Diver drowns while training

[Nitrox Junkie]

For the second time in less than two years, an Indianapolis Fire Department training dive turned deadly.

In an accident that is still under investigation, officials said 37 year old Paul Jolliff drowned after he apparently panicked and was unable to surface just before 1 pm Friday.

It took rescuers nearly two hours to find Jolliff in the cold, murky water of a Northwest side pond. He was pronounced dead at Methodist Hospital.

The seven-year veteran normally drove a firetruck and was a paramedic at Station 10, 2970 N. Sherman Drive.

He was on his 22nd and final practice mission before being certified as a department dive team member. Another Indianapolis firefighter, Warren J.C. Smith, died on a training dive in August 2000.

He is survived by his wife, Wendy, who is pregnant with their second child. Jolliff also has a son who will turn 3 in October. Jolliff was the grandson of Paul K. Jolliff, an Indianapolis firefighter from 1940 to 1966.

The accident happened in a pond near 79th Street and Marsh Road. The private, 10-acre pond has been used by police and fire agencies for training for about 40 years.

Investigators spent the afternoon and evening questioning at least 25 witnesses at the pond on the grounds of the Ropkey Armor Museum. Many details of the accident are still unknown.

Senior Deputy Cheif Dave Grider informed firefighters via their radio about six hours after the tragedy of the news and ordered all flags flown at half-staff.

At a news conference a few minutes later, he and other department leaders were unable to say whether proper life-saving techniques were followed. Chief Louis Dezelan cut short a vacation, returning to Indianapolis from south Florida on Friday night.

The United States sees three to five deaths a year among police and fire department dive teams, according to Mike Bielmaier, vice president of the International Association of Dive Rescue Specialists.

Usually, those deaths come in practice as divers face situations for which they are unprepared.

"Typically, the problem lies in training," he said, "or in the equipment available to them."

The association is a nonprofit operatiing from Fort Collins, Colo. aimed at helpiing public service divers and teams. Bielmaier said his group recommends new divers be banned from depths greater than 60 feet.

Officials said Jolliff was between 50 and 60 feet down at the time of the accident, but the pond is up to 70 feet deep in some spots.

IFD officials promised to learn from the incident

"It makes us want to find out everything we can. If there's any way that it can be avoided in the future, we want to find it." Grider said. "We won't rest until we find it."

Jolliff was part of a class of novice divers. They were finishing the last of their training dives, said Dawn Smith, deputy cheir of the Pike Township Fire Department.

The training class included firefighters from Lawerence, Fishers, Indianapolis and Wayne and Pike townships, along with officers from the Indianapolis Police Department.

Jolliff and his dive partner decended at 12:15 p.m. During the training, divers perform a search for an object and do so intentionally in zero visibility.

The two divers were tethered together and also had a rope that led to the surface.

At 12:30 p.m. just 15 minutes into the practice run, Grider said Jolliff apparently panicked and reached over and informed his diving partner. Jolliff's weight belt was removed --- either by himself or his partner, Jay Updike of the Fishers Fire Department. Updike surfaced and immediately warned diving instructors of the danger below.

When the weight belt came off, Jolliff should have floated free to the surface. But he didn't. It took the use of a sonar-equipped boat from Fred Ropkey, owner of the property, for searchers to find Jolliff at 2:56 p.m.

Indianapolis Fire Department officials say that the pond has all types of debris at the bottom, ranging from wires to tree limbs, that might have caught Jolliff.

"Just about any pond in Indiana is going to have the possibility of a snag," Smith added.

The Marion County Sheriff's Department is investigating the death.

One diver in the rescue party had to be helped to shore after he got a severe headache. He was treated at the scene.

The last firefighter who died in an accident drowned in about 70 feet of water.

An investigation afterward showed he might have become entangled in lines used to guide a training search. Smith had been practicing the rescue of a drowning child.

