Diver in tsunami

[jasondbaker]

Read the story at this link:

[fishchaser]

Saw an ABC hour-long special last night. They briefly interviewed a woman who said she was at 20m, then quickly sucked down to 40m.

Scubaboard.com had several posts, but they suffered a database problem that wiped out nearly a week of messages. I happened to cut-and-paste one message to a friend in Singapore and still had a copy in my outbox. Here's a copy of one diver's experience:

Just got back to Singapore today from Trang via Hat Yai (Thailand).

Was on the LOB (live on board) from 24 - 26 Dec 04. We had 9 divers from Malaysia and 2 from Singapore, supported by the Dive shop owner (an Instructor) and a crew of about 10.

I was in Trang (South of Karbi) doing my last dive of the 3D/2N LOB. We were at Koh Ha at about 12noon on 26 Dec, about 2 hrs from mainland/

During the last dive, there were unusually strong current, 4++ knots easily. The type that could sweep your mask and mouth piece off. I was holding on to the reef with a reef hook at 1st. It was about 1/2 way into the coral. The current onto me so strong that the coral broke !

Then had to hold on to the rocks with 2 hands...... and hang on tight. Much like the handle bar of a roller coaster....

Subsquently, the current change directions and repeated it's wrath. Added a very very cold thermocline and sends the shivers to my spine at 25m. The fishes were fighting the currents for dear lives, with one school which was ahead of me, passing by me later.....still trying to swim .... Was holding onto the rocks for dear life, arm was feeling tired but still cling on.

Looked around and saw most of my dive mates did the same. Was worried for the 2 newbies in the group but they were ok and was taken care of by their more experienced buddies nearby....

Already hit deco mode by then, did a longer than usual safety stop at 10m were I still can anchor to the reefs for support if any surge comes my way... For some miricle reason, I still have enough air

We were having lunch while enroute to Emerad Cave for some sun & sand, when the news broke at about 1.10pm(?) about the earthquake in Indonesia. Later reports stated that there were 40 person traped or dead in the cave. These are likely to be day tripper, snoklers.

While we were near the coast, we were hovering nearby but not allowed to dock. The captain order everyone to don our life vest . This wait lasted about 3 hours and seems like eternanity. Some when to catch a nap, other pack their gears, and a few jokers like me trying to lighten the mood with a few stupid joke.

We were finally given the green light to dock at Pak Meng Pier. The path leading into the dock were littered with what looked like a few sunked fishing and long tail boats, smashed wooden jetties. At the dock, there was a contingent of ambulance, police cars, priest, hearse and people waiting. They were are looking at us anxiously. But look reliefed when they heard from our crew that we were ok.

A senior policeman told us that Karbi, Phuket, Ko Lanta and Phi phi were "gone". The group made plans to return to Hat Yai immediately, away from the danger zone

As we are out in deep waters, did not meet the tidal waves are seen on TV (later). It was only when we reached Hat Yai at about 1am that we got to see the tv reports that it was a 9 on the Ritcher scale !!!

I thank God for being alive today.

If you can, please contact your local Red Cross and support their relief efforts to the affected areas.

Happy New Year

[pink_fins]

This taken from the D2D board Part 1 (was to long)
sad but good read
gail

This is an email I got from a former student. He moved to Thailand this fall from NC to become a divemaster and try to work over there.

There has been some confusion about why i have not gotten in touch with
everyone about all of this madness that is going on here. It has been very
difficult to get a cell phone to work ever since the quake/tsunami. You
have to dial about 50 times in order to get through. Land lines were down
for days, so therefore no internet was available. I did go diving that day,
and this will fill you in on what I experienced.

Normally, I would include various sections of the news, but really all that
is worth talking about appears in the next section, and will be the only
section that is in this Chronic.

IN TRAUMATIC, WORLD ALTERING, DISASTER NEWS:

I had just jumped off the boat to dive at Koh Bida Nok, an island just south
of the famous Phi Phi (pronounced pee-pee, it’s ok to laugh) islands. This
is a gorgeous area that was made famous by the somewhat popular Leonardo
DiCaprio movie “The Beach.” The dive outfit I am trained by and work for
dives here on a regular basis, and with good reason as it is spectacular
both above the water and below. I was assisting in the training of a group
of 5 Open Water students (the first level of diving certification) and was
there primarily to assist in any sort of emergency because I am a rescue
diver. We were halfway through the 2nd set of underwater skills tests when
the unthinkable occurred.

