Blackout at SWS April 30th, 2016 [Triton Open]

Reposting Thomas' (ttwwaattaa) post from NCUH...very scary stuff, and just super glad that Thomas is OK and that Steve (lorikay2) was there to save him...

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Some of you already heard about what happened to me during the Triton Open this past Saturday and I, as well as others wanted to stress the importance of key topics that are sometimes overshadowed in our NorCal/CenCal bubble of freediving and spearfishing.

TLDR; I blacked out for a period of time and was unresponsive and only bc so many little pieces fell into perfect place that day like a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle that got thrown up and landed in all the right places, especially the the actions of Steve A., am I here able to shout about the importance of the safeties of freediving that everyone should know about.

The below are the my and Steve A.'s account and look back of what happened on Saturday. They're not meant to overshadow other stories of this kind but rather shed more light and awareness on the importance of some of the most overlooked issues we breeze over in our bubble of the sport.

Please feel free to share this with whoever you'll feel will benefit from reading this. Stay safe out there!

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Thomas’ write up of the April 30th event

   Where do I start with this? How do I start telling a story like this? I can start by saying that I know there was a higher power looking after me that I can’t even begin to explain. There was so much even before Saturday’s event that impacted the outcome of how I’m able to write this today. Part of the higher power’s effect was Steve Arsenault deciding to stay back with me and wait while I checked out some spots I marked on the depth finder. Part of it was him deciding to call it a day early and sit on top of his kayak. Part of it was him deciding to look back to check up on me. Part of it was his anchor not being stuck when he pulled it. So many things that fell into place that day led to Steve seeing me out there and I’m so grateful he was there to save me.

   Shallow water blackout isn’t as common in our part of the state/country in Central/Northern California due to the depths we commonly dive at but after this experience, it should be known by all who freedive or are looking to getting into freediving that it can happen to anyone in the water – no matter who you are, or where you are. The most important thing coming out of this is practicing the best safety techniques in freediving – like always diving with a trained buddy.

   As I jumped in and made drops to check out what we were marking on our fish finders, I was feeling great. By that time of day, my body adjusted and wasn’t contracting at depth anymore and my bottom times were just about where they normally are on any other day – no signs of performance degrading or fatigue (looking back, maybe it was the competition adrenaline that pushed those feelings of fatigue back – very possible). On the dive I blackout out on, I remember kicking back to the surface feeling comfortable and relaxed. Upon surfacing I took one breath in one breath out, then remember taking the second breath in then blacking out as I saw the sun shining – it was a slow fade from the bright sun to complete darkness.

   Steve recalls getting to me and seeing that I was unresponsive, this is the part that I don’t remember. This is the part that pains me so much to know that I put someone in this position, where they felt that they were the only hope between me living or dying. I can’t begin to imagine what he was going through, the feeling of helplessness with my body in his arms, unresponsive and blue. I will never feel what Steve felt that day and don’t wish that feeling upon anyone. To read his account of the events and picture what was going on, it reminds me on every word how lucky I am to be here today and how grateful I am that he acted the way he did during the whole incident.

   I remember coming to and seeing the inside of Steve’s kayak. I remember kicking and pulling myself up on the kayak and hearing, “C’mon Thomas!” After sitting up on the yak and looking around me – I noticed I didn’t have my weight belt or mask. I sat up, readjusted, and grabbed onto the side straps on the kayak. I then heard Steve and Pat (another diver in the water that day) talking about how they should get me back to shore. As we started, Steve was at my left and I looked down and saw his face, I’ve never seen someone looked so relieved and shocked at the same time. He grabbed my hand tight and expelled a sigh of relief. It was at that very moment that I realized what just happened. I knew I blackout out and got saved.
   
   During the paddle in, I sat there breathing in and out as best I could, coughing and spitting out blood. The breathing was super labored – there was a sharp pain in my chest and it felt like my chest was being squeezed. I reached into the neck of my wetsuit to relief some of the pressure the wetsuit was creating. It helped a ton to keep breathing that way. Soon after, I started to get the feeling in my toes back and felt like my legs had just been run over by a car. I remember at one point, Pat was grunting to get pass the thick kelp bed in the home stretch of the paddle where we were greeted and ushered in by the local fire department and I grabbed the paddle to help get us back, it was the least I could do in that situation. The thoughts running through my head at that moment will never come close to what Steve, and even Pat had in their heads in that situation. I will be forever grateful.

   Like I started this write up, there were so many things that fell into place. Not only that day, even from the months before. While taking the FII Level 1 Course with Matt Lopez, he noticed I was wearing more weight than I needed. Since then, I started diving with less weight to keep me comfortably buoyant on the surface. Who knows what the outcome would’ve been that day if I was still wearing a few more pounds on my belt? Thank God I listen to advice that comes from experienced people in my life.   

