Tragedy at the U.S. Nationals Spearfishing Tourney

[Pezman]

I'm not a spearo, but here's a suggestion that may be practical. I apologize for posting something so unemotional in such a charged thread. I'm not a cold hearted engineer -- I just think that the mortality rate that Scott mentiones is horrifying and it seems to demand some kind of solution. I'm all for being free-spirited and those arguments have some appeal, but think of the price that this fellow's family is paying. Diving alone is one thing, but diving alone in a competitive atmosphere invites trouble and the results bear this out.

At any rate, here's my suggestion. Woudl it be possible to have the regs require guys to dive in pairs? The pair with the most fish wins, provided they adhered to good "buddy" practices. This requirement could be enforced using dive-loggers. A rugged, cheap logger like the Sensus Pro would be ideal. The loggers could be sealed in a tamper evident package that let in water but disallow a computer connection, so that tampering is impossible. There could be criteria set for profiles (e.g. two buddies down at the same time for 2:00 would be a definite violation). Exact criteria would be for experts in the sport to formulate. It shoudl be relatively easy to make a computer program that parses the logs and flags any potential violations.

Naturally, the buddy criteria would be open to some interpretation. In order to allow for practical lattitude in judgement, "borderline" pair profiles could be juried by participants. If folks turn in sealed loggers, this judging would be double-blind and therefore totally impartial.

Who's the chickenshit w/ 1 karma square that neg'd me for this? Even if you don't have the courage to sign it, at least explain yourself. Scott's post confirmed that it wasn't a completely insane idea.

10x for the karma from those who understood the intent of the message. Glad to see that the post seemsed to stimulate some conversation on improving safety.

[w3ac]

Gene was definitely a hero of mine. When a fellow diver called me to tell me that he died I was shocked and didn't want to believe it. To say that this isn't a tragedy is ridiculous. He was not only one of the best spearfishermen in the world but he was also a mentor, a husband, and a father. I think people have a right to show some emotion and not just pretend to be hard asses.

Brad

[sturgeon]

Pez,

Your thinking is along the lines of some possibilities that were voiced at the banquet by the current USOA National Freedive Director Bill Ernst (having himself lost a teammate at a past Nationals). Here's Bill's idea, two 2 man teams that would make up a single 4 man team. Each pair within the 4 man team would be allowed to carry only one gun (hence no need for a datalogger as only one person can dive at a time since there is only one gun between them). He told us this sort of configuration is currently being utilized in several countries where loss to SWB during tournaments was extremely high (I think I remember New Caledonia being one of the Countries mentioned). The reasoning behind the old system (3 man team) in the USA was because this used to be the way divers qualified for a slot in the World Championships (as a team). But that has since gone by the wayside and now teams qualify for the Worlds as individuals.

One point people should understand from this tragedy is that SWB can (and does) happen to anybody!!!!!!!!! From the most experienced divers to the most novice. I lost a good friend and dive partner of mine in a local tournament here in West Palm Beach a few years back and since then I’ve saved partners of mine lives 3 times and have witnessed several other divers get saved in my presence by other guys. If you regularly dive deep (whether you’re a great diver or not), sooner or later it’s going to happen to you (more than likely it will be from a fish and probably during a tournament). On the USA National level there are very few (if any) of the upper echelon divers who have not blacked out at one time or another. My advice to everybody who reads this (advanced and novice alike) is to plan on it happening to you someday rather than making the mistake of thinking to yourself “oh, it will never happen to me”. Dive safe and be smart so that when it does happen you are prepared and somebody is there to save your life! If you must dive alone, stay shallow and/or keep your dives short. This by no means guarantees you won’t black out but it at least lowers your odds. Please remember, the surest way you have of surviving a blackout is to dive with a buddy and this does not mean just in the same ocean but within arms reach on every return to the surface, especially if he has been down an extra long time or you’ve heard his gun go off.

A personal sad note to me is that immediately prior to this year’s competition I shook the hand of every diver I felt close to (this included Gene) and wished them good luck and told them to “dive safe”.

