7 divers missing off Indonesian island

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Thanks zivva.
When I said "anchored", I meant "secured in a place". Wasn't aware there if there were buoys there.
But do boats follow the divers at all time or wait for a while only expecting them to surface at a certain point after a certain time? Because that can be a problem if the divers encounter a stronger than expected current.

Having dived Nusa Penida/Nusa Lembongan dive sites many, many times during my years in Bali, I can tell you that our boat captain would follow bubbles (if possible), but mostly waited for 10 minutes before heading to an agreed spot. Having said that, the currents can change direction completely during your time underwater. I have had drift dives where we have been travelling at speed with the coast on our left shoulder, only for the current to change direction after 20 minutes or so, and we drifted back to almost where we started.

Today's report from Putu in Bali is as follows:

Today the Rescue search end bit earlier.. due weather is not good.. we been search for almost 5 full days.. 5 of the 7 missing diver were found alive and one of them is past away..we still have one left..not sure still in the ocean or some where on the island which is remote..we will begin the search tomorrow again in the morning..at 7.30... will check the clift on south side of nusa Penida island..definetly some of us will go there and check by our own.. cannot wait to do it..


 
This article contains more information on a surface float and ditching weights as well as a statement from the other four divers.

Beach Trash, Coconut Water Helped Divers Survive - WSJ.com
Beach Trash, Coconut Water Helped Divers Survive
Five Survivors Give Their First Detailed Accounts; Search for Last Diver Continues
Wall Street Journal
Updated Feb. 19, 2014 9:26 a.m. ET
By I Made Sentana, Toko Sekiguchi

BALI, Indonesia—Surviving thanks to coconut water and beach rubbish, burned by a tropical sun and hurled by waves against rocks, a group of Japanese women stayed determined to go home alive after a recreational dive turned into a disaster.

Five survivors from the group gave the first detailed accounts of their ordeal following their rescue after four days in open water and on exposed pieces of land near the Indonesian island of Bali, a popular destination visited by 3.3 million tourists last year.

Recuperating from first-degree sunburn and dehydration in hospitals in Bali, they answered written questions Tuesday and Wednesday from Japanese media submitted through their country’s foreign ministry. Their tale highlighted struggle and resourcefulness as well as sorrow for a colleague who died and stubborn hope for another still missing.

“We kept telling each other…we can get through this,” four of them said in a joint response.

Saori Furukawa, 37 years old, one of two instructors leading the group, said in a separate account that the currents were “gentle” when they made their third dive Friday off Nusa Lembongan, an islet in the channel separating Bali from the island of Lombok, known for tricky currents but also great visibility to see marine life including manta rays and ocean sunfish.

When they surfaced, Ms. Furukawa said, they signaled with their dive floats for their boat to pick them up. But she said that visibility was poor because of sudden heavy rains and strong winds that kicked up high waves.

They heard a boat engine and blew a whistle to attract it. No boat came.

Her colleagues said that they were astonished how far they had drifted underwater. They saw boats but couldn’t recognize theirs.

“We tried to evacuate to the direction of the shallows, but the tide had changed drastically and we dumped our weights immediately,” Ms. Furukawa said. “The water surface started to whirl like a washing machine, and all of us huddled closely and held hands.”

Darkness increased. They drifted, but Ms. Furukawa said that she used the positions of the coast lines, lights from the islands, the flight course of airplanes and a compass to keep a grasp on their location. Coastal currents pushed them back when they tried to swim toward the islands.

“We decided to stay still in order to save our strength, or swam lightly when the tide started to flow a bit toward the islands,” Ms. Furukawa said.

The divers were experienced and didn’t panic, Ms. Furukawa said. They tried to attract the attention of a large boat with lights but failed. They tied their buoyancy jackets together to stay as a group, cheered each other on to stay awake, and drank water from drifting coconuts.

The next morning, they saw a tugboat passing Nusa Penida, another islet. Ms. Furukawa took a float and swam toward it, “kicking my fins with all my might” but was unable to catch its attention. Tidal currents prevented Ms. Furukawa from returning to the group.

She eventually reached Nusa Penida and cleared big offshore rocks and high waves that swept her fins away. Ms. Furukawa said that she was “too weak to move” and unable to seek help, pinned on one side by high waves and on the other by a sheer cliff.

She collected rain water, slurped water droplets from leaves, and drank liquid from plastic bottles littering the beach. She wrapped herself in styrene foam scavenged from the rubbish to stay warm.

The other women also approached Nusa Penida. In their joint statement, four of them—Aya Morizono, Atsumi Yoshidome, Emi Yamamoto and Nahomi Tomita—described a terrifying experience of being carried by big waves toward a cliff and banged atop a rocky stretch.

“After the third or fourth wave swallowed us, we were completely separated from one another,” they said. “It was by chance that the four of us were able to surface…and land.” The others didn’t emerge.

The four climbed to the highest point on the rock and used lights during the night to draw help, to no avail. They stayed in shade during the day to avoid the beating sun. Losing strength, they collected rainwater in their fins and huddled together during a downpour at night to stay warm.

“We kept telling each other that we swam and survived for 28 hours in open water, we can get through this,” they said. “We also worried about our injuries worsening because pus was forming in some of them.”

Search boats found the women Monday. The four on the rock were driven at slow speed to Bali to avoid worsening their injuries. Meanwhile, Ms. Furukawa said that she was lying unable to move and brought to consciousness by people on boats yelling at her. She was taken to safety in a helicopter that first dropped her water and cookies.

