Learned that 80% of commercial diving accidents happen in under 30 feet of water

I was reading through some old Coast Guard accident reports last night during a slow shift and that stat caught me off guard. Always figured the deep stuff was where you had to watch yourself most, but apparently the shallow stuff gets people complacent. Found it in a 2021 safety bulletin from the ADC if anyone wants to dig into it. Has anyone else noticed guys getting sloppy on the easy jobs more than the hard ones?

2 comments

2 Comments

viola_cooper624d ago

Man, that stat really hits different when you think about it. I mean, we all know the shallow stuff feels safe, right? You can see the bottom, you're not fighting the pressure as much, so it's easy to let your guard down. But that's exactly when people skip the pre-dive checks or don't bother with the backup air because "it's only 20 feet, what could go wrong?" I gotta ask you though - do you think it's more about the divers themselves getting lazy, or is it that the supervisors and tenders on the boat don't keep as close an eye on the shallow dives? Because I've seen both, honestly. One guy I knew almost got his leg caught in a prop guard in 12 feet of water cause nobody even bothered to rig a proper downline.

noah_palmer424d ago

And I had a buddy who almost drowned in 15 feet because his weight belt slipped off and he couldn't get back up, but nobody on the boat noticed until he was face-down cause they were all watching the deep divers. It's that combo of lazy divers and lazy tenders, honestly.