   The story above and below (Steve’s write up) isn’t meant to keep people away from freediving. It’s meant to be a lesson and learning experience that you don’t have to go through if you take the right steps into ensuring you’re doing the thing you love in the safest way possible. Always dive with a trained buddy – no matter who you are, you can potentially experience a blackout. When I use the term trained, I mean in freedive safety training. How to spot your buddy on their dive, how to make sure they recover fully before alternating dives, and knowing what to do when your buddy blacks out. Those are all things that will help in situations like this one. The importance of weighting yourself properly is an underemphasized vital importance in the sport. When on the surface, you shouldn’t have half your mask underwater like I was before I took my FII class. It could’ve very well been the difference of Steve seeing me on the surface floating that day and me sinking to the bottom of the ocean. Go take a freedive safety class from an FII or PFI certified instructor (the 2 most reputable names in the sport), it’ll teach you the proper safety techniques to be a safe dive buddy and diver.

   I’ll be forever grateful to Steve for saving me that day and will never really know why everything happened the way it did. All I can say is that I’m grateful and thankful for the actions Steve took that day to bring me back but never wish that experience upon anyone, even though he didn’t take a freedive course – he was still able to see signs of life in me after beating on my chest. I want to reiterate that these stories are meant to spread safety and awareness that this could happen to anyone – even more common for the experienced divers. So please, let your fellow divers know what happened, dive with a trained buddy and get educated how to enjoy this sport in the safest way possible, no matter how experienced you are or think you are.       
   
To all who’ve been supportive throughout the process of my recovery – you all know who you are – Thank you.

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Steve’s write up of the April 30th event   

First off, I want to just say how lucky we were to have everything fell into place the way it did.  There were so many little things that led to a favorable outcome.  If just one of the small things had changed, we would have never even known Thomas was missing until it was too late.  We're so fortunate that something larger than us was watching over us that day.
   
   As Thomas, Aaron, and I were heading to our last dive spot of the day, Thomas and I were getting good marks on our fish finders.  Aaron was a bit ahead of us so Thomas said he was going to jump in real quick just to see what the marks were.  I stop paddling and head over and tell him that I'll wait for him and just watch.  I see Aaron spin his kayak around and then decide to jump in myself.

   There were tons of good fish around, so the three of us work the area for a while.  Time goes on and I shoot my last fish of the day.  I'm getting cold and tired so I jump back into my kayak.  I see Aaron is working just up current and don't immediately see Thomas.  Not a big deal since I figure he's underwater on his dive.  Last I had seen him was just off to my left working a little deeper. I know I've got the fish I need to be competitive for the tournament, so I start putting my gear away.  At this point, I have all my gear stowed except for my fins, just in case I need to jump back in to free my anchor. 
   
I get repositioned in my seat to sit back and wait for Aaron and Thomas.  As I look over to my left, I see Thomas at the surface lying on his back.  Normally I would have raced over at that point right there, but another friend of Thomas had warned me not to freak out if I see him on his back.  Sometimes Thomas recovers on his back instead of the normal face down with his snorkel in his mouth.  I keep looking back at Thomas just out of nervousness of seeing a person doing their surface recovery on their back. 20 seconds go by and I start to solely watch Thomas since the wind and waves are pushing him further way.  15 seconds later and a stream of water comes out of his mouth and his arms are making small splashes.  I start yelling his name trying to get his attention figuring he's fine but that he's acting out of the ordinary.  All of the sudden his back arches and his head goes under water.  I pull my anchor up as fast as I could (luckily it was free), and race to over to him.
   
As I'm about 10' away from him, and about 50' away from my original position, I can see that Thomas is convulsing and foaming at the mouth.  I grab his fin and leg and swing his body around to get control of his head.  At this point the wind is 15kts and a large swell is pushing us out to sea and south.  Once I have his head I start yelling his name and slapping his face, and grinding my knuckles on his chest.  His limbs were still slightly moving but his mask was full of blood and sea water.  I immediately drop his weight belt and toss his mask.  Blood and water keep dribbling from his mouth but his body has stopped moving.  This whole time I'm trying to balance on my kayak while holding his upper torso above the water, and trying to resuscitate him.  I'm yelling for Aaron who's about 150 yards north of us and yelling "help" for anyone who might be able to hear.  I'm still trying to resuscitate him when all of the sudden I can see that he has stopped any signs of life.  I knew his body had died but knew his brain had about 4 minutes to go.  I pulled him as far up onto my kayak as I could and not having the ability to give him real chest compression, I start thumping over his heart as hard as I could.  I give about 15 thumps and bend over to give him breaths when all of the sudden I see him crack his mouth and move his eyes.  I keep yelling his name and slapping his face.  He pushes a small amount of water and blood from his mouth and I roll him over to try and keep clearing more.  The amount of time from the point I first got to him, to when he came back to, was about 2.5-3 minutes.  It's hard to gauge how long it had been since he hit the surface and blacked out. 
   
