Lessons learned - a SWB Story

[cebaztian]

Thanks for sharing and CONGRATULATIONS.

I have had a similar experience ( I should have been dead). What saved me was actually having the snorkle IN my mouth. But I know some cases where a snorkle in the mouth is not a good idea.

If you had died. You (and I) would have had no one else to blame but ourselves. We are in fact idiots if we think that alla factors of solo apnea can be controlled. If you know the risk and take it - its your own business (and your families). BUT...

Trying to find details in the dive to blame I find very ...(whats the word)... unrewarding.

You dive alone - you ask for it.


Sebastian
Sweden

 

[jome]

I was thinking about this case, and others like it. Basically in spearfishing and even recreational freediving "active buddying" is pretty hard to do. Sure, you can go out with a friend, but as soon as you start hunting, it's very very easy to get carried away and no real superivison happens.

So as a geek and engineer type I started thinking. Ok, we've talked about autoinflating wests and what ever, but it woudln't actually need to be that complicated.

How about simply an alarming device (a fog horn etc, something really loud). It has a timer on it - once you hit the surface, you have 15 seconds to push a button, or it will go off (sort of a dead man's switch - no pun intended). Provided that the buddys are at least within reasonable distance, that would alarm them early enough to probably do something in time (before laryngospasm gives away).

It could have a "dive time alarm" too, meaning it goes off 15 sec from surfacing or 2 min since starting the dive - something like that.

Maybe someone has suggested this before, seems so obvious...?

Another thing that came to my mind was did you wear a computer and if so, did it show anything strange in the dive profile? It's a shame that they don't really show anything useful after surfacing, but that lead me to another idea. The X1 has an acceleration sensor, so hardware wise it would be equipped to record sort of what happens after surfacing. Ie in this case we could tell that you hit the surface at time x, and started "trashing about" at time y, and we would know how long you were unconcious.

From the acceleration sensor data you should be able to easily differentiate from a person laying unconcious and still, from a swimming one, even if there were a bit of waves or what ever. This kind of data would be really valuable in post examination of freediving SWB cases - and why not scuba as well...

Technically it shouldn't be that complicated to implement...I think.

 

[spaghetti]

More simple than Jome's wise input:
Many of my friends dive with a whistle attached to a necklace made of elastic. In Colin's case, or whenever the injuried person hasn't lost consciousness and is still able to blow in a whistle, it could have helped.

 

[Mr. X]

I bought a couple of proper emergency "storm" whistles for the kayak buoyancy aids. I am appalled by how quiet they are -- barely audible. Nowhere near as loud as a referees' whistle. Useless.

 

[settingsteel]

I bought a couple of proper emergency "storm" whistles for the kayak buoyancy aids. I am appalled by how quiet they are -- barely audible. Nowhere near as loud as a referees' whistle. Useless.

Indeed, those whistles are crap

 

[spaghetti]

I bought a couple of proper emergency "storm" whistles for the kayak buoyancy aids. I am appalled by how quiet they are -- barely audible. Nowhere near as loud as a referees' whistle. Useless.

In facts it's got to be a LOUD whistle. The one I have doesn't have the "ball" inside, works also when wet and is as loud as ref's whistles. I don't claim it makes me 100% safe of course, not that having a whistle allows me to indulge to risky diving behaviours. But every little bit helps (as long as they are LOUD bits in this case).

 

[cdavis]

I get the feeling that looking for reasons in a B0 is being equated to looking for excuses for diving alone. I don't feel that way at all. Diving alone is asking for it, period. But, when we get a case of open water BO without buddies (or with them), we ought to beat it to death to extract the last bit of information. The computer idea is a great one; the D3 should have a lot of info on it. That might answer the question of whether or not there was something that happened after 30 ft that slowed his ascent way down.
Thinking about the snorkel thing, it might well explain how water was aspirated without getting enough to kill him. Maybe the shock of aspiration woke Colin up or maybe he got enough 02 along with the water to regain consciousness. Anybody else have a similar experience? Sebastion, didn't you post a description of your experience? Where? How is it similar?

