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John, While I partially agree with you, some of the scenarios that have been discussed have been interesting. I have followed intently the issue about the current on the deep wreck dive. With that said, now that Sheck's obituary has been posted, I would like to ask some questions about the details of the operation. #1) Was any type of communication available, either between divers or the surface support crew? If not, I would propose that some type of communications link be established. It might not be a bad idea if we could come up with some remote telemetry data on the divers to indicate their physical condition (i.e. at a minimum their pulse, perhaps respiration rate). What else would be useful and doable? This could be a multi-way com link so not only can the surface crew monitor the divers, but they could monitor each other. Also, it should not be impossible to come up with a two way com link, something along the lines of the wrist unit that was used in the abyss (not easy, just not impossible). Perhaps something as simple as having an "I'm ok" button that the diver has to hit every so often (it could blink to remind him), and an "I'm not ok" which would activate an emergency plan. #2) What were the backups in place should something go wrong? It's not clear what support plans were in place to take care of problems at depth. I would like to hear the details about what plans were in place. If the divers are not "on the line", then obviously there is no way to assist them should they become unconscious/etc. I was more than a little suprised by the statement in the obit that Sheck was at 906 ft. Rumors prior to this stated that his computer had read 999 ft. Being at 906 ft means that Jim actually was deeper than Sheck. What was the visibility down there? If the lines were 30 ft apart, perhaps this was actually too far apart? If Sheck was indeed at 906 ft, why wasn't Jim able to see him? Perhaps there needs to be 2 lines per diver - one to hold the deco tanks, and a secondary "emergency" line. I would suggest that for such a dive, this emergency line have a positive release mechanism (i.e. the diver has to release the lock to descend), perhaps somewhat similar to equipment used by climbers? It would have to be designed to allow rapid descents. This line would somehow be permanently attached to the diver, perhaps with some type of harness? I would have a 2nd set of rescue divers descend either with or just shortly after the first pair start down. They would stop at the depth of the 1st decompression stop. This set of divers could be on fully redundant CCRs. Should an emergency occur, i.e. communication is lost, or the telemetry on the deep divers shows anomolies, the emergency line should be used to rapidly bring the deep divers (or at least the deep diver in trouble) up to the 1st deco stop at which point the 2nd set of d ivers can assist them by maintaining open airways, switching tanks when necessary, etc. This presumes an unconscious diver, btw. If HPNS was a factor, then the possibility exists that had a rapid ascent to the 1st deco stop been possible, a recovery would have been possible. While some of this is speculation, I would really like to know about the details and planning of a major record setting dive like this... -Carl-
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