Elderly visitor dies after dive trip
(CNS): A 72-year-old man who was visiting the Cayman Islands from Mississippi died Monday afternoon following a dive in the waters around the George Town Harbour. The man had experienced difficulties while on the dive and he was brought to shore by the boat he was out with at around 2pm. The dive boat was met on North Church Street near to the Lobster Pot by police and the fire service, who took over administering first aid until the arrival of the ambulance.
The man was then taken to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead. Police said the matter is under investigation.
The visitor is now the eleventh person to lose their life in local waters this year.
Category: Local News
There needs to be an age cap on scuba diving period.
Ageist.
No, who are you to stop people from doing what they want? Diving is a high risk activity and accidents happen, divers know this.
Better die diving than rot from cancer for years.
MHRIP.
For Gods sake think before you type, you insensitive jerk.
In many other countries in the world, all divers are required to show the dive operator an official ‘Fit to dive’ medical certificate completed by their doctor and no less than one year old. In Cayman, visitors only have to check a box to self-certify that they are fit to dive. That’s one of the reasons we have so many elderly, overweight and unfit divers in Cayman – and as you can see, it’s an accident waiting to happen. I understand the appeal of diving, it truly is one of the most amazing things in the world. But still, not worth dying for.
I have dove in many countries and never had to show that
Probably written by a doctor trying to drum up more business.
Lets also make people get a signed doctors note before signing up at the gym, or running in the marathon, etc..
Actually, the comment was written by a dive boat captain that has already had to deal with three diving fatalities in Cayman where elderly people failed to disclose dangerous medical conditions and then dived and died. Causes incredible heart ache to the families and terrible trauma to the other divers on board, and the dive staff who have to deal with these sad incidents. So yes, there is a vested interest – not a financial one, just an interest in not having to go through this again please.
Rest in peace, Sir. I am sorry your end could not be met at home, with family around you.
It appears as if some of these people snorkeling and diving on this island should not be allowed to. So many come here, jump in the water then we hear that they drown. Are these clients asked provide any current some health data before allowing them to get in the water? I imagine they are given a waiver form to sign that would prevent the company from being liable but apparently that is not enough. Aren’t the dive companies and tourism department a bit concern about the number of fatalities that occur yearly? To me it appears to be a worrying occurrence.
I’m not sure it would make much difference if the rules were tightened up. I used to regularly visit a resort where a medical exam with a chest x-ray (and an ECG if the student was over 40) was mandatory for open water students. Despite that one of the instructors had a 38-year-old woman go into cardiac arrest and die in the water two days after her exam.
At that time the dive centres just over the border from there were also supposed (many didn’t bother) to see a current diving medical certificate before signing customers up. The problem was you could (and a lot of people did) download the form, print it out and fill it in yourself – there was no way to verify it’s authenticity.
It’s up to the individual to decide. I stopped diving when I started getting slight signs of health problems just after my 61st birthday. I’d been diving for 20 years and it was time to move on. I’ve never looked back but other people view life differently.
You’ve also got to remember that the waiver and self-delaration forms used by dive centres are more for their own protection than any kind of medical screening. I have no way of knowing if any of these incidents were caused by a failure to declare an existing medical condition but if they were it wasn’t a very smart move because, amongst other things, it’s the kind of ‘get out’ that insurance companies love to exploit to avoid paying.
True but clearly something need to be done to prevent all of these deaths in our waters.
Noting can prevent death.
Exactly to what numbers are you referring to , as there is more than one category of water related incident at play? A summary:
1.In-water incidents exempt from scuba/ snorkelling
2.In-water incidents including scuba/snorkelling
3. Water-Craft related incidents ( boats,jet-ski,other water sports )
If the numbers allowed you to break-down the percentages of accidents related to each of these few ( there are more categories that would relate outside those above,) the numbers would show a very, very small percentage of participants that engage in the various activities , result in a casualty . Cayman remains a very safe location for such activities when these figures and facts are compared, especially to other locations. Far higher numbers occur in places like California, the Hawaiian Islands and Australia , that can & do have far more hazardous maritime conditions for any water related activity. Recently, just in Los Angeles County in California, there were more fatalities in one day due to hazardous surf conditions , than Cayman sees in 1 year.
And it CLEARLY appears that many of the locals living here shouldn’t have a drivers license. How many deaths on cayman roads this year?