Bahamas: Missing Female Diver

[boulderjohn]

John, I agree with 99% of your argument, but as a former college English lecturer, I have to disagree with your comments on the idea of "coming up with a thesis and then supporting it" as leading to dangerous thinking. That is a rhetorical technique for writing persuasive arguments and a tool for teaching students to be able to back up their claims with evidence. Too many students make nefarious claims and have NO IDEA how to support their arguments. Many students come out of high school with no critical thinking ability, and being able to support a claim with logic and/or evidence is an important skill that needs to be developed.

I almost did not respond because of the hijack, but I think I can get this on topic.

For the first decade of my life as an English teacher, I would have agreed with you. I then grew tired of fuzzy logic and weak arguments presented in proper rhetorical technique. When I realized I was doing everything backwards and focused instead on teaching thinking, observing, and drawing conclusions instead of rhetorical technique, I was stunned by the soaring improvement in my students. This led eventually to the part of my career when I was teaching teachers how to teach.

During those years, teachers responded much as you did. I therefore have a ready arsenal of many hours of responses should you be interested in pursuing this.

You are right that the typical student has no idea how to form an effective argument. That is because they have been taught to use rhetorical technique in lieu of thought. Try teaching them instead to examine the facts with an objective eye and you will be shocked by the results. When students really understand why they believe something, they have no trouble making an effective argument. When they have instead plucked an opinion out of the air, it all comes down to rhetorical technique.

For the purposes of this thread, it is all the same. We need to draw conclusions based on the facts before us, not preconceived opinions.

 

[boulderjohn]

This may seem at first to contradict what I said earlier, but I do not believe it does.

Let me start with a typical far-flung analogy.

Many years ago a 13 year old chess player named Bobby Fischer played what many have called the Game of the Century. In the middle of the game, with everything seeming to be in total balance, Fischer's queen was attacked by a bishop, if I recall correctly. (It's been a while.) The purpose of the attack was to make Fischer remove his queen to a less threatening position. Shockingly, Fischer allowed the queen, the most powerful piece of all, to be taken, seemingly in exchange for a mere bishop. At that level of play, such a move is unthinkable and, well, suicidal.

But Fischer won, and analysis shows that once the queen was taken, he could not have lost--there was nothing his opponent could have done to stave off defeat with the resulting position of the pieces.

For me, the brilliance of the move lies not so much in the act itself but in the fact that Fischer even considered it. Mere mortals such as I would never take a moment to ask, "Hmm, what if I let him take the queen?" We are so bound by convention that we dare not consider something so unconventional.

That goes back to what I said earlier about having one's mind tainted by preconceived suppositions while doing research or examining evidence. When you go into it with a preconceived notion, you examine what you see in comparison to that notion. You must instead look at the situation, see what is there, and consider all the possibilities--even the possibility that sacrificing a queen may be beneficial, or that a seeming diving accident might instead be a suicide.

 

[ItsBruce]

To elaborate on John's post, let me reference a scene from the movie “The Sentinel” (20th Century Fox, 2006). I have used this scene as a demonstration of what is sometimes called "tunnel vision" or "confirmation bias."

In the movie, a homicide detective tells Secret Service agent David Breckinridge, played by Kiefer Sutherland, that he believes the killing of another Secret Service agent occurred in the course of an ordinary armed robbery. Breckinridge looks at the scene and asks the detective if he really thinks it was just a street crime. The detective answers: “In my gut, yeah.” Breckinridge responds: “You know my problem with gut feelings? Once you have them, the only evidence you see is the evidence that reinforces your gut feeling. Human nature.” Breckinridge then explains why the objective fact refute the detective’s “gut feeling.” Breckinridge points out several things, including that even though the deceased agent’s wallet was out and empty and his gun was in his hand, the safety was still in the “on” position. Breckinridge then has another Secret Service agent explain that unlike police officers, Secret Service agents are trained to release the safety while drawing their guns. The fact that the safety was still “on” meant the deceased agent had not drawn his gun and that it had been put in his hand after he had been killed, to make it look like a street crime.

This phenomenon is quite common and often results in unsound conclusions.

