Rob Stewart Investigation

[Protondecay123]

Legal help for Peter Sotis, organized by Claudia Sotis

Bwuhahahahahaa, lol lol lol. She even quoted proverbs.

Quite likely the “ Underwater Charity” that @Rosborne mentions as the recipient of the proceeds from the “documentary “/hatchet job.

 

[Wookie]

Peter was my CCR instructor and my sons CCR instructor. I have many safe hours of tech diving on my rEvo (with carbon fiber tanks just like most rEvo divers including the man the built them)
Many people including myself do multiple tech dives per day when you go to a place like Truk lagoon , I seen plenty get bent doing this but we know and accept the risks just like this guy did. This guy chose to do a third dive with Peter knowing the risk and he probably passed out on the surface and flooded the loop and sunk like a brick. The divemaster should have never taken his eyes off him once he hit the surface knowing Peter was having problems. We teach this in basic first aid class, the first thing you do when you think a diver is bent is send someone to find his buddy because you most likely will be work on two bent divers. So if you want to point fingers look toward the boat operator, once the drivers head breaks the surface of the water the dive is over the people are the boat captains responsibility again. Capt Frank can correct me on this if I’m wrong.

I learned that lesson a very hard way running my first tech trip. If one diver is in trouble, his (or in this case, her) buddy is in just as much trouble. I had a very sharp crewmember who recognized this and saved both. I would never have seen it myself, as it was my first tech trip.

 

[Protondecay123]

Peter was my CCR instructor and my sons CCR instructor. I have many safe hours of tech diving on my rEvo (with carbon fiber tanks just like most rEvo divers including the man the built them)
Many people including myself do multiple tech dives per day when you go to a place like Truk lagoon , I seen plenty get bent doing this but we know and accept the risks just like this guy did. This guy chose to do a third dive with Peter knowing the risk and he probably passed out on the surface and flooded the loop and sunk like a brick. The divemaster should have never taken his eyes off him once he hit the surface knowing Peter was having problems. We teach this in basic first aid class, the first thing you do when you think a diver is bent is send someone to find his buddy because you most likely will be work on two bent divers. So if you want to point fingers look toward the boat operator, once the drivers head breaks the surface of the water the dive is over the people are the boat captains responsibility again. Capt Frank can correct me on this if I’m wrong.

Well Horizon Divers liability in this is very clear IMHO as is Mr. Sotis's. Mr. Sotis would actually have a better defense if he were to contend that he was pulled out of the water first because of a Medical Emergency rather than it was simply more convenient for the boat to pick him up. He almost certainly was having a Medical Emergency. Type 2 DCS almost certainly. What instructor gets out of the ocean before a student for "convenience".? None. As a matter of fact in a class I took a while back, I invited my instructor to get on the boat first since it was closer to him. He refused. On the boat he said " The instructor is always last out of the water." Contending in someway that Sotis is being made a scapegoat is ridiculous. US law is clear on the relationship of a teacher and a student broadly falling under "en loco parentis". Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart had the same relationship with Sotis as previously fully certified students doing a group dive without instruction at Truk is a false equivalency. And as a matter of fact, your admission of seeing other divers "bent" shows that Sotis knew the GF's he was diving could be dangerous to others. Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart's "advanced training" somehow altered that teacher-student relationship/responsibility is contrary to the guidelines of every certification agency on the planet. Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart mentioning a "propensity to pass out" in a book written years ago is somehow a "medical condition" that he tried to hide shows a reckless disregard for the truth. A medical condition is diagnosed by a physician, not by a patient. Clearly someone is trying to use this passage in a book, as means to discovery for Stewarts personal medical records. Good luck with that, because his "propensity to black out" in this case was exactly the same at Sotis, who had no such reported propensity. His Medical Emergency was almost certainly the same Medical Emergency Sotis experienced. Type 2 DCS. Also if the boat had pulled Mr. Stewart out first, we almost certainly would be having an almost exact opposite discussion of Sotis's estate suing Sharkwater Productions and Horizon Divers. He's lucky to be alive.

 

[Wookie]

Well Horizon Divers liability in this is very clear IMHO as is Mr. Sotis's. Mr. Sotis would actually have a better defense if he were to contend that he was pulled out of the water first because of a Medical Emergency rather than it was simply more convenient for the boat to pick him up. He almost certainly was having a Medical Emergency. Type 2 DCS almost certainly. What instructor gets out of the ocean before a student for "convenience".? None. As a matter of fact in a class I took a while back, I invited my instructor to get on the boat first since it was closer to him. He refused. On the boat he said " The instructor is always last out of the water." Contending in someway that Sotis is being made a scapegoat is ridiculous. US law is clear on the relationship of a teacher and a student broadly falling under "en loco parentis". Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart had the same relationship with Sotis as previously fully certified students doing a group dive without instruction at Truk is a false equivalency. And as a matter of fact, your admission of seeing other divers "bent" shows that Sotis knew the GF's he was diving could be dangerous to others. Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart's "advanced training" somehow altered that teacher-student relationship/responsibility is contrary to the guidelines of every certification agency on the planet. Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart mentioning a "propensity to pass out" in a book written years ago is somehow a "medical condition" that he tried to hide shows a reckless disregard for the truth. A medical condition is diagnosed by a physician, not by a patient. Clearly someone is trying to use this passage in a book, as means to discovery for Stewarts personal medical records. Good luck with that, because his "propensity to black out" in this case was exactly the same at Sotis, who had no such reported propensity. His Medical Emergency was almost certainly the same Medical Emergency Sotis experienced. Type 2 DCS. Also if the boat had pulled Mr. Stewart out first, we almost certainly would be having an almost exact opposite discussion of Sotis's estate suing Sharkwater Productions and Horizon Divers. He's lucky to be alive.

