Diver Dies in the Galapagos on Peter Hughes boat

[scorpiofish]

Which brings upthe usual questions, where were the people who might have been able to help her? Buddy? Guide? Group?

As noted in the excellently detailed description of the diving, it is normal to end up out of site of the DM, rest of the group and even your buddy. Other divers disappear from site and often re-appear later in the dive. There are 7-8 divers for each DM.

The norm is to backroll with BC deflated and do a screaming head first decent to the wall due to currents. Then divers spread themselves out so the exhaust bubbles don't aggregate. When hammers come around, you hold your breath as long as possible so as not to scare them away. Just like we teach in OW.

I have had the fortune of visiting on three occasions. With permission from the DM, I would wander off the rocks very early and move about in the blue. Depending on the visibility, you go in and out of site of the wall. I've paralleled the shark for long distances, while my head was attached to my viewfinder. If I cleared my ears 5 times, I would then make myself look at my gauges. I've ended up far from the site only once. Oddly, four or five of my group appeared near me shortly before surfacing.
On another occasion, the entire group left the wall about the same time to follow a whaleshark. I was first off the mark. When I finished snapping, I turned around and saw around 5 of my group snapping and filming. The rest had been sucked down in a down current as soon as they left the wall. By the time they got out it, the rest of us were long gone. We all left the wall withing 30 seconds of each other.

If one needs the security of a buddy, one must take it upon themselves to stay close to one. My first trip included four buddies. One was an instructor, the other three were novices or rusty. He was going to stick with them the whole time. He got separated within five minutes of the first dive. With the experience level of this particular victim, I would suspect the DM may have been keeping one eye on someone else (the other looking for whalesharks).

 

[fairybasslet]

I think Scorpiofish describes diving in Galapagos quite well. In fact, I would venture to say that the DMs' primary goal is to spot the whalesharks and other critters coming out of the blue, and not constantly babysit the divers.

 

[lemon]

As noted in the excellently detailed description of the diving, it is normal to end up out of site of the DM, rest of the group and even your buddy. Other divers disappear from site and often re-appear later in the dive. There are 7-8 divers for each DM.

The norm is to backroll with BC deflated and do a screaming head first decent to the wall due to currents. Then divers spread themselves out so the exhaust bubbles don't aggregate. When hammers come around, you hold your breath as long as possible so as not to scare them away. Just like we teach in OW.

I have had the fortune of visiting on three occasions. With permission from the DM, I would wander off the rocks very early and move about in the blue. Depending on the visibility, you go in and out of site of the wall. I've paralleled the shark for long distances, while my head was attached to my viewfinder. If I cleared my ears 5 times, I would then make myself look at my gauges. I've ended up far from the site only once. Oddly, four or five of my group appeared near me shortly before surfacing.
On another occasion, the entire group left the wall about the same time to follow a whaleshark. I was first off the mark. When I finished snapping, I turned around and saw around 5 of my group snapping and filming. The rest had been sucked down in a down current as soon as they left the wall. By the time they got out it, the rest of us were long gone. We all left the wall withing 30 seconds of each other.

If one needs the security of a buddy, one must take it upon themselves to stay close to one. My first trip included four buddies. One was an instructor, the other three were novices or rusty. He was going to stick with them the whole time. He got separated within five minutes of the first dive. With the experience level of this particular victim, I would suspect the DM may have been keeping one eye on someone else (the other looking for whalesharks).

this pretty accurate. it's also not unusual for whalesharks to dive or rise when surrounded by a bunch of divers. even the most experienced divers can get caught up in the excitement of the moment before realizing they've just dropped 30 feet or so. this could be an issue for someone on nitrox. moreover, people fin like mad in an attempt to keep up with them, this can cause people to start breathing seriously hard. under those circumstances if something goes wrong, it'll go wrong in a hurry.

 

[DiveMom1]

A good point. If a Medical Examiner finds water in the lungs, then he or she, appropriately, write, "Drowning." But the CE might not know what caused the water to get into the lungs or what started the chain if event leading to that.

With groups like DAN and Dive Investigators I am suprised they do not a forensic dive examiner to perform or assist in the autopsy. Without such critical information from the victim themselves [afterall they are the most reliable wittness and least subjective] all conclutions are merely quesswork.

 

[DandyDon]

"Dive Investigators"...?

Investigations are generally going to be done by local standards and regulations of the country in which the loss happens, within their budgets.

 

[fairybasslet]

With groups like DAN and Dive Investigators I am suprised they do not a forensic dive examiner to perform or assist in the autopsy. Without such critical information from the victim themselves [afterall they are the most reliable wittness and least subjective] all conclutions are merely quesswork.

And how much have you contributed to DAN lately? I just got a letter from them informing members that donations and memberships are sliding down because of the economy and now they are asking for donations to their annual fund and also reminding members about their fund raising auctions. DAN relies upon donations so please remember that when you make suggestions about how they should spend their limited resources.

 

[DiveMom1]

I actually DO SUPPORT DAN.. I'm not saying their "services" should be donated but rather made avaliable. In my oppinion it would be cheaper in the longrun to "hire" an expert to investigate a suspected event rather than prosicution and defence spending millions to speculate. When there are persons or families with "means" involved I would think that funds being spent to "fact find" rather than trying to prove their theory would be prudent for all of those in the sport and/or industry.