And, until we get more information about all we can do here is "hang out" and discuss cool stuff.

 

[sinduda]

Whew...I was hijacked by this thread and read through the whole thing today...well, read lots and perused others. I found this thread to be an amazing instructor on what to do and more importantly, what not to do. It also made me realize how complacent I can get and how wrong that is. I dive in the Galapagos where the currents are always strong and what I must admit does scare me are what they call the 'azules'. Local fisherman will tell you that if you are caught in one of these down currents, in the western islands around Isabela, you do not get out of it. We dive in 7mm wetsuits and for me, that means a lot of weight or my arms are exhausted from keeping myself down at a safety stop. Maybe having some in the pockets makes more sense than all of it around the belt in the event I ever do need to shed some. But I've had no problems yet. Complacency. Down currents are not unusual out here and a distraction of watching hammerheads or taking a photo and you can drop 10 meters quickly. Complacency... I'm accustomed to a dive buddy being at a distance. Complacency....

On the medical check-up, I will say that due to 2 divers dying of heart attacks in the Galapagos just this year, I did end up at a cardiologist for the first time ever to have an EKG, eccogram, etc. It's nice knowing what good shape your heart is in instead of knowing that you should get it checked out. No complacency there due to others' accidents. It's a shame that it can take a tragedy, but better they serve that purpose and perhaps save other lives than simply go unnoticed except by those who loved them. This has been a very good thread. Even if no more light has been shed on Mrs. Woods tragedy, I have a feeling she has helped many. Reminds of of the "If I should die diving" Sticky posted somewhere on these boards.

 

[kimkc1971]

It may not be a factor--I'm just trying to determine what standard practices private DiveMasters should adhere to. I've never seen in-water DiveMasters holding tanks or hands. That could be due to locale (which based on your post, it doesn't seem to be), due to lack of experience of DiveMasters at higher-risk sites (my only experience watching in-water DiveMasters has been at relatively benign locations), or any number of other reasons. Since I don't know how often DiveMasters should hold tank/hands, I'm trying to understand it better. I could ask my DM course instructor when we meet later this week, but ScubaBoard has spoiled me with instant gratification.

We hired a private DM for our son on his first OW dives in Cozumel. He was 12 and it was required by the dive op. The DM stayed right next to him at all times and even held on to him on occasion where the current was swift. He of course wanted more independence, but she wouldn't let him leave her side. This may be in part to the fact that he was a child, but regardless of a divers age, if the decision is made that a diver requires a private DM, the diver's ability to handle various situations especially over deep depths shouldn't be assumed...

 

[Only halcyon]

I have been reading most of the on this tread and its very interesting to read what everyone has to say.

I spoke with the dive investigators the other day and they will get back to me in a couple of weeks, so they say.

I was the only diver who saw what i thought was 100% of what happened that day but as I am told was only 70%.

My wife and I spoke with one of the DM proir to diving that day and mentioned that my wife was having trouble with her ears and if we didn't decend with teh group not to worry. After entering the water it turned out that my wife could only go down to around 15ft so we watched the other diver decend and swam in their bubbles for the first 5mins of the dive. I quickly tired of this and notioned my wife to move to the left of the bubbles which was moving us over the wall (the wall being on our right at this point). My wife wasn't very comfortable with this but I didn't feel like spending the dive looking at bubbles.

A few mins after at about 8mins into the dive my wife decended to around 40ft and I followed we followed the group who were now infront and were gradualy decending.

