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> I'm assisting an instructor in a PADI open water certification > dive number one. We're boat diving off the coast of Catalina Island. > There are four divers in the class and one of them, the diver who > had the problem was 62 years old. The Instructor enters the water > first, followed by the four students, and then myself. > > After a surface swim of about 100 yards, we decend as a group. The > decent was normal, and the depth was 34 feet. While I'm not an instructor, the above yells disaster to me. Who else does OW dive 1 from a boat? Students may be prone to seasickness for a start, they dont know how to get into the water properly so they are possibly going to be aprehensive about jumping off the boat, and weight could be a problem as there's nowhere you can stand and get their salt-water weighting correct. Also, a 100yard surface swim for any new diver in full gear is going to be a little strenuous even for a fit person. you have more drag, and a possibly overinflated bc which restricts breathing. 34 feet for mask skills?! no way! 10 feet is enough. finally when I'm divemaster for an instructor, I always enter the water first and watch the students jump in and grab the mermaid line. if they loose their mask I can help them. if they havent inflated their BC and they sink like a stone I can retrieve them. if the instructor gets in first and deals with these problems well and good, but he's lost control of the group (especially if he needs to descend) which puts the rest of them in trouble as well. > The diver acts as if he does not seem to quite understand > what is expected, and is generally acting a little confused. I'd say the diver has gone into shock at this point, but noone could really say I guess. could be bad air, he could have had a phobia of water/depth/sharks which resulted in panic closely followed by shock when he was underwater, there are literally hundreds of things which could have been wrong. was he asthmatic? > Once on the surface, the diver immediately threw up. After he > finished throwing up, I told him to relax and rest a few minutes > and then we'd go back to the boat. did he respond at all? a nod or look at you meaningfully or make any effort to hold onto you? > Two nurses (divers also) happened to be on board and they > checked for a pulse... There was none. They began CPR. After > approximately one minute, the diver began breathing on his own. congrats to all involved for a clean rescue. Max. max@ma*.ne*.au* --- Some day we may discover how to make magnets that can point in any direction. -- Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'. Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.
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