Error OW student drowns - Same San, Thailand

[Submarine_MiG]

*This is the translation from a Facebook post by Thai DMT that searched for the missing OW student*

First of all, I would like to express my condolences. I was part of the search party that dove to find the missing OW student.

Why didn't we say anything on the day of the incident?

First, we're gathering the information and summarize what happen on the boat chronologically. We don't want to post anything without evidence. There are many things that no one can answer. We still don't know why the student was alone underwater. Why other people in the group came back without knowing one of the group member was missing. They realized after my group was back because my group was the last group.

I would like to be the represent of the people on the boat and scuba Same San people. We are not going to conceal anything as is alleged now but a lot of things still can not be answered right now. Moreover, many people are helping with the information about the instructor that is responsible. I don't want to reveal the person but I would like to share my experience.

Chronology

1. The boat arrived at the dive site. I and my instructor (not the accident group) went to set up buoy so students can hold on the line during the test. It took us around 10-15 minutes to complete then we went to the surface for our students (2 people)
2. My instructor went up on the boat to teach students do the BWRAF while I waited at the stern. The accident group finished preparing gear and started jumping into the water one by one. I floated at the stern and watched them.
3. There is one person jumped and started to panic. That person did not inflate the BCD and started to sink so I grabbed that BCD, pulled up, and told that person "Calm down and inflate". After that I grabbed that person's inflator hose and inflated for that person. To be honest, the inflator button was very hard. After that the DMT from that group grabbed that person tank's neck to regroup with the rest of the class but I can still see that that person still haven't fully calm down yet. However, I think their instructor can deal with it.
4. I am not sure whether the person I helped from 3. is the deceased but I think there is only one person who show sign of panicking based on my observation watching that group jumped into the water. Since I worked in this field, I already have a sense of it. When I watched from the stern, there is on one show sign of panicking like the person I helped. I stayed at the stern around half an hour because my instructor was teaching buddy check and briefing student before going into the water. That means I watched a few people jumping into the water.
5. I led my OW student under to test along with my instructor. We dove for 49.14 minutes. We dove close to the buoys around the boat.
6. After surfacing, I and my instructor led our class to the boat and I went back to retrieve our buoy and dove to 6m around 2 minutes (according to the dive computer)
7. I surfaced with the buoy, gave it to the dinghy then I hold onto the boat back to the big boat.
8. I came out of the water, removed my gears and washed myself at the big boat.
9. During that, there is foreign instructor asked me "What is your level, instructor?". I answered "I'm a dive master" (Actually, I should have answered DMT) I want to keep the answer short. Meanwhile, I saw boat crews start panicking since we are the last group to board and there is one missing equipment.
   1. A: There is someone missing around 30 minutes
   2. Me: Your shop? Why haven't that person came up? You didn't brief about lost before going into water?
   3. A: Not my shop? The other one, they came for the test, first open water dive. That person was sitting over there.
   4. I walked with the foreign instructor and saw that there is one missing cylinder. That instructor showed me that the missing person was sitting there.
   5. I told my instructor about the missing person and we start changing our cylinder because we thought that person must already panicking.
10. During that, the dinghy was looking for an air bubble for 1 lap and still couldn't find anything. We got into gear and jumped into the water.
11. The foreign instructor went one direction and I and my instructor searched the other direction. We went to the place that buoys were set up because every shop set the buoy facing into the island and my buoy was the furthest. If I turn my back to the pier, my buoy was to the left off the island. The other shops' were to the right into the beach.
12. We planned to search for only 30 minutes. I and my instructor searched for only 24.34 minutes. Max depth was 7m and minimum depth was 2m. At the end of the dive, the visibility was so bad I lost my instructor. I pointed my compass to the boat and knock my cylinder telling my instructor from time to time communicating. We heard the dinghy over my head so I decided to surface which I was the last person. My instructor had surfaced before me around 1-2 minutes. The dinghy driver told me that they found the missing diver so I hopped onto the dinghy and went to the big boat.
13. What is saw was instructor, DMT, DM, and Boat manager were doing CPR.
14. I would say that everybody follow the protocol that they were taught. They were doing their best.
15. The main question that everyone want to know is Which shop?, Which instructor. To be honest, I've never seen the instructor's face before and I don't know the name of the shop.
16. I would like to say thank you to all the dive shop that looked for the missing diver include instructor, DM, and DMT.

In the end, I would like to express my condolences to the relative and friend of the deceased.

Some people asked me about where was the diver. According to someone on the boat, the decease was found 3m next to the group's buoy. Regulator was not in the mouth. About the dive buddy or when did the deceased lost from the group, I don't know and I didn't ask anyone since the situation on the boat was chaotic. We focus on the first aid so much that we didn't do anything except helping the deceased.

Source: Anonymous post in Thai diver Facebook group

Note: I tried my best to translate the post into English but stuff may be incorrectly interpreted