before climbing aboard is one of the riskier times.

 

[DiverGuam]

I have heard dive operators say that getting on and off the boat is the most dangerous part of the dive.

Entries and exits are always the points of danger anywhere.

 

[elubes]

Cool thanks for the replies everyone.
Helps very much!
Definitely will keep diving.

 

[Laurent Pilotte]

Rope is the leading cause of deaths in the diving industry.

Sent from my XT901 using Tapatalk

 

[Akimbo]

Rope is the leading cause of deaths in the diving industry...

That is inconsistent with my understanding. Can you share the source of that data?

This is the most current data I know of:
Annual Fatality Rates and Associated Risk Factors for Recreational Scuba Diving

 

[tangfish]

A ladder on a boat in rough seas can be a very dangerous thing indeed. Glad you and the others made it back without incident. As far as those borderline dive condition days, sometimes it's just better off to live to dive another day. You never know when Mother Nature will decide to turn a borderline day into a sh1t hitting the fan type of day.

 

[yardpro]

welcome to nc conditions (even if you weren't in nc)

 

[scuba5150]

I recently saw a fellow diver use a technique that I had not seen before to deal with a swinging boat ladder. Seas were about 3-4 feet and several divers were hanging on the tag line with BCDs inflated waiting their turn to ascend the ladder. The ladder was hinged at the top so the bottom part of the ladder would swing up and down as the boat pitched. When this diver reached the ladder, he quickly deflated his BCD completely than started to work to ascend the ladder. The DM said the purpose of deflating the BCD was to keep the diver’s BCD from acting like a balloon and making the rising and falling of the ladder more extreme.

This seemed like a good idea to me at first. But I wonder what would happen to a diver who got pitched off the ladder, hit the water hard, got disoriented and didn’t have the buoyancy to stay on the surface???