Back in the Saddle

Happy New Year!!

Sorry for the long layoff. When it gets cold in North Florida, I tend to hibernate for a while. To make matters worse, the site where I get most of my articles for the blog, Cyber Diver News Network, has been down until I checked it for the upteenth time tonight and found it back online.

Anyway, it's time to get back in the saddle. Since the diving weather has been less than ideal, NOW is the time to get your equipment inspected and serviced for the soon-to-come diving season. Please don't wait until you have booked a dive trip to check out your gear. You will most assuredly be disappointed when that o-ring ruptures or that burst disk bursts immediately before jumping in the water.

Another thing to consider NOW is that you will need a passport to travel outside the United States. Passports take several weeks (if you're lucky) to be processed, so you better start now if you plan to dive with Marshall on any of his world-wide excursions.

I have spoken with DAN about a webcast for the February meeting. The subject will be determined in the next few days and I will publish it herein. With respect to a few complaints received about the webcasts, we will be doing things a bit differently this year. The business meeting will start promptly at 7 PM. The Club President will keep things moving briskly so that we conduct all necessary business by approximately 7:30. At 7:30 (give or take a few minutes), the webcast will begin. If the webcast runs a little long (20-30 minutes is desired), club members may stay until it's finished or leave early if they need to move on. I think this approach will satisfy everyone while not degrading the quality or integrity of the webcast. As always, your feedback is welcome.

Now that CDNN is back online, I will post a few articles in the next few days.

Thanks, and dive safe!!

PADI BASIC COURSE

I have nothing against PADI, so don't assume that I have an axe to grind. I'm like CNN, I report, you decide. You may need to copy & paste this into your browser.

http://www.cdnn.info/news/editorial/o050620.html

Lionfish Toxicity

For those of you who attended the September meeting, Chris Rule asked a question regarding whether the Atlantic lionfish was more venonous than other lionfish species. Here is DAN's spokesman, Brian Harper's response:

Hey Billy,

Thanks again for hosting last night, and thanks to your group for all the great questions. Regarding the inquiry about whether lionfish in the Atlantic or Caribbean are less toxic than Indo-Pacific lionfish, the answer seems to be that there is no difference in toxicity. The primary reason is that these are not two distinct species—they are one in the same: Pterois volitans. They have not been present in the Atlantic/Caribbean for long enough to evolve into a different (more or less venomous) species.

CPR Procedures For Divers

Info on CPR

DAN News
Hands-Only CPR Statement from DAN Education
Last Updated: 7/29/2010 4:53:36 PM

The American Heart Association recently released a position statement, intended to clarify cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training for lay rescuers, regarding the use of compression-only CPR without delivering rescue breaths. This statement was issued to “amend and clarify the “2005 American Heart Association (AHA) Guidelines for Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) and Emergency Cardiovascular Care (ECC)” for bystanders who witness an adult out-of-hospital sudden cardiac arrest.”

Extensive research, completed since the 2005 guidelines were released, indicates the survival rates for full CPR are no better, and no worse, than compressions-only CPR. These studies discuss only the situation where a collapse was witnessed and only pertains to adults in non-choking and non-drowning scenarios.

The idea is that if the perceived barrier of delivering rescue breaths as part of CPR is removed, bystanders will be more likely to administer care to a collapsed adult.

While this change is important with regards to lay rescuers providing emergency care in the event of a collapse on the street, it will not affect the care of an unconscious diver. Loss of consciousness with cardiac arrest in water must always be assumed to include elements of drowning. For this reason, full CPR is still recommended. For the most part, the proposed changes do not translate to the diving environment.

The AHA ECC Committee admits this in their statement: “The AHA ECC Committee acknowledges that all victims of cardiac arrest will benefit from delivery of high-quality chest compressions but that some cardiac arrest victims (e.g., pediatric victims and victims of drowning, trauma, airway obstruction, acute respiratory diseases, and apnea) may benefit from additional interventions taught in a conventional CPR course. Therefore, the Committee continues to encourage the public to obtain training in CPR to learn the psychomotor skills required to care for a wide range of cardiovascular- and respiratory-related medical emergencies.”

Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning

Thanks to our venerable club VP for this story! It's a little long but well worth the read.

Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning

The newly-hired captain jumped from the cockpit of the Sport Fisher, fully-dressed, and sprinted through the water. A former lifeguard, he kept his eyes on his victim as he headed straight toward the owners who were swimming between their anchored boat and the beach. “I think he thinks you’re drowning,” the husband said to his wife. They had been splashing each other and she had screamed but now they were just standing, neck-deep on the sand bar. “We’re fine! What is he doing?” she asked, a little annoyed. “We’re fine!” the husband yelled, waving him off, but his captain kept swimming hard. ”Move!” he barked as he sprinted between the stunned owners. Directly behind them, not ten feet away, their nine-year-old daughter was drowning. Safely above the surface in the arms of the captain, she burst into tears, “Daddy!”