I was floating behind the 5 students, pushing them back down to the sand
whenever necessary so that they instructor could keep them all in line, this
meant that they were all in a “U” with the instructor in the middle of that
“U” with me behind them all. They were all west of my location and things
were going as they always do with this sort of thing (it’s actually pretty
boring) when I noticed to the north of our location, some pieces of wood, a
rather large amount of fish, and sea urchins heading our way in the open
water very quickly (it is not possible for a sea urchin to swim in the open
water, they have no means of propulsion)….. That’s when it hit me… and at
the time I had no idea what “it” was…. In a half second I could barely see
the group, in 1 second I couldn’t see them at all, in 2 seconds the current
had carried me 100 meters south, in 10 seconds I had been carried 200 meters
south and 8 meters down….. At this point, I am starting to panic a little
bit (which I believe is somewhat warranted)… I can still see the surface; I
can still see all the stuff that is flying around me and with me. I am
starting to worry about if the boat will be able to see me when I surface…
most of all; I am worrying about what has happened to those students because
all of them had NEVER dived in the ocean before. This was their first
experience scuba diving outside of a swimming pool.

After being forced down to about 14 meters (roughly 42 feet) I see a giant
rock and kick with all my power to get behind it. I succeed. I sit there
for 2 minutes; I still haven’t a clue what all this nonsense is – we checked
the current tables before the dives like we always do and the current for
the next hour was supposed to be negligible: A.K.A. “easy swimming.” My
breathing rate has tripled; I still have a half tank of air which could last
me about 40 minutes if I lower my breathing rate. After the 2 minutes have
passed I grab the rock very tightly and stick my head over the top… and am
nearly swept away again….

[pink_fins]

Part 2

2 more minutes pass, I have a little less than half a tank, I stick my head
up again… the current has weakened but is still stronger than anything I
have ever tried to kick against in my time diving previous to today…

The group is nowhere to be found, which isn’t nearly as traumatic as it
sounds because the visibility is crap now that all the sand has been kicked
up by the current. We have a rule in diving; if you are separated from the
group you search for 1 minute and then surface. I had far exceeded that
rule out of necessity. I ascend slowly, as you are supposed to, and am
unable to control my rate of ascent as well as my direction- so am again
being forced even further south, far further than I want to be.

What I encountered when I got to the surface can only be described as chaos,
there were boats everywhere, all out of control. The swells are 6 feet
high, which is extremely abnormal out here where there is very little
shallow water to cause such an occurrence. I signal to my boat, which is a
very long ways away from me at this point, to come and pick me up. I am
unable to switch to my snorkel because the waves are coming from every
direction, so I keep my supplied air in. I nearly start to signal to other
dive boats for help when my boat spots me. I eventually get back on board
our boat by way of a floatation device attached to a long rope; boats are
playing dodgem while attempting to pick up all of their divers and
snorkelers. I get on board, take off my scuba equipment, but keep on my
wetsuit, fins, mask, and snorkel, expecting to need to perform a rescue on
one of the students. At this point I still have no idea what has caused all
of this. There are whirlpools that are created by the island and the
current; there are what appears to be various “rivers” flowing in all sorts
of directions. It absolutely blows my mind that everyone makes it back to
the boat safely.

When everyone got back on board, I check my phone like I always do, and I
had missed 13 calls, all from the dive shop I work for. There is also a
text message from a friend that says “John, this is not a joke, there is a
seriously huge tsunami headed your way, do not allow divers to enter the
water” This message was sent 4 minutes AFTER we had already entered the
water.

We were not aware that what we were witnessing was a tsunami until after we
were all back on board and had eaten lunch. We were not aware of the
extreme nature of this earthquake/tsunami(s) until watching CNN later the
following day. It is hard to imagine that sort of thing being the case when
you are underwater. There is nothing in the manuals that trains you how to
react in such a situation because the chance of you being underwater during
one is infinitesimal.

On the way back to Ao Nang, the small beach city I live in, the carnage we
see is unbelievable. There is debris everywhere. Phi-Phi Island is
destroyed. There are multiple helicopters seen hovering.

We are told by our shop to head back to Ao Nang immediately, which we do,
but at a very slow pace because there are pieces of other boats, trees, and
oh yeah, people in the water. We pick up all the people we see, they are
cut up very badly. This is where I get to use my first aid training, which
were highly inadequate for the situation and something I never thought I
would actually need to use. Basically, I was giving them water, towels if
they were cold, and simply telling people to hold the gauze in place, and if
they were Thai, telling them “mai chai” which means “no,” anytime they
remove the gauze. What else could I do really? We pick up some tourists at
Poda island, which is within sight of Ao Nang, and one of the women’s nose
is nearly removed from her face, another woman has a broken arm (obviously
broken; visually) and an unbelievable amount of cuts and scratches on her
body. The driver of their boat refused to abandon his ship, was thrown into
the rocks with the boat, and was not found. There was a young Thai woman
crying uncontrollably on our boat, she was cradling her baby in her arms
that didn’t make a sound the entire trip; you can make the connection here I
am sure.

One of the most eerie things I have seen in my life was a speedboat, driving
in circles at full speed, because NO ONE WAS ON BOARD. I can only assume
that the inhabitants attempted to outrun the wave, and failed.

We arrived back to a much different Ao Nang than we left. There are boats
in the street, trash and sand and wood floating all over the place, there is
a rather large boat in the process of sinking in shallow water. There are
helicopters, military, and people with latex gloves on that I presumed were
doctors… everywhere. And of course there are a slew of people who are doing
nothing to help but are taking pictures and videotaping. It is organized
chaos.

