Bahamas: Missing Female Diver

[mikemath]

The bottom line is that a DM today ain't what he use to be ... he's a DG instead. Which creates a major problem, today's diver is less prepared to dive without leadership supervision and today's leaders are less equipped to provide the required leadership, that's what we are seeing in the recent rash of incidents. Mark my words ... they are going to continue.

What's a new diver to do, except make sure that when they rent-a-buddy that the buddy has been diving since, at least say, the mid-1980s?

Newbies in most sports don't know what they don't know. Certification agencies could help by ensuring "how to identify an effective divemaster/dive operator" is covered during training. A website for dive operator/instructor reviews would be useful if enough of the community contributed.

Regarding 25+ year veteran divers acting as DMs, I haven't seen many myself. There needs to be a more accessible answer for a sport that continues to grow and attract new participants.

 

[DandyDon]

Newbies in most sports don't know what they don't know. Certification agencies could help by ensuring "how to identify an effective divemaster/dive operator" is covered during training. A website for dive operator/instructor reviews would be useful if enough of the community contributed.

Regarding 25+ year veteran divers acting as DMs, I haven't seen many myself. There needs to be a more accessible answer for a sport that continues to grow and attract new participants.

I don't think you're going to see agencies doing much about quality in the field, nor are you going to find many 20 yr veteran DMs.

 

[Thalassamania]

Newbies in most sports don't know what they don't know. Certification agencies could help by ensuring "how to identify an effective divemaster/dive operator" is covered during training. A website for dive operator/instructor reviews would be useful if enough of the community contributed.

Regarding 25+ year veteran divers acting as DMs, I haven't seen many myself. There needs to be a more accessible answer for a sport that continues to grow and attract new participants.

I wish that there was, the agency answer is just, "well ... they are certified, aren't they?" We can see that's just so much horse pucky. So what to do? On a personal level I will guarantee you that if you dive as my buddy your body will make it to the surface or neither of us will, but I suppose that's kinda hard to make a contractual duty. There's also to the problem that at my age I'm MUCH, MUCH, more expensive than your average 18 year old DM ... but you get what you pay for and what's your life worth?

 

[boulderjohn]

Whew!

I had paid no attention to this thread until I spent the last few hours perusing it. Having read it all, I am still baffled.

First of all, can a reasonably skilled instructor in contact with a diver who does not want to be brought to the surface successfully overcome that resistance? Of course! I honestly don't see a question here. The idea that only specially trained scientific divers can pull off such a feat is absurd. If I were in that situation and did not bring the diver up, I would be humiliated and depressed to the point that I would need serious therapy.

The opposite is usually the problem. I am thinking of a specific situation in which a diver in an AOW class had a heart attack at depth, threw away her regulator (the illusion it was not giving her air), jacked her BCD, and headed up. The instructor tried to stop her, lost his grip for a second, and she was gone. Going down? Not the same thing at all.

So that part of the tale makes no sense to me at all. Because I can't believe that the instructor could not bring her up, and because there were no actual witnesses to this part of the event that we know of, I reserve judgment as to whether or not it actually happened.

I still don't think we know everything. For example, I never saw a definitive answer to the question as to whether the instructor/DM was hired for only the wife or for the husband as well. If the latter is true, where was he? If they were supposed to be together, where was he? There was a very confusing post early on that suggested he may have had problems that prevented him from descending properly, which may have put the DM between the two. If so, then that is a different issue, because the DM should have made sure that they descended together. (If your buddy has a problem descending, then it is your obligation to stay with your buddy.)

In short, despite the mind-numbing number of posts, I don't think we know enough yet to draw real conclusions, and repeating the same arguments over and over again will not add to our knowledge.

 

[Thalassamania]

You're right ... stopping the bolt to the surface is the real problem, one that can be very, very hard to solve.

 

[Web Monkey]

Why hire a DM as a dive bud if they can't or won't assist you in times of trouble? What are they getting paid for, and what is it they THINK they are supposed to do? Is this just UW companionship?

Beats me.

You would have to ask them.