Scott

[donmoore]

Incredible words Scott! That is a must read post for every spearfisher person!
don

[donmoore]

To add to the idea of one gun per 2-person team, which is an awesome idea, (simple and effective), would be to require the use of a float and float line. Require that the partner without the gun - have hold of the float. Then the non-diving partner would always have to be close to diving partner, because the diving partner would not have enough float-line to descend with if not.

When the diver surfaced there would be an exchange of gun for float with the partner.
Just an idea,
don

[sturgeon]

Don,

I've actually done one of these type of tournaments before. They are a lot of fun and very effective safety wise because the diver waiting his turn to dive is right at the diver's side who comes up with the gun so that a quick exchange can take place and the next diver can dive. If it works right, 2 divers can dive all day with almost zero surface time (except when a fish is shot of course) because as one diver dives the other one recovers/breaths up and then goes almost immediately upon return to the surface by the diver who was just down. It can be done either where the non-diving member carries the float and float line while the diving partner uses a reel gun and then each get swapped or the good old standard system can be used where the gun is hooked to a float and float line and the entire unit gets swapped after each dive.

Scott

[Mark Laboccetta]

Stugeon and Fuzz, it was nice seeing you guys in Hawaii last week and I just wish the play of events would have gone differently. Fuzz, sorry I couldn't spend more time talking and shooting the ***** I wanted to, but you saw how hectic things were the day of the expo. It was such a positive event with so many great people in a beautiful location that it was very sad to wittness what happened. My whole team of guys were all like zombies even though they tried to hide it and we were still in disbelief, my wife was even crying and she didn't even know him. We try so hard to project our sport to the public as the wonderful sport it is, a brotherhood, a tribe sharing the same passion, and then something like this happens. Why? for what? What could have been done to prevent it?

I just hope that if anything maybe it will teach us the hard way another valuable lesson. Gene's death prooves that no matter how experienced a diver is (he was 99' Team champion in the florida keys Nationals) this could have just as easily happened to anyone of us who practice this sport. Just like Terry Maas's poor son. These were great people loved by their family and peers who we all respected and the last people we ever thought would be the victims of their own passion.

Maybe now we will start to look at trying some rule changes in the formats of the tournaments, maybe it will prompt us to be more self conscious when we dive about what we are about to part take in, maybe his death will save another life one day. If something like this ever happens in my tournament in Hatteras it will be the last one I ever organize. It was impossible to try to enjoy the event after the accident. The anguishing face of that poor mother of two small kids standing on the beach waiting for her husband to paddle his kayack back after everyone else was alerady in was enough to make anyone cry and feel her pain, you guys take care of yourselves, your loved ones, and dive safe,

Mark

[feign]

This must be very difficult for all those people involved. I think all of us in the freedive/spearing community feel compassion for the family and sorrow for this loss.

I had a question about the possible rule changes. The 1 gun rule, is it switch after every dive? In a competition I thought this may cause some disagreements, like one guy takes longer to breath up/dives longer etc. so actual shared gun time is very one sided. Maybe I'm wrong and a one dive/switch method is effective. As an alternative though, could they switch every 30min or something. Or another method as Pezman mentioned, the combined fish of two people wins, kind of like doubles in tennis?

[fuzz]

Nice meeting you guys Scott & Mark. Congrats Scott, you put on a good showing. I agree with Mark - the setting of this year's Nationals was nice, ... then an occurrence like this turns things 180.

feign - 2 person/1 gun teams as mentioned & used in various tournaments are an alternative, but would have many oppositions. Some examples:

It would be okay when swimming from shore or boat diving, but kayaking(all of the nationals except Florida) makes it a bit more difficult to stay together.

For nationals, I took 4 guns & 2 extra shafts. I used 3 of the guns & 2 people from my club lost a shaft in the first couple hours. Different situations require different tools. To go from that to sharing 1 gun just isn't practical for a lot of situations.

Fish sharing is against the rules right now & theoretically doesn't occur, but if someone wanted to place high individually, it'd be easy enough to have someone willing to give up their fish as a partner & almost impossible to enforce.

It's a great concept & can actually be quite effective - since as Scott mentioned, you could have almost 100% bottom-time as a team. In blue water, one person can work the flashers while the other dives down & vice versa. Despite these advantages, there are also many shortcomings that would not allow it to be readily accepted in national level competitions.

