Dive Story of the Week

6/10/2010 by Capt. Darrick Lorenzen | 0 Comments | 448 Views

This is the other side of the precautions we scuba divers take on every trip. An example of what could happen in a worst case scenario. This is a true story that was told to me by a diver who was on location during the incident. The written format was completed by our intern, Patti Blake. Names have been changed to protect the privacy of those involved.

He is floating face down in the warm saltwater, somewhere in Key Largo. His hair is matted over his purple features and his eyes are staring into space. Blood runs down the corner of his mouth and his regulator floats out to his side. The air in his buoyancy compensator won’t let him sink into the blue waves that gently swish his body from side to side.  All alone, he happens to bump the bow of a boat. His name is John.

The sounds of splashing and yelling interrupt the quiet. Four pairs of hands pull John out of the water and onto the boat. This just happens to be a boat full of advanced open water divers and a few dive masters.  There is scrambling on the deck as someone calls the Coast Guard, another diver runs for the first aid kit and the emergency oxygen tank. Two people start to remove his dive gear, pull his mask off his face and check his vital signs.

John isn’t breathing and he doesn’t have a pulse. A dive master, Christopher, tilts back the drowned divers head and initiates the first two breaths of CPR. The air goes into the lungs and makes the chest rise visibly. This means the drowned diver didn’t choke on something that would block air from the lungs. Without any barrier masks in the first aid kit, the Christopher makes direct contact with the bloody mouth of the drowned diver.  

A second dive master, Alex, begins chest compressions at the rate of 100 beats per minute. The compressions go an inch deep and the sound of ribs cracking is disgustingly audible. This is normal; if he wasn’t cracking ribs then he wouldn’t be doing this right. CPR isn’t supposed to be gentle. After 15 long minutes of chest compressions and breaths the drowned diver takes a shallow breath.

Meanwhile, there is a problem assembling the emergency oxygen tank. It’s an older model with tubes and special wrenches that make it confusing to assemble in a hurry. A dive master is struggling with the disassembled parts.

“I can’t do this!”

Christopher switches places with the diver who can’t assemble the tank. In seconds, the oxygen tank is assembled and flowing pure oxygen into a mask over the droned divers’ face. John is finally breathing slow normal breaths. Many new oxygen tanks come pre assembled in packages and only require the flip of a switch and selection of a flow rate.

The boat has been traveling this entire time to a meeting point that was set up with the Coast Guard. Alex monitors John’s vital signs. Out of curiosity, Christopher examines the drowned diver’s dive computer. (For the record. If you come across a drowned diver you should NEVER tamper with their equipment!!!) According to the dive computer, John was doing a 95ft dive and did a rapid ascent to the surface without doing decompression stops. His weight pockets are nowhere to be found and his buoyancy compensator is completely inflated.

John’s eyes open wide and he sits up. Natural color is starting to return to his face, but he still looks more like a corpse than a breathing person. Alex tries to assure him that everything is okay and they are trying to get him help. John tears the oxygen mask off of his face.

“I just want to breathe!”

John stands up and pushes Alex away. He starts running to get off of the boat. Coincidentally, EMS are boarding the boat and are stunned to see a man who was so close to death fighting off the men who breathed life back into his body. The EMS try to get John to get on a gurney, but he wont have it. An EMS worker grabs John under each arm. They escort him off the boat and leave behind several confused divers. He gets into an ambulance and is driven away, leaving behind a mystery.

Less than an hour ago, 95 feet below the breaking waves the beginning of our story took place. John was on a pleasant dive with some of his closest friends. Something happened, nobody knows what he was thinking about but it sent him into a panic. He began to remove his gear, trashing around. His buddy checked his air and he had plenty. She began to panic. He was becoming dangerous, he might strike someone else. After a brief struggle, she removed his weight pockets and inflated his buoyancy compensator. John rapidly ascended to the surface where he was later found by the boat of divers.

The moral of the story is dumb luck. Divers are known for the precautions they take to stay safe. In this particular incident, everything that could have gone wrong did so and the diver still lived. This story is important in the fact that it shows how small precautions can make or break a situation. John was found because his quick thinking buddy inflated his buoyancy compensator and let him shoot to the surface. Decompression is important, but in this case the diver got very lucky. He was revived because the people who found him knew CPR and had emergency oxygen available. John is lucky to be alive, let alone walk off the boat that rescued him.

Do you have a dive story?

We would love to hear it! Send it in to Midwest_Scuba_Diving@yahoo.com

We will take the good articles and post them online. If it’s the best article of the week, then we will post it, send the author a gift card to the dive shop of their choice and possibly publish their story in the next issue of Midwest Scuba Diving.