Missing Diver incident

[jhelmuth]

FWIW...

[1] I've never liked 3-some buddies - solo is better.

[2] Buddy or not - always dive with a safety sausage and whistle.

[3] Aquanuts (Key Largo, FL) has a great system for ON/OFF. You are required to attach an identifying tag (identifies you on their roster list) to your tank. When the dive is over, you provide the tag to the DM at a roll call (like signing in). To get back in, you get a tag to go back on the tank. Back on the boat, you turn in the tag at role call. The boat does not leave untill all tags are in their pigeon holes (a specially made box that visually accounts for every tag).
I've never seen it done better.

 

[IndigoBlue]

FWIW...

...
[3] Aquanuts (Key Largo, FL) has a great system for ON/OFF. You are required to attach an identifying tag (identifies you on their roster list) to your tank. When the dive is over, you provide the tag to the DM at a roll call (like signing in). To get back in, you get a tag to go back on the tank. Back on the boat, you turn in the tag at role call. The boat does not leave untill all tags are in their pigeon holes (a specially made box that visually accounts for every tag).
I've never seen it done better.

That reminds me somewhat of U.S. Navy embarcation procedures on troop ships. Not exactly, but close.

Good idea!

 

[MikeFerrara]

Is that they system that DAN developed?

 

[Damselfish]

There's a couple comments about 3-some buddies in this thread but was it? The article says "Carlock and three dive buddies had entered the water at about 8:45 a.m." This adds up to 4. Was it 2 pairs, a 4-some, or is the article inaccurate (gosh, imagine that.)

Anyway, I personally feel that 3-some buddies are fine if you do things right. Same as a 2-some is pretty worthless if done wrong.

 

[DEEPLOU]

FWIW...

[1] I've never liked 3-some buddies - solo is better.

[2] Buddy or not - always dive with a safety sausage and whistle.

[3] Aquanuts (Key Largo, FL) has a great system for ON/OFF. You are required to attach an identifying tag (identifies you on their roster list) to your tank. When the dive is over, you provide the tag to the DM at a roll call (like signing in). To get back in, you get a tag to go back on the tank. Back on the boat, you turn in the tag at role call. The boat does not leave untill all tags are in their pigeon holes (a specially made box that visually accounts for every tag).
I've never seen it done better.

From what I remember, I think it was Aquanuts that did the same thing only it was a husband and wife who survived by clinging onto a bouy through the night. As I recall they were attorneys and did sue the operator.
That prompeted the better accounting system.

PS: on a 6 pack it is easy to see if there are only 5 people on board.

 

[Rick Murchison]

Arntz told officials that Dive Master Zacharias Araneta had accounted for all the divers before leaving the first location, Croft said.

Yep, some helpful soul (now keeping his mouth SHUT) answered the roll call for him. Hard to fault the DM on that one.
Rick

 

[dc4bs]

Consider ditching your tank when it is completely empty, at which point it does you no good anymore. You can tell the boat where you left it, if they find you later. You can also tell them what to do with it, if they find it again!

Umm... An aluminum tank (with a few exceptions) is generaly bouyant when emty so it'll probably just float near you if you ditch it unless you left your reg on it. Depending on how heavy that is, it may or may not sink.

Even a steel tank is only a small amount negative or neutral when completely empty.

But if it is, in fact, completely empty and just costing you energy to drag it around then sure, that's a more than good enough reason to ditch it.

Personaly, I'd be face up floating on the surface and would want to keep that chunk of metal between me an any sharks that might look up and see what might look kind of like a resting seal aabove them...

Not very helpful if it's a big shark, but then, not much a scuba diver generaly carries is if he's really hungry, is it?

 

[H2Andy]

They should just make it a criminal case. Attempted murder or something.

well, that would be up to the State of California, not the
victim...

the problem is finding a criminal law this DM broke.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Yep, some helpful soul (now keeping his mouth SHUT) answered the roll call for him. Hard to fault the DM on that one.
Rick

I'm not so sure. Considering the importance of a correct roll call I don't think the DM should be counting an unidentified voice. Hech the diver who "answered the rooll call" may have been just talking to some one and the DM heard it as an answer to the roll.

You need a face, signiture or something.

Even if some smart guy did yell..."HERE" the crew is responsible for making certain every one is on the boat.

I fault the crew because regardless of what they thought their responsibility was to know.

 

[MikeFerrara]

well, that would be up to the State of California, not the
victim...

the problem is finding a criminal law this DM broke.

I'll bet that like accidental shootings and who knows what else the prosecutor won't see the value in spending the money and effort to prosecute.

Also I'll bet if I learned to read law I'd find more holes and contradictions than I do when I read training standards. LOL
If the prosecutor thinks he can get a conviction and that it will be good for his career (worth his time) then a law was broken. LOL