Greenjuice
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Woman rescued near San Clemente Island - California
- Thread starter DandyDon
- Start date
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TGIF858
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She was very lucky that there were many capable people in our group and that a lot of things simply fell in her favor. Having previously had someone pass away on me while performing CPR, I consider this a miracle of sorts. Of course at the time, our collective thoughts were simply to do what needed to be done, and that can be attributed to Bill Powers who has built Power Scuba on a foundation of safety.
Regarding the ascent, I did not replace the reg in her mouth. Per Rescue training, if you find a diver without a reg in their mouth, you don't put one in. BUT, having seen exactly how long she had been down, I thought she might regain consciousness, so I did hold the reg in front of her mouth as I attempted to snap her out of it. If she had regained consciousness, her first instincts would have been to breath, so I tried to prepare for that.
Before even lifting off the bottom, I knew it would be an emergency ascent and factors from Rescue training began pouring into my mind. Time was utterly critical for her. When she failed to quickly respond I dropped the reg and grabbed her BC inflator. As I did, my buddy and another diver arrived. We all ascended at the same time, so the rate was a bit herd-like, not easy to control, but I did weigh the danger to us at the time. My buddy and I had been down for only 5 minutes, it was the first dive of the day/trip, we were using EAN 32, and the other divers who joined us had zero bottom time. Therefore, considering our nitrogen load was minimal, the risk for the bends was reduced. I also made sure to exhale a lot on the way up to avoid a lung expansion injury. I did start dumping air from my drysuit about half way up to slow us a little. We ascended from 82' at well over over 100'/minute, but because of the aforementioned, I thought that I could stay with her to the surface. Had it been a later dive of the day or had we been down longer, I would have gotten her positively buoyant and let her go at some point. Perhaps the other divers who arrived later from the surface could have taken her to the top in that case. In any case, the boat was only about 15 feet from the point where we surfaced, so with or without us she could have received additional help quickly. None of us experienced any symptoms and we were all watched by other members for the 6 hour journey back to port. Monday morning quarterbacks can conjecture as they like, if we not gotten her up as quickly as we did, the outcome would have been different. As it was, she was released from the hospital the following day.
T.C.
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Greenjuice
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Thanks. I expect this might be one of the most important calls made that day, well judged and executed.
It might appear to go against the book but given the likely nitrogen loading of the victim and rescuers, allowing barotrauma to be the main risk to be managed, it is amazing what ascent rates can be tolerated.
If she was hypoxic, with or without circulatory arrest, at that time, the situation would become one where 'time is brain'. Every minute delay in getting her back to the surface would have mattered.
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---------- Post added March 27th, 2014 at 12:50 AM ----------
TGIF858, did you decide to drop the weight belt or leave it on to help keep control of the ascent?
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TGIF858
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Thank you.
I didn't remove her integrated weights. I didn't need to remove them because she became buoyant with them in and locating/ditching them would have used precious time. I didn't keep them in to control the ascent because that simply didn't occur to me at the time. Things were moving pretty quickly, but had she not risen after inflating her BC, I would have ditched them, hopefully.
MalibuJerry
Contributor
Kudos to Power Scuba…this is an impressive rescue and a good lesson for all of us.
Great job on the rescue everyone.
I am curious (not criticizing) as to the reason for the chamber ride. As I understand it:
1. This was the first dive of the trip. So there was no residual nitrogen load
2. The victims "dive" was short. I'll be generous and call it 3 min total.
3. The initial loss of consciousness occurred at the beginning (descent) not during the ascent. Therefore she wasn't breathing compressed gases, so this was physiologically more of a free diver situation. Basically if you haven't breathed compressed gas it doesn't matter how deep you went you can't have a lung over expansion injury.
IF (and this is a big IF) this was known at the time of the chamber ride what was being treated? We might have to wait for the injured diver to contribute to find this out.
I am curious (not criticizing) as to the reason for the chamber ride. As I understand it:
1. This was the first dive of the trip. So there was no residual nitrogen load
2. The victims "dive" was short. I'll be generous and call it 3 min total.
3. The initial loss of consciousness occurred at the beginning (descent) not during the ascent. Therefore she wasn't breathing compressed gases, so this was physiologically more of a free diver situation. Basically if you haven't breathed compressed gas it doesn't matter how deep you went you can't have a lung over expansion injury.
IF (and this is a big IF) this was known at the time of the chamber ride what was being treated? We might have to wait for the injured diver to contribute to find this out.
Last edited:
T.C.
Contributor
An over-abundance of caution?
I asked the same question of the DAN medical tech when I called in my report. She responded that the increased partial pressure of a chamber ride helps a LOT of things besides the bends... brain functions being one of them. She also said that noticeable improvement in cognitive functions upon descending in a chamber is not at all uncommon.
Bill
Let's be clear that while a rapid ascent may well have aided in the positive outcome in this scenario, we shouldn't all overwrite the common sense we've been taught about how to safely surface ourselves and a victim. That is incredibly fast. It was a judgement call that happened to not end poorly.
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