This is a lot your opinion, like Fox News. You may get out of the water after your students, I may get out of the water after my students, but you have to know Peter. Peter is a bit of a narcissist. Peter wouldn't ride on my boat because it wasn't nice enough for him, he rarely did liveaboards, and then they were only the most very POSH. Although Add helium did many trips with me, some routine tech trips to normoxic depths, some to 500 feet, Peter wouldn't be caught dead on the Spree. So I wouldn't find that Peter exiting the water first to be abnormal at all.

Peter was not acting as Stewart's instructor on this dive. Or any dives on this trip. Peter was very clear in the role of Safety diver, as was Claudia, their roles were spelled out on the studio call sheet that was prepared for that day. You may or may not have seen the call sheet, I believe it is in evidence, but buried somewhere. I have dived with many of my students. I certainly dove with them in an instructor role, but they were my buddies and employees after. I still dive with them. I do not take responsibility for their dives, aside from a buddy role, when we dive together. I am a lousy buddy.

You are correct that medical conditions are diagnosed by physicians, and Claudia is one. But the patient (Student?) has to come to the doctor complaining of a problem before the doctor can diagnose it. If you don't get this about student medicals, well, you need to go back to that module in your instructor manual. The medical form is there to protect the instructor in the event that the student has a medical condition that wasn't disclosed on the medical form, or has disclosed such a condition, shifting the liability for the student to the physician. Dive instructors are not typically smart enough or trained to evaluate medical conditions, so the WRSTC makes it easy for the instructor to escape liability. As in this case.

It's cool to hate Peter, just like any narcissist. They don't care, or understand the general population's hatred. But if you're going to hate on Peter, hate on him for something he actually did. He didn't kill the Stewart kid. The Stewart kid had every opportunity to not die, and failed.

 

[MarkFlory]

Protondecay123 I don’t know were you read in all that Truk BS info from out of what I said, it had nothing to do with Peter, when I went I went with one friend, there were people there from all over the world and a some of them got bent and no one died.
Stewart didn’t die from getting bent he died because a dive master took his eyes off of him and he drowned plain and simple.

 

[StefinSB]

Protondecay123 I don’t know were you read in all that Truk BS info from out of what I said, it had nothing to do with Peter, when I went I went with one friend, there were people there from all over the world and a some of them got bent and no one died.
Stewart didn’t die from getting bent he died because a dive master took his eyes off of him and he drowned plain and simple.

One could argue that he died because he did an idiotic dive.

 

[kelemvor]

Well Horizon Divers liability in this is very clear IMHO as is Mr. Sotis's. Mr. Sotis would actually have a better defense if he were to contend that he was pulled out of the water first because of a Medical Emergency rather than it was simply more convenient for the boat to pick him up. He almost certainly was having a Medical Emergency. Type 2 DCS almost certainly. What instructor gets out of the ocean before a student for "convenience".? None. As a matter of fact in a class I took a while back, I invited my instructor to get on the boat first since it was closer to him. He refused. On the boat he said " The instructor is always last out of the water." Contending in someway that Sotis is being made a scapegoat is ridiculous. US law is clear on the relationship of a teacher and a student broadly falling under "en loco parentis". Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart had the same relationship with Sotis as previously fully certified students doing a group dive without instruction at Truk is a false equivalency. And as a matter of fact, your admission of seeing other divers "bent" shows that Sotis knew the GF's he was diving could be dangerous to others. Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart's "advanced training" somehow altered that teacher-student relationship/responsibility is contrary to the guidelines of every certification agency on the planet. Somehow contending that Mr. Stewart mentioning a "propensity to pass out" in a book written years ago is somehow a "medical condition" that he tried to hide shows a reckless disregard for the truth. A medical condition is diagnosed by a physician, not by a patient. Clearly someone is trying to use this passage in a book, as means to discovery for Stewarts personal medical records. Good luck with that, because his "propensity to black out" in this case was exactly the same at Sotis, who had no such reported propensity. His Medical Emergency was almost certainly the same Medical Emergency Sotis experienced. Type 2 DCS. Also if the boat had pulled Mr. Stewart out first, we almost certainly would be having an almost exact opposite discussion of Sotis's estate suing Sharkwater Productions and Horizon Divers. He's lucky to be alive.

This wasn't a training dive, therefore sots wasn't an instructor on this dive and all that stuff about an instructor's responsibilities don't apply.

 

[boulderjohn]

I don't know the rules for IANTD, so I have a question. With PADI technical dive training, in all tech classes a doctor (or other qualified medical staff) must sign the medical form indicating the diver is cleared to dive. Does IANTD have that rule, or can a student just indicate that he or she has no medical issues?

 

[Searcaigh]

don't know the rules for IANTD, so I have a question. With PADI technical dive training, in all tech classes a doctor (or other qualified medical staff) must sign the medical form indicating the diver is cleared to dive. Does IANTD have that rule, or can a student just indicate that he or she has no medical issues?

When I did my initial IANTD Trimix course I had to have a signed medical form from my dive doctor. I don't recall if this was IANTD rules at the time, but my instructor required it.

 

[Wookie]

I don't know the rules for IANTD, so I have a question. With PADI technical dive training, in all tech classes a doctor (or other qualified medical staff) must sign the medical form indicating the diver is cleared to dive. Does IANTD have that rule, or can a student just indicate that he or she has no medical issues?

http://www.bedouinmoonhotel.com/pdfs/IANTD_student_medical.pdf