Maybe I'm wrong.. It's jsut my oppinion

 

[DiveTheGalapagos]

I went on a live-aboard Nov. 9 right after learning about this horrible tragedy. It was very hard to understand how it could have happened and it was very sobering that it could happen to someone of her experience level. Others have died in the Galapagos this year, but due to heart attacks. As Jorge, all I heard was second-hand, but I heard the separation happened at Wolf, not Darwin which makes a lot more sense. Darwin, as someone has already described, is less diving than hanging on to rocks and watching the show unfold until Mr. Big comes along and everyone goes full speed out into the blue to chase. So that it occurred at Wolf makes more sense. I heard the two buddies become separated from the group around the eagle ray dive at Wolf. Rule 1: If you lose the group, wait one minute and if you don't find anyone, ascend slowly and wait in the Panga. So when the other six plus guide didn't see the 2 missing divers, they didn't go back to look. When they surfaced, the buddy didn't know where she was. And then she was found. I hear the Dive Guide is on suspension pending investigation. And while my heart goes out to her loved ones, I also couldn't imagine how awful it would be to lose someone on 'your watch.'

Diving the northern islands is a bit like the difference between high school and college...there is no babysitting and you are responsible for you. This is not to say there's not help if you need it and it's known. A guide friend of mine told me that 2 weeks ago, one woman narced out at about 120 feet while chasing the whale shark and kept dropping. I think he finally grabbed her at 140 ft...on Nitrox. Once she became aware enough to know she was in trouble, she ditched her weight belt at which point, the 2 who had hold of her and her began shooting to the surface. They managed to dump her BC and get the situation under control. So lots of near misses occur in the Galapagos we never hear about.

On another trip I took to Darwin and Wolf, one guy surfaced screaming at the Dive Guides because they didn't take care of him. His BC leaked. He realized this and didn't continue the dive, but couldn't ascend either. I asked him why he didn't drop his weights. He said he had never practiced that before. Not a lot of babysitting on these trips. They don't even do the check dive with you. You are expected to figure out your own weight. Unlike the daily dives in the southern and central islands, if you are diving Wolf and Darwin, they assume you are capable of diving these conditions because you state you are on your application for the trip. Having said that, I was on a Darwin-Wolf live-aboard earlier this year with a woman who only had 20 logged dives and had just learned to dive in Jan. 2009!

On this trip, I got sick, food poisoning I think, as I don't get seasick. Once before, I've vomited after surfacing, but this night (at Darwin), I was leaning over the ship violently ill and gasping for air in-between. I could not even hold down water. I thought of Donna (though I didn't know her name until this thread). Before that night, I was sure I could vomit through my regulator and get through it, but after that type of vomiting, I was sure I couldn't. I did not do the 2 dives at Darwin the next morning...too dehydrated (not only vomiting), too weak and too aware that may have been how she died. I did the 3rd and sat out the 4th. I wondered if I might have gone diving regardless if I hadn't been aware of this tragedy. It's hard to give up a dive at Darwin, let alone 3. I thought of her again afterwards at Wolf. We had very little current, but I've flown around those shoals at Wolf before. And when viz is bad, it wouldn't take much to get separated when in motion with a group.

I also had a situation this trip at Gordon Rocks where I was completely separated after we all got sucked into a 4 knot current between the Pinnacles. I looked around and couldn't find anyone. Never saw the diver behind me who, though a DM, was at a shaky skill level due to not being in the water for 3 plus years. He was able to watch me get out of the situation and follow. You don't swim out of that kind of a current in a trench - nowhere to go with pinnacle that almost reach the surface. I just sat there a minute holding the rocks, thinking I was alone and then finally saw another fin across the trench peeking out of a cut in the rocks on another pinnacle. I pulled myself down, across the trench and up the other side in a current stronger than any I've felt so far at Darwin and Wolf. Took the poor guy about 6 more dives to get comfortable in the water again. I couldn't do the decompression stop my computer was insisting because of the up and down profile since he was almost out of air and intent upon ascending and I had to go with him. Had to pop the battery to get rid of the error since I was diving every day. Others did the deco stop. That dive was only 25 minutes start to finish.

The Galapagos can be completely calm, but the unexpected does happen and can certainly test your skills and especially your ability to remain calm. I sometimes wonder if complacency isn't as much of a problem as inexperience. Tragedies like Donna help all of us become better divers, cold comfort to her loved ones no doubt, but possibly life saving to yet others. She was certainly with me on my trip week before last.

 

[Leejnd]

Leslie, thanks for your indepth post. Having just experienced a scary near-miss of my own in the Galapagos, it was very upsetting to me to come home and find out that a diver had died in the Galapagos while I was on my own trip there.

While there is very little information about this incident, this forum is all about learning what we can from accidents - even if that learning occurs from speculation. So while we don't know for sure that sickness/vomited had anything to do with what happened, I think there are some important lessons to be learned here with regards to that theory.

I get seasick. Which is ironic, considering that not only am I a diver, but I also own a sailboat, and regularly go on cruise vacations. If I'm going to be on a boat for any length of time, I usually wear a patch or take a pill of some sort to stave off the seasickness. But I also do a lot of shore diving, and don't use any kind of seasickness remedy, because I don't want to do something that will leave me with side effects for hours afterward.

Hence, I have found myself "feeding the fishies" a few too many times while floating on a rolly surface, either before or after descent. Fortunately my nausea usually stops the moment I descend, so I have never found myself in a situation where I had to vomit through my reg. But I have read numerous times that it is okay to do so, so I have continued to do beach dives without seasickness remedies, assuming that if it does happen, I'll be find.

But now I'm re-thinking that. Leslie, you made an important point about the violence of your own vomiting episode, and how it would be hard to do that underwater through your reg and still be able to breathe.

The lesson I'm taking from this is that vomiting underwater is something to REALLY avoid. And for me, that means I'm going to start wearing a patch or taking something before EVERY dive, including beach dives.