Panic may have led to death

[Formerly 45yroldNewbie]

It seems a lot of accidents are caused by forgetting to dump weights. I think from now on I will make it a point to add a reminder to my buddy and myself during the final check before entering the water..."If in trouble ditch the weight!!"

Sincere condolences to the mans' wife and kids.

From Yahoo ....

http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/kenai...-9249634c.html

By JAMES HALPIN
jhalpin@...

(Published: September 27, 2007)

An Alaska SeaLife Center diver who died in Resurrection Bay after his
tank ran out of air may have panicked while trying to remove his
weight belt, Alaska State Troopers said Wednesday.

Matthew Myers, 44, died Tuesday near Fox Island about 5 miles from
Seward while he and a dive master, Bob Hicks, were out on a training
dive, part of a series that would have certified Myers as a
scientific diver, said Tim Dillon, a SeaLife Center spokesman.

Myers was certified as an open-water diver in 1982 and was certified
an advanced diver in 1984, Dillon said. Becoming a scientific diver
involves the same skills, with the added requirements of knowing how
to collect samples while diving in certain conditions, among other things.

The pair was alone underwater when Myers ran out of air and signaled
to Hicks that he needed to surface, troopers spokeswoman Beth Ipsen said.

"There's a red flag right there," said Stephen Jewett, the University
of Alaska's diving safety officer. "If he's truly out of air, then he
can't inflate his buoyancy compensator. If he couldn't get his weight
belt off, he's going to go back down."

The men surfaced, but then Myers apparently began to panic, Ipsen
said. Even for an experienced diver, some degree of panic is not
uncommon, Jewett said.

"Most people that have a fair amount of experience under their belts
can grapple with that, but we just don't know exactly what happened," he said.

Hicks switched their tanks so that Myers had the fuller one and asked
Myers to take his weight belt off, Ipsen said. Myers for some reason
was unable to do so.

The pair began trying to swim to shore. Their boat was still
anchored, Dillon said, but depending on their dive pattern, they
might have surfaced closer to the shore than to the boat.

When Myers went below the surface, Hicks thought he was again trying
to remove the belt, Ipsen said. But Myers never came up.

"(Hicks) couldn't go after Myers right away because he had the empty
tank," Ipsen said.

Hicks swam back out to the boat and radioed for help, Dillon said.

Coast Guard and Seward Fire Department crews responded, along with
SeaLife Center divers. They recovered Myers' body after about 90
minutes, Ipsen said.

He was transported to Providence Hospital in Seward, where he was
pronounced dead at about 2:15 p.m. His body was released to his
family by the state medical examiner later that night, Ipsen said.

Dillon said the SeaLife Center is awaiting the results of the
investigation before it comments on the specifics of what happened. A
diving computer that Myers wore on the outing will be among the
evidence examined, he said.

The SeaLife Center has 25 regular divers who conduct about 100
open-water dives each year, Dillon said. Jewett, who works closely
with the center, said he has known Hicks for years and called him a
highly competent diver.

Reached at his home Wednesday night, Hicks wouldn't comment, saying
the accident was still too recent.

Myers was finishing up a master's degree from the University of
Alaska Fairbanks' School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, Dillon
said, and he was working at the SeaLife Center as a marine mammal
scientist. He had been employed there since 2001, Dillon said.

"He was a very experienced diver," said Jessica Huebert, Myers'
cousin. "I'm sure whoever was there was doing their best. I'm not
blaming anyone, but this just seems kind of strange."

Myers leaves behind a wife and two children, Huebert said.

[Netsloth]

Dang. It's hard to imagine how that went down. He made it to the surface safely and drowned because neither he nor his buddy could figure out how to drop his weight or inflate his BC? They managed to swap TANKS but couldn't remove a weight belt?

What in the wide-wide world of sports?

[datamunk]

wow thats horrible. yea i dont see how they exchanged gear but not removed a belt... better believe if he couldnt have i would ahve cut that thing off of him. that or manually inflate BCs... dunno....

rescue class taught me to forget the price of gear, if you have to, take it all off and let it float off.. then search or go buy new stuff.. i imagine he was in a wetsuit so minus weights and bc/setup he would have been fine..

its just sad tho, hate to hear about losin a diver

[charlesml3]

OK, somebody is really going to have to explain why he couldn't inflate his BC on the surface by blowing into the inflator....

And really! The could switch tanks but couldn't ditch a weight belt? That really doesn't make any sense at all.

-Charles

[Bigg_Budd]

Yeah. The switching tanks thing has me friggin' stumped...

[subsur]

maybe he had a heart problem or some bad leg cramps also we don't know how fast they surfaced. the investigation is still going on so it's all speculative but i don't understand why BC was not inflated orally once they made it to the surface or even after they switched tanks. he had 25 years of diving experience. very strange.

[Chad]

Very strange circumstances and very sad outcome.

[Formerly 45yroldNewbie]

Yeah it didn't make a lot of sense to me either! Experienced, swap tanks, can't think through panic to orally inflate BC???

I guess it proves that panic can and does do strange things to the mind. Which is why as part of the pre-dive check I suppose we should all remind our buddy whee our weights are and how they come out/off/apart whatever.

[cummings66]

It also shows the need to take rescue as soon as you can. This while tragic did not need to occur. It would have been simple for the other diver to remedy the situation if he had the proper training.

Ditching the weights was one solution, but not the only one available in this case. As others have said orally inflating was one solution availabe to them at any point in the dive, in fact he should have been buoyant at the surface anyways with an empty tank. He could have removed the gear, in fact by removing the tank and switching it they negated the positive buoyancy he would have had.

Really, this accident while sad tells us that a rescue course should be taken by every single diver out there who dive with buddies. You never know when you'll need the skills.

[Kokomo]

Condolensces to the family. This all sounds really really weird!