Dangers of reef hooking?

Two recent threads on ScubaBoard have touched on deaths of divers in which reef hooks were present:

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=285417#post285417
http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25725

opinions?

Scubaroo once bubbled...
Two recent threads on ScubaBoard have touched on deaths of divers in which reef hooks were present:

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=285417#post285417
http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25725

opinions?

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The first of those threads is really about rebreathers, not reef hooks.

The second thread is very long and I see no point in rehashing the issues again.

Quote from first thread:

He was found a several of hours later, in the same place where they left him, entagled in his still attached reefhook with no gas in either his rebreather or bailout. There was evidence that he way trying to disentangle himself.

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Quote from second thread:

The victim hooked on the reef. She lost a fin in the current, perhaps looked back to assess the situation, and lost her mask in the process. She panicked, dropped her weight belt, and tried to remove her BCD. What follows next, no one knows. She may have panicked, hyperventilated, and became unconscious. She had an abrasion on her forehead, so she may have hit her head in the current and became unconscious. The end result was that she was unconscious and drown. Although the reg was in her mouth, her nose was exposed, and the current was high velocity, and sea water likely could've entered and filled her lungs.

The time I hooked, discovered her, and the divemaster unhooking her was brief.

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First incident - victim found entangled with reef hook line, ran out of gas.

Second incident - victim found drowned still attached to reef hook.

I was trying to stimulate some discussion on any dangers associated with reefhooks, rather than go over issues in the above threads.

As I think I posted in that thread, I was shocked that this practice goes on. Even if it doesn't hurt the reef, which I find hard to belive, it's a pretty dumb idea to throw a bunch of vacation divers into a screaming current and have then clip themselves to the reef. The practice is the height of stupidity IMO.

I consider myself a strong swimmer and I'm used to working with lines above and below water, but, I think I would still be hesiatant to take a suicide clip and attack to my harness under these conditions. Bottom line: if you get in trouble you must assume that you are not going to be able to unclip due to the force of the current and you will need (under emergency conditions) to locate your knife or shears and without dropping them, cut yourself free.

A kid in my home town drown last year while riding a boggie board attached to a bridge. The line wrapped around him and the current was too strong, no one had a knife and it took a long time to free him, byt then it was way too late.

Currents and lines don't mix, espically for 3 dive a year tourist divers.

I can't believe people do this crap...I guess for enough cash you can do anything you want

I guess so Big T. Stupidity prevails over common sense at times and unfortunatly, people get hurt.
Why would someone even want to hook themselves to a reef. (How can that NOT hurt it if the current is pulling you with such force that you need to anchor yourself to a FRAGILE piece of aquatic life?)

Drop into a fast flowing current and tie yourself to the local bottom features with a hook and string. Isn't that the above-water equivalent of hooking a carabiner and climbing harness to yourself and tying off to a car, then letting the driver take you for a ride while you cling to the car?

Scubaroo once bubbled...
Quote from first thread:



Quote from second thread:

First incident - victim found entangled with reef hook line, ran out of gas.

Second incident - victim found drowned still attached to reef hook.

I was trying to stimulate some discussion on any dangers associated with reefhooks, rather than go over issues in the above threads.

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Yes, I can read and still stand by my remark that almost all of first thread was about rebreathers. IMHO, the question of dangers associated with reefhooks was rather beaten to death, along with some other issues, in the second thread.

FreeFloat once bubbled...
Drop into a fast flowing current and tie yourself to the local bottom features with a hook and string. Isn't that the above-water equivalent of hooking a carabiner and climbing harness to yourself and tying off to a car, then letting the driver take you for a ride while you cling to the car?

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Hmmm, Jackass comes to mind here.

HA HA HA HA...now that's funny DD