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Michael: >> that's like saying that most air crashes involve some sort of pilot error. But you just cannot stop there, but need to analyze the nature of the error. << Agreed, compare the following two reports on a HYPOTHETICAL incident. Hopefully it demonstrates why I prefer one version over the other. Version A A 37 year old diver from Massachusetts drowned at Balucci Springs, FL on February 31, 1998. The victim had been diving with 2 companions. It was their first dive for this weekend. All three divers were Full Cave certified, carried 3 lights per diver and were diving normoxic air. The divers reached the "Room of Pearls" where they called their dive on thirds. Maximum depth recorded was 157 feet, the diver reportedly went without incident. After 25 minutes dive time they started their decompression at 20 feet on 100% oxygen just outside the cave entrance. Several minutes into decompression, the victim signaled trouble to his companions, moments later his body went limb, the regulator fell out of his mouth and the body was sinking to the bottom of the spring. His dive companions surfaced the body and alerted bystanders who immediately started CPR without ever reviving the victim. The county coroner ruled this an accidental death. Results of a standard drug test suggest the use of a controlled substance 12 to 24 hours prior to the dive. In addition an inhalator was found in his personal gear. Version B (by the time the Tech-Diver list gets the news...) Another Deep Air diver bought the dust. Peter Peterson, some overweight asthmatic dumb fuck from New England, committed the maximum strokery of all times. Believe me, I saw the gear - bondage wings, stuffed hoses, Aluminum cylinders. The fat slob properly got himself stressed out just trying to push his deformed soon-to-be corps through the water. No wonder he was ready to just pass before he could ever make it to the surface. He didn't deserve any better! Of course, his pot-smoking buddies were breathing off the short hose and couldn't even get a working regulator to him on time. Instead they abandoned the guy on shore and went back to complete their weenie decompression. But at least they carried certification cards from no-good red-neck instructor Mike Mickelson. >> most deaths are cuased by diver error, you HAVE to blame the dead diver for doing something wrong. << I disagree - blame won't bring him back. Why not just REPORT what he did, including all the things that he did wrong? Michael, all I'm asking is, that we start reporting accidents in a fashion that doesn't cause families unnecessary distress. Version A has all the facts, we ALL can see what happened. I bet you, the family would even cooperate with fact collection. There is no need to "dramatize" the facts and write up Version B just so that we all "get the message". Did you ask for a baby-sitter? I didn't! If anything, Version B will scare future witnesses or participants away from EVER providing ANY information about future incidents - and then we wonder why people stop reporting (which started this whole discussion). >> So what really happened in the Red Sea? Deep Air diving? Explaining this one with a heart attack (impossible to prove)? Or a freak equipment failure (impossible to prove)? How come he could not deal with that failure? Isn't that a valid question? << The management of the Red Sea incident was pathetic. The first "announcement" reported one witness seeing the diver starting an immediate, unexplainable descent, but then the victim supposedly gave a signal. WHAT signal? Help? Trouble? Okay? All the questions you raise are VALID - I never said that I had a problem with people looking for ANSWERS! But that's a far cry from calling the dead diver names, or for non-witnesses to presenting speculation or "best guesses" as if they were established FACTS. Best Regards, Andy -- Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'. Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.
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