How did this captain know, from fifty feet away, what the father couldn’t recognize from just ten? Drowning is not the violent, splashing, call for help that most people expect. The captain was trained to recognize drowning by experts and years of experience. The father, on the other hand, had learned what drowning looks like by watching television.

If you spend time on or near the water (hint: that’s all of us) then you should make sure that you and your crew knows what to look for whenever people enter the water. Until she cried a tearful, “Daddy,” she hadn’t made a sound. As a former Coast Guard rescue swimmer, I wasn’t surprised at all by this story. Drowning is almost always a deceptively quiet event. The waving, splashing, and yelling that dramatic conditioning (television) prepares us to look for, is rarely seen in real life.

The Instinctive Drowning Response – so named by Francesco A. Pia, Ph.D., is what people do to avoid actual or perceived suffocation in the water. And it does not look like most people expect. There is very little splashing, no waving, and no yelling or calls for help of any kind. To get an idea of just how quiet and undramatic from the surface drowning can be, consider this: It is the number two cause of accidental death in children, age 15 and under (just behind vehicle accidents) – of the approximately 750 children who will drown next year, about 375 of them will do so within 25 yards of a parent or other adult. In ten percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch them do it, having no idea it is happening (source: CDC).

Drowning does not look like drowning – Dr. Pia, in an article in the Coast Guard’s On Scene Magazine, described the instinctive drowning response like this:

1. Except in rare circumstances, drowning people are physiologically unable to call out for help. Th e respiratory system was designed for breathing. Speech is the secondary or overlaid function. Breathing must be fulfilled, before speech occurs. 
2. Drowning people’s mouths alternately sink below and reappear above the surface of the water. The mouths of drowning people are not above the surface of the water long enough for them to exhale, inhale, and call out for help. When the drowning people’s mouths are above the surface, they exhale and inhale quickly as their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water. 
3. Drowning people cannot wave for help. Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water’s surface. Pressing down on the surface of the water, permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe. 
4. Throughout the Instinctive Drowning Response, drowning people cannot voluntarily control their arm movements. Physiologically, drowning people who are struggling on the surface of the water cannot stop drowning and perform voluntary movements such as waving for help, moving toward a rescuer, or reaching out for a piece of rescue equipment. 
5. From beginning to end of the Instinctive Drowning Response people’s bodies remain upright in the water, with no evidence of a supporting kick. Unless rescued by a trained lifeguard, these drowning people can only struggle on the surface of the water from 20 to 60 seconds before submersion occurs.

(Source: On Scene Magazine: Fall 2006)

This doesn’t mean that a person that is yelling for help and thrashing isn’t in real trouble – they are experiencing aquatic distress. Not always present before the instinctive drowning response, aquatic distress doesn’t last long – but unlike true drowning, these victims can still assist in their own rescue. They can grab lifelines, throw rings, etc.

Look for these other signs of drowning when persons are n the water:

• Head low in the water, mouth at water level
• Head tilted back with mouth open
• Eyes glassy and empty, unable to focus
• Eyes closed
• Hair over forehead or eyes
• Not using legs – Vertical
• Hyperventilating or gasping
• Trying to swim in a particular direction but not making headway
• Trying to roll over on the back
• Ladder climb, rarely out of the water.

So if a crew member falls overboard and everything looks O.K. – don’t be too sure. Sometimes the most common indication that someone is drowning is that they don’t look like they’re drowning. They may just look like they are treading water and looking up at the deck. One way to be sure? Ask them: “Are you alright?” If they can answer at all – they probably are. If they return a blank stare – you may have less than 30 seconds to get to them. And parents: children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, get to them and find out why.

Tragic Death of Wes Skiles

If you've ever read a dive magazine or National Geographic underwater pictorial, chances are you've seen Wes Skiles' awesome photographic work. I was not aware that he was from Jacksonville. Here is the link:

/jacksonville.com/news/metro/2010-07-23/story/famed-underwater-cinematographer-photographer-and-cave-diver-remembered

You may have to copy & paste it into your browser.

Recall Info Aqua Lung America

The U. S. Consumer product Safety Commission announced the following voluntary recall regarding "Apeks WTX Power Inflators Due to Drowning Hazard". The recall involves power inflators installed on certain Aqua Lung BCD's. Click on the following link:


http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml10/10286.html