It is possible that the divers were out on a local charter in San Diego. This boat may or may not be required by law to have a divemaster on the boat in addition to the captain. They may or may not have a questionable history and often the only boats in town that are not booked full while the other charters are staying busy. The charter may have had an individual "acting" as a divemaster but "actual certification" has yet to be confirmed. It is possible that the buddy team came up in the kelp away from the boat, then descended together underwater heading toward the boat. It is possible that the deceased diver got snagged on kelp while the other buddy continued to swim according to their heading accidentally not realizing their buddy got hung up in kelp. That diver may have surfaced somewhat upset, maybe even panicked. The individual "assisting" on the boat with no gear or float, etc, could have been telling the person to take off their gear, while they jumped into the currently 65-70 degree water on the surface swimming to the struggling diver to assist them. It is also entirely possible that they received assistance in removing the BC to help remove the tangle in the BC with the kelp. That person may of slipped underwater and in a panicked state did not remove the weight belt. It is very possible that they were not told to remove their weight belt. It is pure speculation, but we cannot ask the deceased diver. Actually, it may be impossible to ask the "assistant" since it is possible that they cannot be found. I guess we will need to wait for more details.
UWScotch - thank you VERY much for being willing to "part with info so we may learn something from this tragic event", as you said on your earlier post. That's really the whole point of this forum - to discuss these tragedies, dissect them, and learn from them. You seem to have first-hand knowledge of this incident, and while it must be very difficult to discuss, I'm sure you recognize that we are not probing for info to be disrespectful or morbid or to assign blame, but to UNDERSTAND.
We love diving. At least, I sure do - and I'm sure the active participants in this thread feel the same way. We don't want to die diving. We want to find out what kills divers, and make sure it doesn't happen to us.
I wish there was a way to find out just how many lives have been saved by divers reading this forum. I can say for sure that I myself have learned things in this forum that kept me from doing stupid things! Maybe that saved my life - we'll never know. When I became certified several years ago and found this board, I spent countless hours reading the threads in here. And when I'm about to go on a dive trip, I tend to haunt this forum for a while beforehand, just to make sure there doesn't end up being a thread about ME in here.
Just in this thread alone, I'm confident people have learned things about CA diving, about kelp, about ditching weights, that may very well save their lives someday.
Anyway, the story you tell actually does ring true. (Obviously all told as "speculation", which is all we really can do in here anyway.)
It's helpful to know that he did, in fact, have a buddy. That answers a lot of questions. If these divers were not experienced in doing the "kelp crawl", then what happened is understandable. Personally, I would never descend again directly into thick kelp once I'd surfaced in it. If I'm going to get tangled, I'd rather do so on the surface where I can breathe. I've surfaced in very thick kelp, and managed to get myself out of it without removing my BC. But divers who don't have experience in kelp, or know how to get out of it, can feel like they are hopelessly tangled. And if that's what happened, I can see how the buddy might have been focused on his own tangles and not realized that the other diver was stuck even worse behind him.
In spite of the speculation that the "DM" wasn't actually certified, I still have to chalk this one up to diver panic/error. Yes, the "DM" should have told him to ditch his weights. But the diver should have known better. How awful that he got such bad (and ultimately deadly) directives from the "DM".
As I see it, the lesson here is all about ditching weights. Had he done that, he would more than likely be able to go home to his wife and baby.
The lesson is also, as mentioned many times in this thread, about learning about a new dive location, and the conditions you might face. Had they known more about kelp - how to break it, how to do the kelp crawl - they wouldn't have had to remove his BC at all. I've gotten myself out of many kelp tangles without removing my gear.
It'll be interesting to see what the investigation ultimately reveals, and whether or not the dive op is held accountable. I can see reasons for that - certainly he gave bad instructions to a panicked diver!
But IMHO, this is still a diver error incident. And a particularly tragic one at that. :depressed:
