I was a dive instructor for a period in my life (35 years ago now) and was also a dive master for a Caribbean dive operation.
I was with a group for a morning dive... and I had 2 recently "certified" divers, both certified by a hotel dive course that I always thought was "weak" (my training came from an ex NAVY Seal instructor).
Anyway, on the dive boat headed to one of our standard dive locations I gave last minute instructions about having a dive buddy, check each others equipment, wait on the surface after entering for your dive buddy to join you, use hand signals, don't touch anything, etc.
We reached our destination and the boat captain hooked up to the mooring, the resort couple were eager to get wet. The guy jumped in from the dive platform and immediately descended.
His girl friend panics a little and jumps in after him. Only problem was... she didn't crank the valve on her air tank open. No air means she can't stay on the surface because her b/c is totally deflated and she is wearing weights. She immediately starts thrashing and trying to stay on the surface. I look at the boat captain and he looks back at me... I'm closet to being ready to go (but no dive fins)... so I jump into the water and sink down to find her... she is thrashing around like crazy and hitting me in the face and kicking me... I ignore all that and grab her legs and punch my b/c. We come back to the surface with her choking and spitting (and still hitting me). The boat captain was there (no dive equipment on) and we wrap her up and tow her back to the dive platform. She was alright after a few minutes on the boat.
I went down a little later to find her boyfriend pulling himself along the bottom by fire coral. I tapped him and hand signaled that he needed to surface.
BTW, fire coral is poisonous so by the time he got back on the boat his hands looked like cartoon hands and he was in agony. Instant karma!
Beached them both.
And yeah, saving someone from drowning is incredibly dangerous to the rescuer.
But these cops should have tried.
Edit history
= new reply since forum marked as read