Florida Keys snorkel, dive deaths now up to six for 2011

[DandyDon]

Keys snorkel, dive deaths now up to six for 2011

A Canadian man, 69, died after a snorkeling trip off Key Largo on Tuesday. The death of John Hobus raised to six the number of scuba or snorkeling deaths in Keys waters so far in 2011. A week before Hobus died, a 42-year-old British visitor died after snorkeling off a Key West beach.

Monroe County Medical Examiner E. Hunt Scheuerman said the cause of the two most recent deaths will be listed after results from additional tests are received. "It's always better to wait to have everything put together," he said Friday.

Hobus, of Whitehorse in Yukon, Canada, was on a snorkel trip at Cannon Patch Reef with the Reef Roamer catamaran from Key Largo, reported the Monroe County Sheriff's Office.

"Hobus began to have trouble as he was swimming back to the boat," said agency spokeswoman Becky Herrin. Hobus was pulled aboard and boat crew performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation while returning to shore to Port Largo. Hobus did not survive.

His wife told a detective that Hobus underwent triple-bypass heart surgery in 1995 and was still on several medications.

Simone Newman, 42, of England apparently fell unconscious and died May 24 while snorkeling off Dog Beach in Key West. Efforts by bystanders and first-responders to revive him failed. Key West Police Officer Gary Celcer reported that he "did not see any gross visible signs of trauma" on Newman.

In two scuba-related deaths earlier this year, the medical examiner determined air embolisms triggered the fatalities.

Steven Knorr, 60, of Wisconsin was spearfishing from a private boat in 50 feet of water off Marathon on March 23. His son, a Marathon resident, found Knorr unconscious at the surface.

Richard Snow, 56, of Three Oaks, Mich., died March 10 after a dive off Marathon from a commercial dive boat. Snow began having trouble while surfacing and fell unconscious.

Air embolisms are caused when a bubble forms in the bloodstream, blocking the flow of blood to the heart or brain. Scuba divers have a larger risk of embolisms because compressed air inhaled at depth expands as the diver surfaces.

Most dive-related deaths are attributable to medical conditions, Scheuerman said, but a significant number can be traced to embolisms. "If the history [of the dive] is consistent with a possible embolism, then you look for things during the autopsy that may confirm it," Scheuerman said.

In February, Clermont resident Cheryl Chastek, 50, died of physiological complications from a near-drowning suffered while diving off a private boat in the Lower Keys, the medical examiner ruled.

Piers Harley, 64, of Ocean, N.J., surfaced at Key Largo's Molasses Reef after a Feb. 27 dive trip and died as he returned to the commercial dive boat HMS Minnow.

 

[Sinbad Scuba]

Thanks for posting.

 

[Tricia]

With regard to the snokeling deaths: I suspect that the average person thinks that snorkeling is so easy, any fool can do it. (And let's face it, us scuba divers enjoy perpetuating that myth... ) So people get out there snorkeling who are in no physical condition to do it (or have very poor swimming skills). We've all seen somebody lining up for the snorkelling boat and thought, "Wow! That's a BIG guy! Should he be doing this?"

At the resort where I often dive, the instructors rotate doing the snorkel boat with the dive boat, to reduce their chances of a DCS hit. And they tell me that when they take the snorkel boat out, they worry a LOT more about the snorkelers than the divers. Because nobody checks the physical fitness or swimming skills of these folks - they just take them at their word. So you get a lot of people out there who shouldn't be snorkeling, let alone diving...

Just my two cents!
Trish

 

[deeper thoughts]

Some of these incidents happened when we decided not to take our boat out because the reefs are "doable","sporty".Surface conditions usually play a big factor out here with scuba/snorkeling deaths

 

[DandyDon]

With regard to the snokeling deaths: I suspect that the average person thinks that snorkeling is so easy, any fool can do it. (And let's face it, us scuba divers enjoy perpetuating that myth... ) So people get out there snorkeling who are in no physical condition to do it (or have very poor swimming skills). We've all seen somebody lining up for the snorkelling boat and thought, "Wow! That's a BIG guy! Should he be doing this?"

At the resort where I often dive, the instructors rotate doing the snorkel boat with the dive boat, to reduce their chances of a DCS hit. And they tell me that when they take the snorkel boat out, they worry a LOT more about the snorkelers than the divers. Because nobody checks the physical fitness or swimming skills of these folks - they just take them at their word. So you get a lot of people out there who shouldn't be snorkeling, let alone diving...

Just my two cents!
Trish

Perhaps a lot of truth there. Before I got into scuba, I used to snorkel and free dive on vacation trips anywhere on the sea and some boats offered some instruction on snorkeling, some not. I had figured out ear clearing ok, but had no idea about shallow water blackout - never mentioned, :shocked2: and didn't use a snorkel vest until later on in all that - just swam. I was lucky.

When my daughter booked a cruise to Cozumel with her not in the least athletic mom, my grandson, and our German student, I gave them as good of a class as I could in a pool and made sure three of them had snorkel vest, her mom to use a life vest. They took the snorkel vests but didn't bother using them.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

One of the reasons that I am now teaching a 3 phase Snorkeling/ Skin diving program for the Girl Scouts in SW Pa. Phase three is rescue skills for snorkelers and skin divers. They also are required to know how to swim before they start the course. We have had two drownings in two days locally. An 8 yr old and an 11 yr old in public pools. Still waiting for the full story on the 8 yr old, but the 11 yr old was just starting to learn to swim and mom thought it would be ok to drop him off with his friends and go somewhere else. There is some indication that peer pressure was a factor.