“I saw from the helicopter that the four others survived, but heard the other two were missing,” she said. “I was so worried about them I couldn’t sleep at night.”

The body of Ritsuko Miyata was discovered Tuesday floating off some 30 kilometers from where the dive began. Search teams widened operations Wednesday for the last diver, instructor Shoko Takahashi.

–Miho Inada in Tokyo contributed to this article.

Thank you Nihon.Iruka for pointing us to this interview earlier. I found this Japan News article which undertook a English translation (possibly abridged). I hope a serious search is continuing for Shoko Takahashi, the last missing.

Diver describes Bali survival ordeal - The Japan News

Diver describes Bali survival ordeal
8:40 pm, February 19, 2014
Makiko Yanada / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer
 
When I said "anchored", I meant "secured in a place". Wasn't aware there if there were buoys there.
But do boats follow the divers at all time or wait for a while only expecting them to surface at a certain point after a certain time? Because that can be a problem if the divers encounter a stronger than expected current. And if the boat is following them, then the engine revs should be heard...

In addition of agreeing on bottom time & exit point, boat captains typically follow your bubbles all the way. As the dive site is quite popular especially in the mornings with many local boats (snorkeling + diving) & boats coming from Bali, even if your captain loose you during the dive or has to stop on the way to pick up another group of divers there is always other boats to signal your position to your captain in order to pick you up or to pick you up themselves. But once you get behind the surf it's just rip current all the way until Penida (good luck with the free diving fins :x). Passed 2PM or in bad weather it's a freaking no man's land all the way to Penida or Bali with just a few boats crossing the Badung strait.

Personally I've been diving Mangrove in the afternoon with just 1 or 2 boats on site on several occasions and despite having dove the site hundreds of time always with the same boat captain who knows precisely to 50m where I always surface IMO the most conservative practice is still to dive the site with loads of boats around, just in case.
 
Hey divers. Let's us show some respect to the 7 divers. It's already unfortunate that one life is lost.. 5 are lucky to have a second go at their lives. Show some respect and professionalism By being objective and true to the subject of updating the thread with latest updates.

Speculation serves no purpose at all. And if there's any truth to that, we will take the learnings from the official news release.

If you want to take these arguments up, I strongly suggest you all discuss this in another thread.

Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk
 
This is not a tragedy, scuba diving in the ocean is a known danger-- there is no such a thing as a "recreational" dive in open water. The sad part of my view of this incident (drawn from published accounts, and my own experience) is that if these divers were forewarned of impending bad weather, they most likely would have not dived that day. Also, the rule of "the cascading of bad events" when something goes wrong applies here. Most importantly, any well-thought dive plan includes the consideration of what is to be done when coming to the surface and not finding the dive boat.
 


A ScubaBoard Staff Message...

Fin type does not appear to have been relevant in this tragedy and so the discussion about free diving fins versus split fins has been split off and moved here http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/fi...-free-diving-fins-might-help.html#post7042067. Members are reminded of the importance of staying on topic in this forum. Marg SB Senior Moderator
 
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If you didn't go diving in Indonesia because it was going to rain, you wouldn't do many dives. Many of the liveaboards I have dove off in the Pacific follow the bubbles so that isn't an unusual or crazy idea. Having dove in quite a few places in Indonesia, the currents there can be quite severe and not moving in the same direction. When we dove Batu Balong, manta rays were jumping and everything looked great but you could see the surface was criss-crossed by lines of current folding all over itself all over the surface as it flowed around the spot. We ended up moving along one side but no one, even the guides and the rest of the several very fit and experienced divers, could get around the point because of the current flowing at that time. After a day of diving, and descriptions like "the water was whirlpooling around us", it's zero surprise that no one could fight that current successfully, regardless of super fins. I noted that even in Raja Ampat, many locations were islands with sheer faces all around with no access point, where it would be very difficult to even get out of the water, let alone move from that location. With the waves pounding the cliffs, and no energy left and dehydrated, they ended up on the rocks simply because the ocean happened to put them there. I'd have to give them a lot of props for just surviving this event.
 
I know there are people here from dive operations on Bali. You people are the only ones who can prevent this happening again.
While we hope for a good outcome for the last diver and pray this does not happen again, I can give an example from another part of the world:

Great diving with occasionally strong and challenging currents in a remote location with limited SAR and evacuation facilities is a feature of the islands off the East African coastline. I am aware of one operator that requires Dive Guides to conduct the entire dive with an SMB on a reel (exhausting in itself, if there are strong winds and waves pulling from the surface, if you have ever done this). They also only do two dives a day, both in the morning; providing an extra safety margin - time to mount an SAR in daylight and to call for airborne support from the mainland.

I'm sure the decision to put client safety so far above profitability must have weighed heavily on these dive operators and respect them for their courage in implementing what they believed was necessary for diver safety above all else.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
So what should have been done differently (apart from the freediving fins rubbish)?

From what I read the boat dropped anchor while on a site with some current, instead of following the divers?
The weather changed and there was no warning to the divers. I've dived in situations where it was agreed that engine revs would mean go up.
Also, don't they pay attention to weather forecasts? Or are they completely out of communications in those areas?
Boat not having fuel to search the divers.
Huge delay to report them as being lost!

Its normal to dive during a small storm here in asia...trouble is, being able to tell the difference between a major storm with strong winds/choppy seas and strong currents/big waves from a passing rain storm that doesn't last long and doesn't have a lot of wind/strong winds or creates choppy seas...I guess that's why DM's are paid..to make tough choices/decisions in the best interest of the divers he/she is leading....and I know it's not easy sometimes.
 
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