Capt. Mario Garza, spokesman for the INdianapolis Fire Department, said the department made minor changes to its procedures after the accident, but some steps -- including checking divers' air supplies before submerging -- were adopted.









"Its a sad tragedy. Just pray"

Jeff Great lakes diver

:tribute:

 

[MikeFerrara]

The true situation in public safety diving is divings dirty little secret. They are poorly trained, inexperienced and ill equiped. IMO, it is criminal.

 

[Uncle Pug]

Originally posted by MikeFerrara
The true situation in public safety diving is divings dirty little secret. They are poorly trained, inexperienced and ill equiped. IMO, it is criminal.

And you are right Mike.

Throw in a few unmentionables like inter-agency turf wars, intra-departmental rivalries, ego driven agendas, macho attitudes.... (dear reader this does not apply to you nor your department/ organization... I am talking about another department/organization)

AND...

Often very hazardous diving environments.

But someone has to do this work... and some one has to train for it... and accidents will happen... and it is very sad when someone who is persuing a career of helping others loses their life... and every FF/rescue worker knows that their life is on the line... and as a public we should be willing to front the money for the best training and equipment... and we should also respectfully mourn the loss of life whether it be in training or in an actually rescue situation.

 

[gentlegiant]

This was a tragic loss and I hope it causes a change in the way rescue divers are trained and equiped. I have talked with a couple of guys in local dive shops who are rescue divers in addition to being instructors and in both cases the departments have made blanket choices on gear selections that could be troublesome. One department has equiped all of their divers in Scubapro gear, which is pretty good gear, but made poor choices in the gear configuration. They decided to go with the integrated "airsource" backup regs instead of a real backup/octo and I believe they are using jacket style BC's instead of a back inflation BC or better yet a BP/wing setup. IMHO rescue department divers should be trained and equiped as technical divers due to the type of diving they are called on to do. If it were me I would want a bulletproof, simple and proven gear configuration. I am not a DIR diver, although my equipment configuration and ways of thinking are heading that way as I do more diving, but DIR does make sense for rescue and public service divers. They are most often diving in high current, low vis conditions where the last thing they need to think about is gear management. I think the main problem is the department heads and bean counters not being familiar with diving and not allowing the divers to make the choices on gear configuration and training.

My hood is off to all those who do public service diving and I hope that those divers get the chance to do things the right way so that no more of them have to pay the "ultimate" price unneccesarily.

 

[tchil01]

This year at Beneath the Sea I saw a group that was discussing specific training and certification for Public Safety Diving. There was a lot of discussion about liabiity, Workmens Comp issues and insurance for public safety divers, including a push for a third class of divers instead of just commercial and recreational. Several guys at our LDS, including the son of the owner are police who also dive for their depatments when needed. The get no other training as divers outside of their courses through the LDS.

Ty

 

[DivingGal]

Public Safety Divers are getting additional training. Sure not all, and definately not enough of them, but there is training out there for them.

Last year I took a course with Andra Zaferes from Lifeguard Systems - all about Public Safety Teams -- though the audience turned out to be divers like myself who wanted to improve their "rescue/recovery" techniques. She quickly adapted the course, and we all had a grand time.

Lifeguard Systems

 

[pipedope]

Most public safety diving is being done with the wrong gear.

When you are going into zero visability water with lots of entanglement hazards and have to work then surface supplied gas (air) is the way to go. Surface supplied gives you nearly unlimited time so nearly any problem can be worked out. It also makes a com link dirt simple so the diver can be telling the surface personel in real time what is going on. In the vast majority of cases it is easy to find the surface supplied diver by following his (her) unbilical. In the cases where this is not the case you have one of two common conditions (actually common only in the extreem case of not having the diver still on the end of the hose). First is where the unbilical is hung up and the diver cannot free it, he tells the surface that the unbilical is hung up and that he is going off com and surface air and going on the bailout bottle for the trip to the surface. the dive supervisor has the option of sending the standby diver down to escort the diver up if things are very hazardous. The other case is when something cuts the unbilical. Now you have the sudden loss of diver sounds on the com link and lots of bubbles from the cut hose. Soon you will see the diver surfacing on the bailout bottle.

