Diver missing at Cocos Island, Costa Rica

[CRDiver2007]

Has anyone heard anything more about this? Cocos is an advanced site - this is the only English article about the missing diver, though there are a couple in Spanish in Costa Rica.

Canadian citizen reported missing

Published Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Canadian citizen reported missing

By the A.M. Costa Rica staff

Agents of the Judicial Investigation Organization are requesting help from the public to find Canadian citizen Kent Alexander Madsen who has been reported missing since Friday, March 13.

According to the judicial investigators, Madsen, 59, was last seen that Friday when he was diving on Cocos Island.

The island is located in the Pacific Ocean, approximately 550 km southwest of the Costa Rican mainland of the Central Pacific Coast in Puntarenas Province.

According to the information of the investigators, Madsen was scuba diving with a group of tourists who were taking driving lessons near the coast of the island.

However, by the time the lesson was over, all the tourists returned to the boat except for Madsen.

Professional scuba divers tried to track Maden for 72 hours, finding only his scuba equipment on the beach of Manuelita Island but there was no trace of the Canadian.

Manuelita Island is located on the north coast of Cocos Island.

 

[Dan]

Sorry to hear this. I hope they find him.

Any bite marks on the gears?

There were a couple of accidents of Tiger Shark attacks on divers at the surface.

Death in Cocos from shark attack

German diver attacked by shark - Isla del Coco, Costa Rica

Manuelita is small island off Cocos. We usually dive from a boat, not from shore.

 

[CRDiver2007]

I heard from someone here in Costa Rica that he was diving a rebreather with the Undersea Hunter Group liveaboard, but don't know anything other than that. Haven't heard anything about the gear recovered.

Was hoping someone here had heard more information about the incident.

 

[rongoodman]

The channel to the south of Manuelita is where the tigers tend to hang out and they have been known to go after individual divers.

 

[Dan]

We usually dive on the west side where the hammerhead cleaning station is.

 

[scubadada]

I dived Cocos in 2017, before both attacks. We saw a tiger a couple of times on the west side while looking for hammerheads

 

[Dan]

I was there after the 2 accidents and didn’t see any tiger shark, nor turtle (the staple of tiger shark).

Cocos Diving Trip Report, 17 -27 September, 2018

Plan to be back there again in September 2020, if the COVID-19 is over.

Gathering a group for Cocos with Argo on 10-20 September 2020

Undersea Hunter group does cater to rebreather divers. There were 2 rebreather divers when I was there in September 2018.

 

[HalcyonDaze]

Has anyone heard anything more about this? Cocos is an advanced site - this is the only English article about the missing diver, though there are a couple in Spanish in Costa Rica.

Canadian citizen reported missing

Published Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Canadian citizen reported missing

By the A.M. Costa Rica staff

Agents of the Judicial Investigation Organization are requesting help from the public to find Canadian citizen Kent Alexander Madsen who has been reported missing since Friday, March 13.

According to the judicial investigators, Madsen, 59, was last seen that Friday when he was diving on Cocos Island.

The island is located in the Pacific Ocean, approximately 550 km southwest of the Costa Rican mainland of the Central Pacific Coast in Puntarenas Province.

According to the information of the investigators, Madsen was scuba diving with a group of tourists who were taking driving lessons near the coast of the island.

However, by the time the lesson was over, all the tourists returned to the boat except for Madsen.

Professional scuba divers tried to track Maden for 72 hours, finding only his scuba equipment on the beach of Manuelita Island but there was no trace of the Canadian.

Manuelita Island is located on the north coast of Cocos Island.

I'd be curious to know what condition his gear was in. Tooth marks? BC inflated? Unbuckled? Is that model of rebreather positively buoyant? Given that two weeks later they seem to be treating it as a missing person case, it seems they're considering the possibility he came ashore.

 

[Dan]

From what I heard about rebreather, once the counter lung is flooded, the gear would be pretty much sunk.

 

[Centrals]

Professional scuba divers tried to track Maden for 72 hours, finding only his scuba equipment on the beach of Manuelita Island but there was no trace of the Canadian.

The guy swam ashore and then gone to seek help!

Good luck.