At this point I know he has a good fighting chance even if I have to paddle him to a southern beach with him tied to the side of my kayak. 
   
I hear a person yelling back, and see another kayaker paddling towards us.  A fellow spear fisherman named Pat had heard my yelling and came racing out once he saw me sitting in my kayak out in the open.  He wasn't aware Thomas had just drowned and thought that I had lost my paddle or something.  Once he got close enough, I told him the situation while I held onto Thomas who was struggling to breathe and still clearing his lungs.  Thomas at this point was stable but had no vision or muscle control.  I asked Pat if he had a phone or a radio, but at this time our adrenalin was going so hard he said "no" and we continued with the rescue. Pat jumped in the water behind Thomas, while I got in the water on the other side of my kayak.  I grabbed Thomas's arms and pulled him into the kayak while Pat pushed him up from behind.  I could have never pulled Thomas up alone after diving all day.  At this point I was completely exhausted and trembling with the fear of the situation we had just gone through.
   
Pat's friend arrives and I send him to head back up to Aaron and fill him in on what was happening.  In the mean time, Pat attaches his kayak to mine and starts paddling Thomas in while I stayed in the water and swim alongside to keep Thomas from falling out.  On the trip back in, Thomas was still coughing up blood but was able to talk and regain muscle control.
   
Pat's friend meets back up with us and helps with towing us back in.  Pat realizes he did bring his cell phone and calls 911. 
   
After about a .8 mile swim and tow, we arrived on the beach to a waiting ambulance, rescue swimmer, and fire paramedic team who took over and got Thomas safely to the hospital.     

   If I hadn't shot my last fish right when I did, gotten cold, spent one more minute hunting in the water, not look over and see him when I did, or even stopped to wait for him at that spot; it would have certainly changed everything.  We would have never found him, and he would have drifted out to sea.
   
I've never felt so alone or helpless in those few seconds that Thomas stopped.  It was the most fearful and hopeless moment I've ever experienced.  The feeling of literally holding someone's life in my hands and being their only hope to live was something that will always be with me.     
   
This experience couldn't have ended any better and it has definitely changed my idea of what I need to be prepared on the water.  I had CPR training but I should have had a VHF radio, a sound devise like a whistle, and maybe an inflatable of some sort that I could have put around him.  And definitely going to take a freedive course now.

Glad he is alive and well.. Really the only thing keeping me back from diving yet.. scary stuff and thanks for the share!

I've been hanging out and diving with Steve/lorikay2 quite a bit this year and he is a great guy and it does not surprise me at all that he jumped into action to do what he could to save Thomas...

Some of you all met Steve at the AOTY/DOTY awards ceremony, he was DD for Zilla and I.

I've invited Steve to come with me to GSX so hopefully he will be up there as well.

Straight up hero in my book, and proud to call him a friend.

Sincerely,

Jim

That was an intense read.

I'm glad everything fell into place.

Wow!!!

Thanks for posting this Jim. Several lessons in there for us all, on or under the water. Pay attention to the people you are with. Spot check them from time to time. Carry communication (radio, phone) all the time. Most importantly, when something happens stay as calm a possible and think as clearly as possible.

Thanks for sharing the story guys.i

A great read and outcome.
How much we learn when something like this happens and the importance of safety and taking a course on diving and kayak safety .
Happy for Thomas and thankful for Steve and the other friends that helped in the rescue.

Curious as to depth dove and bottom times ?

Thanks for posting

Alex

Wow...good read ..thanks for posting..

Lesson for me. Glad you are OK and things turned out the way it did.

That's an incredible story. So glad it had a good outcome. Makes me think about working on awareness more than my own stringer. And it's scary also to think how, with bigger waves or if Steve had just been in the water rather than higher up in his kayak, the situation could have been terrible. Let's all keep an eye out for each other out there brothers and sisters!

Just finished the write up and was struck by many things. Mostly that this young man, Steve, whom I've never met, demonstrated an extraordinarily uncommon level of composure under extreme duress. Had you not done so and given into panic(a normal response)your friend would have surely perished.

Staring death in the eye and realizing in that frozen moment of time that you are the only thing standing between oblivion and life, is no small thing. To work through the terror and get the job done is quite frankly, otherworldly.

I can feel in your words that you all remain shaken by this event. It will linger for some time I can attest personally to this, having walked in your shoes on more than one occasion. We all are ultra proud of what you did in those couple of minutes and thank you both for recounting your real world story of the closest "near miss" I can imagine and giving us free divers what I call a blood lesson.....
Stay safe my friends

Wow....

I am STOKED at the outcome.
Thanks for posting this Jim.
Lessons to be learned for sure.

Wow, definitely an eye opener for all divers.  Thanks for posting this Jim.

Glad Thomas is ok and definitely someone up there was looking over him that day!