Scuba diver panicked and dead
 (MM / 29-09-09)A scuba diver who got separated from
his underwater breathing equipment during an outing off
the coast of Point Loma Tuesday was found dead an hour
later about 65 feet below the surface.
The deceased man was a tourist from Arizona, diving from
a charter boat with five other people in the ocean west
of Sunset Cliffs when he went missing about 12:30 p.m.,
city lifeguard Lt. Andy Lerum said.
The president of Dive San Diego, which ran the excursion,
tells San Diego 6 that the man was a certified diver,
but apparently panicked at the surface when he and his
equipment were entangled in kelp. He reportedly was fighting
the dive master who was trying to help him.
"He took off his buoyancy compensator which had his
scuba tank on board and as soon as he did that, likely
he submerged, because he still was wearing his dive belt," said
lifeguard Lerum.
Lifeguard divers searched the sea in the area and found the man shortly after
1:30 p.m., Lerum said.
They brought the diver, who had no vital signs and was missing his scuba tank
and respirator, to the surface and performed CPR while transporting him to the
city's lifeguard headquarters on Mission Bay.
After the personnel got the man to the Quivira Basin station, city paramedics
took over the ultimately futile attempts to resuscitate him, Lerum said.
The man, whose name was not immediately available, was pronounced dead on a dock
at the lifeguard facility. |