Connor

 

[Gail_Berke]

More simple than Jome's wise input:
Many of my friends dive with a whistle attached to a necklace made of elastic. In Colin's case, or whenever the injuried person hasn't lost consciousness and is still able to blow in a whistle, it could have helped.

How do they keep the whistle from dangling in their face when they're inverted? Or do they wear it like a choker (snug around the neck) rather than letting it drape like a necklace? Or would it be better to wear it around a wrist?

 

[cebaztian]

Thinking about the snorkel thing, it might well explain how water was aspirated without getting enough to kill him. Maybe the shock of aspiration woke Colin up or maybe he got enough 02 along with the water to regain consciousness. Anybody else have a similar experience? Sebastion, didn't you post a description of your experience? Where? How is it similar?
Connor

Right. Became unconcious. Laryngospam. Floated up (lucky). Continued unconcious. Laryngospasm let go (still unconcious). Body starts breathing (through snorkle). Swollowed the water in the snorkle. Continue breathing. Wake up (remember being woke up by the sound of bits of water gurgling in the snorkle) but the true reason for waking up is increased supply of o2 to the brain. Feeling like amphibious described. High risk of secondary drowning. This was in a pool without anyone noticing. Even if freediving with people around you - YOU ARE STILL DIVING ALONE. Only when you are under direct supervision of another freediver you have a buddy.

What is the problem for spearfishers to dive buddy system? I followed a spearfisher all day with a camera - he caught many fish - I was not in the way.

Sebastian

 

[jome]

This is of course just meaningless speculation, but what if it was the other way around.

Tight dive, maybe a bit on the edge, got to surface, failed to clear the snorkel, inspirated water and then passed out. Or just trying to clear the snorkel could be enough to cause a BO if you're close...

The problem with buddying in spearfishing is that if there are 2 guys out, both hunting, they both want to concentrate on their game and it is very distracting to follow what your buddy is doing. And you don't want to be to close either, especially in bad visibility for obvious reasons.

So the problem was not you following the spearfisher, but was he able to observe you enough to actually help if you had a problem?

The "dead man switch" idea would only work of course assuming that you are not completely alone, but you have friends "close enough" to help - but not actively supervising your every dive.

You can advice and advice spearfishers to do "one up one down" and active supervision, but following that just takes the kind of mental discipline that most will not follow the advice anyway in real life scenarios. Or the might even for the most time but then theres that one big fish that got away on the last dive...I'll nail it now, my buddy is ok for one dive, right?

Is it then better to keep giving the same advice, or come up with another way that comes at least half way in terms of safety and is easy enough for anyone to adapt and follow.

 

[Panos Lianos]

Since we were not there, there is no point speculating about what really happened. We will never find out. Perhaps the 8 min interval (if I read that right) was long enough to allow our very lucky friend to go into hypocapnia (if he was breathing a little harder than usual), perhaps not.

The only truth is that freediving/spearfishing alone is like playing Russian roullete. Only a proper buddy can really help. And there ARE ways to do spearfishing with a true buddy. Consider using only one gun (the other guns can hang on the float). Pass the one gun back and forth between you and exchange roles as hunter / safety diver.

You are so, so, SO lucky to still be alive. Please share your story with all spearos you know who hunt solo. Maybe your story can save a few lives.

 

[Fondueset]

Here in the states we fairly recently had a political movement which advocated teenagers abstaining from sex until marriage. They denied funding to any form of birth control or education on the grounds it would encourage teenagers to have sex.

 

[spaghetti]

How do they keep the whistle from dangling in their face when they're inverted? Or do they wear it like a choker (snug around the neck) rather than letting it drape like a necklace? Or would it be better to wear it around a wrist?