Our dive shop staff met us at the boat and helped us carry everyone in. I
was carrying a Thai man with a broken leg who made painful sounds every step
that I took the entire 150 meters or so of shallow surf that I walked
through. It is amazing what sort of strength you can muster when your
adrenaline is pumping because I never really thought myself capable of
carrying a full-grown person that sort of distance. As soon as I got to the
beach the military, doctors, and various people with a stretcher take him
from me, and it brought tears to my eyes when this broken, injured Thai
person that I couldn’t even communicate with on the boat, looked at me while
being carried away, put his hands together and bowed repeatedly in a sign of
thanks (this is called a "wai" if i am not mistaken.)

I spent the next couple of hours helping however I could. I walked around
with a basket of bottled water and a first-aid kit for the people with minor
injuries. The only people being assisted by the medical crews were the
people who really needed it right away.

300 boats were sunk at Ao Nang alone. I saw about 30 of them, stacked one
on top of the other, plugged into a canal where the drivers thought they
could escape the wave and were wrong.

Ralay Beach, Ton-Sai Beach, and Phi-Phi Islands are all destroyed: These
tourist destinations sit right on the beach, maybe a few feet above sea
level for a majority of the lodging and restaurants. Phuket is badly
damaged and had many casualties. Ao Nang sits up from the beach, and is
just dirty and damaged, not destroyed (these are all very popular tourist
beaches by the way.)

The earthquake that caused this all was a 9 pointer on the Richter scale. I
learned from CNN that it originated in Sumatra which is about 600-800 miles
away from here. 23,000 people have died from the tsunamis. Can you believe
that? 23,000 people! I am not sure of the specifics but I know that only
900 or so are from Thailand. Indonesia, India, and most notably Sri Lanka,
were much more heavily hit. I can’t even imagine how many people were
injured; the hospital here in Krabitown is packed to capacity, with more
people coming in all the time. I have to imagine that the same is true for
all of the surrounding areas.

The only injuries I suffered were superficial cuts on my hands from grabbing
some sharp points on the rock that I was hiding behind at the end of the
initial surge. I realize how fortunate I am to have not been injured.
There has been many times where I was diving at locations that have large
shallow areas, and the surge therefore would have created a wave that could
have been deadly for me and everyone I was with.

As it stands now, I don’t know if I am going to be able to stay here. My
ability to live here counts on my ability to work in the tourist scuba
industry. It remains to be seen if people are still going to come here, but
I sort of doubt if that will be the case. My plight seems rather
insignificant though, given the situation and the sad state of affairs for
so many families. Not just the ones that lost lives, but the ones that lost
their boats or property which was their only source of income. I don’t know
how these people will “bounce back.”

It’s kind of strange how these things seem to happen wherever I am. I am
starting to wonder if I am following the adventure, or if it is following
me.

Anyway, I am not even sure if this should be considered and episode, it is
more of a message to all of you that I am ok. I am unable to call all of
you because it is rare that you are actually able to use your cell phone
because everyone is trying to use their cellphones and the network is always
busy. I understand that some people have been very worried. I apologize
for not getting to you sooner, but hopefully you can understand.

Know that I am safe, and am doing everything I can to help over here.

[dfreeman]

I dove this site January 11, 2002. Checked my dive log and found that my maximum depth was 70 feet. I recall this as a great multilevel dive. Here is what I wrote concerning this site. It is a beautiful place to dive.

Koh Bida Nok
Phi Phi Island
Phuket
Thailand

Site Info

Max Depth: The maximum depth can easily go over 100 feet in this area. Plan your dive to give you time to enjoy this site.

Directions: Go by boat using one of the local dive charters. This is a along an island, so very easy to find. This site is very popular for good reason.

Dive Types: Great multilevel dive site. Bring a camera as this site has some great picture opportunities.

Visibility: Is very good in this area when the wind is moderate, such as typical in winter. Visibility is good but nothing to write home about in windy weather.

Things To See

1) Anemones – There are a lot of anemones and they are beautiful. The variety of colors is amazing.
2) Fish – A great variety of fish in this area. There are plenty of clownfish in the anemones. You can get into schools of fish and have them swim around you, even nip at the hair on your legs. There is a neat overhang with fish in it at this site. Crocodile longtom, oriental sweetlips and bannerfish are just some of the sites.
3) Sharks – There are some sharks in this area. Especially Leopard sharks and even whale sharks. You could get lucky and see them.
4) Creatures – Sea snakes, large clams, multicolored sea urchins, featherstars, moray eels, spiny lobsters and just about anything else can be around. Look for the small stuff like sea horses and pipefish.
5) Corals – The variety of coral and colors is amazing. This is a great site just for the variety of coral that is in this area.
6) Shipwreck – There was a newly sunk shipwreck when I was at this location. It was a fishing vessel that sunk only 2 months earlier and no one knew why. Hopefully it is still there as it was a nice addition to the site.