New to the team!!!

[murphdivers286]

I just made the Dive Team at the St. Lucie County Sheriff's Office. The tryouts were interesting. It was weird wearing the blackout mask. You really have to trust your buddy to be able to do that task. It was nice being friends with all of the members. I actually felt like I belonged with them before I was even placed on the team.

On our first training day, it ended up in a call out. There was a case involved a gun, and it was thrown in retention pond. My Sgt. told me I was up for this dive. I geared up and slide into the water. The water immediately turned black. The bottom was a thick muck. I placed my hand into the muck just to see how deep it would go. I was able to placed my arm all the way down up to my shoulder. It felt like I could have went deeper.

The search pattern we chose was an arc search. I was informed the small semi-auto pistol was still loaded with one in the chamber. I found everthing from golf balls to aluminum siding. I scared myself half to death went I fact to face with the opening of a drainage pipe. I know that alligators hang out in the pipes. I had a thought go through my head about a gator lunging out at me.........<---imagine a gator instead.......I had been down for about 45 mins. when I felt my middle finger go into a large medal ring. I knew instantly it was the trigger guard. I backed out my finger and deployed my marker float.

It was a great feeling to find the gun on my first call out. It just dumb luck I found it. I know I have found my place.......

 

[Jorbar1551]

great job. i hope to start in the next few months for my local dive team.

 

[tnfireman]

Congratulations on making the team and finding the pistol
Ray

 

[Boater Dan]

It was a great feeling to find the gun on my first call out. It just dumb luck I found it. I know I have found my place.......

Congrats on your joining the team and on your recovery. Don't undersell your finding of the weapon! Luck certainly plays a role in ALL the searches we do, but so do efficient and effective search patterns and good bottom coverage by the search diver. The smaller the object, the more difficult the potential location of the object. Guns are difficult to locate especially in muck filled ponds.

Keep training and learning. It never ends.

Stay safe.

Dan

 

[Gary D.]

Welcome aboard.

I have to echo what Boater Dan said.

I will add that you need to treat ALL firearms as if they are loaded. It doesn&#8217;t matter if they have been down a day or 100 years. It&#8217;s just better to be safe than sorry because ALL of them can fire underwater.

Also I&#8217;ll do my peer pressure speech. DO NOT LET PEER PRESSURE PUSH YOU INTO ANYTHING YOU DON&#8217;T FEEL COMFORTABLE DOING! Saying no from time to time will help you live to a ripe old age.

Saying NO is nothing to be ashamed of and there shouldn&#8217;t be anyone question you about it.

On an operation earlier this year, everyone of my guys stood there and said no. I&#8217;m so proud of them because they will say it when they feel a need to. There doesn&#8217;t have to be a reason.

The job still got done but we just went a little different route. Coming in from a different angle is always an option and time for a recovery is on our side.

Sounds like you guys did well and had a good learning experience.

I&#8217;m proud of you!

Now, lets talk about the gator issue. Did you do something in your suit you don&#8217;t want to talk about?

Gary D.

 

[murphdivers286]

Now, lets talk about the gator issue. Did you do something in your suit you don’t want to talk about?

Almost.....

I will add that you need to treat ALL firearms as if they are loaded. It doesn’t matter if they have been down a day or 100 years. It’s just better to be safe than sorry because ALL of them can fire underwater.

Trust me, I always treat a gun if it is loaded. I get aggravated if a child points a toy gun at anyone. I son knows that best.

Thank you all for the welcome. I know I will learn a lot here that I can take back to the team.

 

[Yotsie]

Congratulations and welcome aboard!!! Excellent work on your recovery, right out of the chute. Guns, even underwater, make me very nervous. Like Gary said, doesn't matter 1 hour or 100 years, figure on it going off.

Now the real work begins.... Listen to the guys on the team that have been around for awhile and pay attention to training.

Great work on your recovery!!!

 

[murphdivers286]

My grammar needs a little work... don't you think.

 

[Gary D.]

My grammar needs a little work... don't you think.

I'd keep working on the PSD training and leave the grammer to MS Word.

Gary D.

 

[sparkyjames]

I'd keep working on the PSD training and leave the grammer to MS Word.

Gary D.

now you know why we all love Gary D so much :mooner:
thousands of comics un unemployment and he thinks he can make jokes

hey welcome to the world of PSD there is so many grate guys and gals here to help you find the answeres you are looking for and you cant ask for a beter bunch if you just want to talk about .

kind of new my self to PSD only been on the team for three months now
Grate job on your recovery.

Keep us p dated on your progress

Sparky