Terry

 

[Doc Intrepid]

"The dive boat (White Bungie) had three Instructor certified divers aboard. 1. Was the Dive leader. 2. Had an AOW course and was tutoring the deep dive segment. 3. Was hired in the role of private DM. Also aboard was the Captain (For information, who i'm told also holds PADI DM status). There was no Fin Photo photographers aboard. All of whom are, also, of instructor status."

The "DM" was an Instructor, not a Divemaster, who had been hired to escort Mrs. Wood. (According to Dantheengineer, based on interviews with staff, see post #163)

"About 18-20 mins into the dive, instructor 3, who is at an approximate depth of 60', sees Mrs. Wood at the considerably lower depth of 80'. She taps on her tanks and upon achieving Mrs Wood's attention signals her to ascend to her own depth. She is ignored. After further attempts to attract Mrs Wood's attention fail, the instructor descends and again communicates the need to ascend. At this stage Mrs. Wood proceeds to physically push instructor 3. away. Left with little choice but to try to over power Mrs. Woods, 3. starts to inflate her BCD. In response, Mrs. Wood starts to vent air from the BC via the shoulder dump valve. This altercation continues to an approximate depth of 140' at which point 3. decides to break contact due to the obvious ineffectiveness of her input and safety concerns at the depth being in excess of RDP's. With body language exhibiting anger and aggression, Mrs Wood descents out of sight, still dumping air from the shoulder valve as she goes."

Even accounting for selective recollection, it would seem that the victim deliberately contributed to the outcome - not direct cause, perhaps (speculation is a great thing), but contributory negligence. According to interviews, the two divers were in physical contact with one another between estimated depths of 80 down to 140 fsw. How many seconds might that require? Specifically, the victim:
1. Failed to respond to hired professional (at a depth between 60' and 80' est.);
2. Physically pushes the hired professional away;
3. Fails to swim to the wall and grab onto it to stop descent;
4. Vents BCD while 'rescuer' tries to establish positive bouyancy, etc.

Certainly the victim could have been suffering from either a mental (narcosis) or medical (stroke) condition leading to this behavior. Nevertheless, it is not one single refusal to act in a rational manner, but a series of (ultimately self-destructive) behaviors that collectively contributed to the outcome.

"She looked to be 47 to 52 I dnot know her experience level was."

Terry, ...stop calling her "elderly" for gods sake! She was younger than I am.



Even in my pre-geezerly condition I could put up a tussle if sufficiently aggravated.

I'm not blaming the victim. (I'm engaging in rife speculation...)

I'm simply pointing out that one reasonable explanation is that neither participant is entirely responsible, but that both of them contributed to the ultimate outcome...to varying degrees.

 

[Web Monkey]

Terry, ...stop calling her "elderly" for gods sake! She was younger than I am.

I'm pretty certain that somewhere in the thread, someone said she was in her late 60's (68?). However I'm not going to go back and look for it. It doesn't really matter much anyway, but I'll stop calling her elderly.

Terry

 

[Web Monkey]

Even in my pre-geezerly condition I could put up a tussle if sufficiently aggravated.

I'm not blaming the victim. (I'm engaging in rife speculation...)

I'm simply pointing out that one reasonable explanation is that neither participant is entirely responsible, but that both of them contributed to the ultimate outcome...to varying degrees.

The DM (instructor) still needs to be able to handle this. What if she was an OW student? Can the instructor just let a student die because she pushes him/her away?

Terry

 

[Doc Intrepid]

The DM (instructor) still needs to be able to handle this. What if she was an OW student? Can the instructor just let a student die because she pushes him/her away?

I wouldn't argue that the instructor/DM was blameless.

(Which is probably why all the principles in this tragedy have stopped posting to the thread...)

I'm simply saying that panicked divers have killed would-be rescuers in the past; and that no matter how hard a hired professional may try, a sufficiently combative and non-cooperative diver (descending rapidly from 140' on down below 170') might cause that rescuer to be unsuccessful.

I'm advancing the idea that given what has been posted, a reasonable conclusion might involve recognizing some level of culpability on the part of the non-cooperative victim, who (seemingly, based on what has been posted,) engaged in not just one but a series of actions that were not rational given the circumstances.

For whatever reason...