It was probably around 15mins into the dive at around 60 ft that I fist noticed 3 divers sitting on the wall at around 90ft which i now know to be an 2 divers completing their advanced deep dive with a DM. Shortly after that I saw to divers below me at around 80ft. At this point I was at around 65ft and my wife was slightly above at around 57ft I noticed that something seemed not quite right since I could see that the lead diver was wearing Stuart Cove rental equipment and the diver following was not. I could also see from the way the first diver was moving through the water that they were not as experienced as the second diver who was following and given the depth it seemed kind of strange. I watched the both of them swim under me and start to move ahead all the while decending slowly, by the time they were ahead of me they were at around 100 ft. The viz that day was very good and was around 60ft. I continued to watch the 2 divers while keeping an eye on my wife who still seemed to be having trouble with her ears and the whole dive in general. I signed to my wife that there was something happening below us and to slow down and wait. Iwatched as the second diver whom I now know to be the DM try to get the attention of the first diver only to be pushed away. I then dropped to around 90ft to see what was going on. I could see the first diver (Mrs Wood) continue to swim down to what must have been around 110ft and seemed to have no intention of stopping, I looked on wondering what was happening and wondering what I was missing had they seen hammerhead sharks? I dropped lower to see if I could see what they had seen we were told pre dive that hammerhead sharks had been seen in the area so I didn't want to miss out if a diver had seen them. As I said it all seemed a little strange since the diver going so deep was in rental equipment so I dropped down to almost 100ft leaving my wife at around 60ft. I looked up and my wife was signaling me to come up and catch up with the group who were now quite a way ahead of us. I told her to stay where she was as there was something going on which didn't seem right to me. I could see the DM now hitting her tank with some thing and could see the second diver hitting their tank and could hear the constant signaling noise the 2 divers were at around 130 when I lost sight of them. Iswam up to meet my wife and sigaled that there was something very wrong with the 2 divers below, my wife signed to catch up with the others and to stop worrying, I could see in her eyes that she was pissed off so I leveled off at around 80ft and moved on all the while looking back. At this point the DM came up from below and swam up to me and signed, my buddy is gone and kept repeating the sign, my buddy is gone. I didn't know at the time that she was a DM but I could see from her eyes that something was very wrong. I later found out that she was the DM and her buddy was Mrs Wood. I quickly swam to my wife and passed on the sign, buddy missing, my wife kind of blew me off so I swam quickly to the group and came up on the lasr diver and passed on the sign. It turned out that this diver was not a DM and didn't really understand what I was trying to say. I looked back and notioned my wife to swim with me back to the boat. We caught upto the group who were just under the boat at this point around 31mins into the dive I located the lead DM and signaled that there was a major problem and a diver was missing I counted the divers becuse I remember on the boat they said that there were 15. The lead DM saw me counting and swam over to calm me down, I kept signing to him that we were a diver missing, all the while he continued to tell me it was not a problem. At this point I signed to my wife to surface asap and I swam to the anchor line and started my safety stop and notioned my wife to do the same. After completing the safety stop I was the second diver onto the boat. I dropped my bottle and ran upto the captain and told hime of the problem we had below, he said not to worry it was probably a group doing some thing and not to worry. About 5 mins after I surfaced the DM came up and I told him what I had seen, he tried to calm me down and tell me that I was over reacting, I hadonly seen the 3 deep divers and not to worry about it. It was only when the DM who was with Mrs Wood came up that things changed very quickly. The DM came out of the water and was very upset on the verge of crying. The DM on the boat tried talking with her but she wasn't able to speak at all. The DM told her to go to the front of the boat and came running over to me to ask what had happened. I told him what I had seen and where it had happened, the 3rd DM surfaced and the passed on the info. The DM's swithed there NITROX bottles for regular bottles and jumped back into the water. After around 15mins the 4th DM who was taking the deep water advanced group surfaced and told me that he went down to 140ft to try and stop Mrs Wood. I will post the rest later since its kind of late

 

[mikerault]

Boy...leave us hanging here at 140 feet...

 

[ScubaSteve]

Boy...leave us hanging here at 140 feet...

Yeah but their THANKS to POSTS ratio beats the heck out of even Lynne .

 

[boulderjohn]

There is enough good new information here to help understnad things better. As I understand the post, there was no fight--it was more of a flight. The professionals were all using nitrox, which probably raised fears of toxicity during the pursuit.

I don't want to add more than this until more is posted.

 

[ItsBruce]

There is enough good new information here to help understnad things better. As I understand the post, there was no fight--it was more of a flight. The professionals were all using nitrox, which probably raised fears of toxicity during the pursuit.

I don't want to add more than this until more is posted.

Wow!!! Thanks for the update and new information.

So much for all the posts about fighting underwater and about who would win, etc.