Sorry if I'm incoherent - I'm still trying to recover from the trip & the immense backlog of work that resulted from it.


Pez, don't know who gave you neg, but I sent you some positive for openly speaking your mind.

[feign]

fuzz,

I can see the dilemma when you want the flexibility with multiple guns & shafts.

I had another thought, maybe not practical though. What if in competitions the divers bring a safety diver with them. The competitor has a buddy/friend that stays with the float and gear, while the diver goes fishing. The competitor could keep as much gear as he wants and since he is the only one diving he has total flexibility to use it at will. The safetyman is kind of akin to a golf caddy or the cutman in a boxers corner, he could even load a different gun or shaft on request etc. I guess there would be no way to regulate the safety/support person from not spearing a fish and adding to the competitors stringer though. Maybe I'm off the wall on this, but I don't see that it is that different from freediving competitors & their safety divers. For a freediving competitor going for a deep dive, he may have multiple scuba and surface safety personal just for him/her.

[efattah]

Bringing around a 'safety freediver' with you is a great idea, it is sort of like the requirement for a boat to follow you in ultra distance open ocean swims, or the requirement to have a car follow you during some ultramarathon runs through the desert.

No safety freediver? No registration. Seems it would work.


Eric Fattah
BC, Canada

[Alison]

Originally posted by donmoore
Incredible words Scott! That is a must read post for every spearfisher person!
don

I said someting similar on another forum yesterday, I can only add further that tragic as it may be let Gene's sacrifice be the ultimate lesson to us all. His loss for most of us is purely sad but for some it is a deep loss. my sympathy to those, especially his wife and son, they must be wondering now what its all about. For the rest of us I think his name should be remembered every time we dive, so that we may all arrive back safely at the surface! I think both Gene and his family would want to see this for us all. None of us can bring him back now, remember him and all those who have perished the same way by coming home safely after every dive.
To those who knew him, my thoughts are with you.
Love Ali

[PaulV]

My first writing since Sat...

Gene's death had a deep effect on me. I had trouble with enjoying any of the activities after 3:30 pm on Sat. The first impulse reaction was "what a stupid sport" to cause the loss of such a great guy and friend. This sport to which I've dedicated so much time and money.

The sport remains a dangerous one, and this has again highlighted my own beliefs:

While I have mixed emotions about competitive spearfishing in its current format, I still love the comraderie which I have not enjoyed in any other area of my life. I used to race yachts at a high level, and the level of bonding was nowhere near what I experience with fellow competitors. I truly mean competitors and not just recreational divers. It must be the understanding of the shared risk that forms intensely strong bonds. I would not trade that with anything.

I would not push another person (especially my kids, Scott) into the sport. I would educate them about the realities and let them make educated decisions, but never say "you should do it - you'll like it!!" A mishap as a result of this action would be horrific for me.

As far as the pairs diving, it would help but not to the extent that I think most believe. In the NW and NE it would not help much at all due to the low vis. Would help in FL (keys) and HI. The first step would be to remove the individuality from the sport. As long as we recognize individual ranking, there will be no way to truly embrace a team mentality. I've always been very picky on who I dive with, and I've heard plenty of ridiculous stories of individuals who scout singly and have no care for the team position, only their own place. I say this with mixed emotions, as I've never taken top individual national honors (best was 6th), but feel that this is a necessary ingredient on the road to a buddy system.

One potentially visibly enforceable rule would be to require a team's kayaks to be within 50' from each other, while divers are in the water. This at least forces a team to dive together.

This topic will take a lot of discussion to resolve, at a time when competition spearfishing is at risk anyway due to environmentalists and international politics.

P Verveniotis
San Carlos, CA

[Bill]

>What if in competitions the divers bring a safety diver with them.

They tried this a few years ago for the old guys. It was well accepted and seemed to work OK. Maybe my safety was the best, but he never got in the way and was always close when I surfaced. Setting it up for a big tournament might be a lot of work though.
Aloha
Bill

[Roan]

I just came across this sad story. Like Mikko, I've seen Gene throughout the pages of Hawaii Skin Diver. We all feel how difficult it is to express, in words, our sorrow at such a painful loss, but some of you have done so eloquently in this thread.