Gail I don't know the meaning of "choker" and "snug" words, but we wear whistles with a very tight rubber elastic strap around the neck, tight enough so that it doesn't dangle, not so tight to give any strangling feeling. With the wetsuit on it's still comfortable even if tight. When you need to use it you just grab it and pull it up to your mouth (it's elastic).
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Fondueset the Catholic Church is not a "fairly recent political movement": it's rather an ancient one :-&

 

[SanderP]

Holy crap, how come I missed this thread.

Anyway, I'm really glad you're fine! Although, like previously mentioned, it stays a real mystery how something like this could happen with such a long surface interval and as you said yourself, you felt perfectly comfortable during the whole dive.

Only proves the know fact that SWB can strike when you least expect it.

It also made me think about my own solo diving...

 

[cdavis]

Planos has a very good point, it is possible to buddy spearfish, sometimes it hard, sometimes easy, depends on the conditions. I'll start a thread asking how spearos manage buddy diving in different conditions.

Connor

 

[Gail_Berke]

Gail I don't know the meaning of "choker" and "snug" words, but we wear whistles with a very tight rubber elastic strap around the neck, tight enough so that it doesn't dangle, not so tight to give any strangling feeling. With the wetsuit on it's still comfortable even if tight. When you need to use it you just grab it and pull it up to your mouth (it's elastic).
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Fondueset the Catholic Church is not a "fairly recent political movement": it's rather an ancient one :-&

A choker necklace is just as you described how you wear the whistle around your neck. Thanks for the reply.

And BTW, Gail Berke isn't my real name. I'm Laura.

 

[naiad]

Here in the states we fairly recently had a political movement which advocated teenagers abstaining from sex until marriage. They denied funding to any form of birth control or education on the grounds it would encourage teenagers to have sex.

Good point. There will always be someone diving alone, because of lack of a buddy, wanting to be alone, ignorance or stupidity. If the reason is lack of a buddy, wanting to be alone or ignorance, threads like this one and many others contain many safety tips which can save lives. At least those who continue to dive alone will stand a greater chance of survival if things go wrong.

 

[Mr. X]

Gail I don't know the meaning of "choker" and "snug" words, but we wear whistles with a very tight rubber elastic strap around the neck, tight enough so that it doesn't dangle, not so tight to give any strangling feeling. With the wetsuit on it's still comfortable even if tight. When you need to use it you just grab it and pull it up to your mouth (it's elastic).
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Fondueset the Catholic Church is not a "fairly recent political movement": it's rather an ancient one :-&

Laura, I use thin bungee as a short necklace to carry my car key. Not as tight as a choker but it needs to stretch to go over my head & is short enough to keep the key well above my loading pad, inside my wetsuit.

Spaghetti, sounds like you got a safety proper whistle while SettingSteel & I got the rejects that don't work. Mine are bright orange, pea-less, "safety whistles" and are supposed to produce some extremely high db sound but they just don't. Ultrasonic dog whistle?! The whistles that came on the buoyancy aids (& life jackets I used in the past) were also rubbish - that's why I bought new ones. It's a good idea though (I was thinking of carrying one on the float) just need to find a decent whistle.
We'll let that religous comment slip by as you're Italian and used a small font. Next time: Spanish Inquistion for the heretic.

 

[BatRay]

I can see how a whistle could come in handy. However, given the loss of motor function that Willer mentioned, would it be difficult to fish the whistle out of your suit and hold it if you were suffering from SWB?

 

[efattah]

I'm very happy that Colin got out of the situation alive.

However I disagree with the general direction of the thread.

Once again, we see the same old concept:

- Dive with a buddy and you will be okay
- Dive alone and you will probably die

I strongly disagree. In many cases, diving with a buddy is more dangerous than diving alone. This is especially true when you get a false sense of security, thinking that you can stay those extra seconds because 'you have a buddy just in case.'

Of course, in the IDEAL situation of a strict buddy system in perfectly clear water, it is the safest setup. But MOST of the time, the 'loose' buddy system in less than perfect visibility creates even more danger.

So, always remember -- it is good to dive with a buddy, but every time you dive, assume that you are diving alone, and never assume anyone is going to rescue you from foolishness.