SCUBA is a wonderful thing and is a good choice for quick response and work where independent movement is needed, working in black water is not the place for scuba.

Public safety diving does have exemption from the rules that apply to commercial diving in the USA because they do need some flexibility to deal with different situations but it is still a bad idea to do jobs that call for surface supplied air, full face masks or helmets and standby divers still really need these things to be done safely.
You may take a chance when it might save a life but most searches don't have this opportunity.

Public safety diving has come a long way, let us hope that they can go the last few yards to a suite of gear and training to safely do the jobs they need to do.

 

[Rick Murchison]

Originally posted by pipedope
Most public safety diving is being done with the wrong gear.

When you are going into zero visability water with lots of entanglement hazards and have to work then surface supplied gas (air) is the way to go.

Bingo!
Rick

 

[sharpenu]

As a professional rescuer, I can tell you that surface supplied gas is not the way to go in most cases. Entanglement is a big enough hazard without adding another object (the hose) that can become tangled. The rig required depends on the conditions of the rescue. Some call for pony bottle and horse collar. Some call for drysuit (no picnic in Florida's WARM water) and others still for surface supply. The number one thing to remember as a rescuer is: improvise, adapt and overcome. The only way to do that is to train, train, train.

I feel the problem in this case (form reading the report. I wasn't there and don't have the whole story) is that the diver freaked out. I don't think that a diver with only 21 dives is qualified or prepared for zero viz rescue diving.

My heart goes out to the family of Brother Jolliff. I hope that IFD will realize that there are problems in the training program and fix them. Two deaths in 2 years is UNACCEPTABLE.

 

[indypddiver]

Hello all. I happened across this website last night in an attempt to better research the future purchase of a dive computer. Until that time, I did not know of its existence. When I read the messages posted here, I felt a mixture of pride, sadness, and appreciation. I am a police diver for the City of Indianapolis and was present soon after Firefighter Paul Jolliff was reported missing. Shortly after my arrival to the scene, I was in the water looking for Paul...albeit vainly. It was only with the help of sonar equipment that divers from my team later found him. I truly appreciate those of you who expressed their condolences and wishes of safe diving for us who serve as public safety divers.

However, I was also slightly disheartened when reading other comments suggesting a lack of experience, training, and equipment among public safety divers. I in no way wish to argue against broad and generalized comments. I do wish to set the record somewhat straight. I would strongly disagree with what Mr. Ferrara stated. There are approximately 3 to 5 diving related deaths per year in the public safety ranks. That's after countless divers take thousands upon thousands of calls. We train constantly and are always advancing our diving skills and knowledge. We continuously harp on one another about pre-dive safety. We check, recheck, and check again our gear before entering even the shallowest of water. I think I can safely say that, in general, we are among the absolute safest of any class of diver. Unfortunately, the most advanced and rigorous training in the world will not prevent every accident. I severely wish it otherwise. Its relatively easy to dive 80 feet with 200 feet of vis. Its extremely difficult to dive 20 feet with absolute zero vis in water that averages 45 degrees, and do it over and over and over...try it sometime.

Paul was diving one of the last dives necessary to become a public safety diver for the Indianapolis Fire Department. This was not a fly by the seat of your pants Open Water class, nor was it a class designed to make one a better recreational diver. The class took several months to complete and focused heavily on the number one priority of any dive...safety. Its easy to armchair quarterback any accident and throw your two cents in, but unless you happened to be there, opinions are just that.

I will be attending Paul's funeral in just a matter of hours and wrote this long-winded note probably more out of frustration and sadness at losing a great, great person, than in an attempt to attack anyone's opinion. Please do not take it as such. Paul took great pride in his chosen career and only wanted to contribute that much more by becoming a public safety diver....after all, someone has to do it.

Thanks,


indypddiver