Question of the day

[grumpie]

Your dive team gets a call from the owner of a local gravel pit, his drag line operator found a car in the water hole where he was working, and says that it was not there yesterday when he quit working.
What would you do? step by step andthink and take you time.......

[tullibee]

tell them to stop everything there.  call sheriff & local PD to let them know and find out if anything has been reported (and find out who you're going to meet at the site).  call team and get ready for some work...  treat it as a crime scene until you find out different.

Jon

[MAXFACTOR]

Jon has it pretty right there.  Additionally, I would also consider searching the lake shore area where the car / truck would have went in.  Rope off the area, look for injured parties near shore line and everything above as tullibee put it.

Make sure recovery team is called in,  check over all gear,  when at site........  senior dive team member make up a plan, all divers sign in, note times, etc,. ...everyone agree and know what plan is, and proceed along with planned dive times, safety divers, grid the area and impliment your standard search and recovery methods.  Of course while noting call weather conditions, time of day,  number of divers, etc.

confirm that no one is in car, or around the area of car.  If in a current, work down stream a bit and until senior guy gets report, send boat down stream looking for possible survivors, victims. 

Find out plate number,  do a 28 and 29 on plate    contact owner see whats up
etc.

have a routine recovery if youre lucky..........
maxfactor 

[MAXFACTOR]

Grumpie,
This question begons the question ........  I know you have over 35 years of diving and rescue and recovery experience....  but out of habbit.... 

DO YOU HAVE A CHECK OFF LIST that you provide your public sheriffs with  in case you;re not there.
ie"    In the case of a missing person believed to be in the car
    do the following.
1.
2.
3
4
5

in the case of Vehicle in water with NO KNOW PERSONS MISSING.    do the following..
1
2
3
4
5  etc

IF NOT  MAYBE WE CAN WORK ON A STANDARIZED  CHECK OFF LIST........

example,  in my earlier response,  I did not advise separating the witness 's  etc.
IF IT WERE ON A LIST....... I know I wouldn't have missed it. etc.  or  at least someone else would have got it.

MAXFACTOR

[AngelFire91]

I'm glad that Maxfactor said check the plates. Before I moved up here to the ND, MN area I was working as a Firefighter/Paramedic for a good sized town (500,000 people) in Colorado and Captain of a High altitude rescue team. One night while at work we got called out to a car over the edge up a small canyon road in the county, and they requested our assistance. Long story short, the car was wedged between two trees over the edge with no windshield so we expected the injured to be at the bottom of the canyon. After 45 mins of searching and getting PD helicopters, County SO, our Heavy Rescue, and many others involved. Someone was actually smart and decided to run the plates to only find out the owner was sitting at home and never even knew his car was stolen. it was then we noticed tracks (car and foot) that indicated it was pushed over. So lesson learned!

Anyway, to answer the question at hand.
If the drag line operator found it. That must mean the car has already been brought out of the water right? So Everything everyone else has said already applies, Put divers in searching for a body if there is indicators the car was occupied at the time it entered the water, while information is attaned and confirmed, try to locate the owner or relative basied on plate info. or anything found in the car. Also get stolen info? Establish chain of evidence. Is there anything in the car to indicate it was occupied when it entered the water? (purse or belongings) Check the trunk, Also does the car have a engine in it? I like the idea of checking the shore and surrounding area. Outside of a town?? See if there is any rescent history of vandalism in nearby towns.

Not an all inclusive list, I could go on for a lot longer but I figured I would save the forum. All of this is not in any particular order, and It would of course be a coordination between PD and Rescue personel. Not to mention I kind of answered it as if I was directly involved in the rescue efforts. If I was just joe blow diver that someone called, then I would of course turn it over to the local PD and rescue services. I like situation questions, we should have more of these.

Kevin