Concerns raised about agency response to student fatality

[kelemvor]

But could you imagine the out cry within the industry if PADI or NAUI did this?

I don't know about NAUI. Perhaps they have a similar rule. I don't know about that. I've seen PADI instructors numerous times say they couldn't comment on some stupid thing another instructor did because of a rule just like the IANTD rule. So, I think if it was PADI instead of IANTD in the hotseat, the result may very well have been the same.. assuming that the agency had cleared the instructors involved in the incident, anyway.

 

[Nirvana]

I have read on another forum that IANTD has issued a public response explaining why it decided to take disciplinary measures against some of its instructors.

IANTD's response

Thread on CDF

IANTD states that it has high standards for investigating fatalities during training, conducted by very qualified professionals. It claims that the identity of the investigatory commission is normally kept secret to avoid external pressure, and that the first commission formed relating to this particular incident had to be disbanded because Krzysztof Starnawsk exposed their identities. It goes on accusing Krzysztof Starnawsk of trying to force the QA board of coming to the same conclusions as he.

In my opinion, that statement would have been much more satisfactory if it had disclosed the complete findings of the QA board that examined the incident, explaining how the fatality happened despite the instructors involved acting diligently and in accordance to standards, as seems to be the official conclusion from IANTD.

 

[Wookie]

In my opinion, that statement would have been much more satisfactory if it disclosed the complete findings of the QA board that examined the incident, explaining how the fatality happened despite the instructors involved acting diligently and in accordance to standards, as seems to be the official conclusion from IANTD.

In my opinion, that would be voyeurism. Sure we all want to know the whole story. But we have no right to know. IANTD has a procedure, and they followed it. Lots of folks may not like the procedure, and in accordance with their beliefs protested and got booted. Seems to me that everyone involved got what they wanted.

 

[SeaHorse81]

Sure we all want to know the whole story. But we have no right to know.

^^^^^^^This! I've never seen the sense of entitlement to details of someone else's personal tragedy that I see come up in the discussion of diving accidents and fatalities.

 

[Wookie]

^^^^^^^This! I've never seen the sense of entitlement to details of someone else's personal tragedy that I see come up in the discussion of diving accidents and fatalities.

Same as folks who slow down to gape at fatalities on the interstate, or even fender-benders. But in the dive business we justify our gaping by saying "We could learn a lesson from.....". No. We aren't going to learn a lesson, because no one does accident analysis.

I learned my lesson on the Spree. I had a fatality, and the widow was very clear. "Don't make any of the details public and I won't sue you". I didn't, and she didn't.

 

[Nirvana]

In my opinion, that would be voyeurism. Sure we all want to know the whole story. But we have no right to know. IANTD has a procedure, and they followed it. Lots of folks may not like the procedure, and in accordance with their beliefs protested and got booted. Seems to me that everyone involved got what they wanted.

There is no doubt that we do not have the right to know, legally speaking. What I was saying is that if IANTD is concerned about its public perception, discussing its findings of the accident could be much more productive than just stating that the only wrongdoing it found was that of one of its instructors publicly voicing his dissatisfaction with the QA procedure. I do not think any new significant information came out of that statement.

 

[Nirvana]

^^^^^^^This! I've never seen the sense of entitlement to details of someone else's personal tragedy that I see come up in the discussion of diving accidents and fatalities.

I have to disagree with you. In this particular incident, there was a course being run. If I am to ever take a course with a given instructor, I would like to be reasonably sure that he does not take safety of his students lightly, specially in an unforgiving environment such as a cave.

I think that wanting to know that an agency follows a proper QA to ensure that its classes are safe is very reasonable.

 

[kelemvor]

I don't think the issue of information dissemination after an accident is nearly as cut and dry as you guys make it out to be. Clearly the agency has an interest in protecting themselves and therefore cannot be blindly trusted. The agency did the analysis, therefore the result must be considered suspect. Since we don't have an impartial third party with funding to do the analysis, the next best thing is information dissemination.

Accident voyeurism is real, after all - we are humans. That does not mean that there is not also real value in the details. That people are interested due to voyeurism and therefore we don't need the details is a non sequitur.

Future students are going to put their lives in the hands of instructors. Trust is critical there, because as students we are doing trust me dives until we get certified. Even after certification, we're trusting that the instructor, as an extension of the agency, trained us in a way that will help us to survive in the environment we choose to dive.

The scenario described in the first post could have been easily avoided by having an additional instructor already in the cave or by using another cave or at least by having someone run a darn guideline for the student in advance. It all just sounds like such a massive amount of stupid that the agency not finding the instructor at fault is hard to fathom. I'm no instructor, but there's several violations to what I was taught on day1 of cave1 that it definitely makes me wonder about the quality of IANTD's cave curriculum.

Maybe we need a kickstarter to fund a nonprofit accident analysis organization. Or an endowment from a wealthy widow or something like that. I know there was an awful attempt at such a thing once, which was then ruined by the organization using analysis to try and sell their own rebreathers. Don't let the idea die because some jerk got greedy! Surely if $20 million can be raised to fund a smart watch project, sufficient funds could be raised to start such a nonprofit organization. The Californians managed to fund a nonprofit chamber when it was needed. It CAN be done!

 

[The Chairman]

In my opinion, that would be voyeurism.

Indeed. People want the whole dope when we ban people here on SB. That's a violation of their privacy. You can see that they have been disciplined, but you'll never know how we arrived at that decision. However, you can criticize our decision all you want. You can even call me a "power mad satrap of a moderator" and can expect no repercussions.

But in the dive business we justify our gaping by saying "We could learn a lesson from....."

BS. There are boat loads of lessons being learned in our accidents and incidents forum every day. The very act of speculating helps to make divers aware of how they can be injured or even killed. If we don't get the facts, we're going to do our best to recreate as much of the scenario as possible. This whole issue with threatening litigation works against the public's interest in knowing what happened and how to prevent it. It ensures that the "loved one" has died in vain. Sorry if it shows the dark side of diving and the darker side of covering it all up, but that's not our problem. I want to learn from the mistakes of others.

I have to disagree with you. In this particular incident, there was a course being run. If I am to ever take a course with a given instructor, I would like to be reasonably sure that he does not take safety of his students lightly, specially in an unforgiving environment such as a cave.

Ditto!

 

[SeaHorse81]

If I am to ever take a course with a given instructor, I would like to be reasonably sure that he does not take safety of his students lightly, specially in an unforgiving environment such as a cave.

I think that wanting to know that an agency follows a proper QA to ensure that its classes are safe is very reasonable.

I agree with you. I was speaking in more general terms and not specifically related to this thread, which I didn't clarify.