Posted by John Walker on January 20, 2002 at 17:10:19:
Typically I would avoid any possible confrontation over such a dive as I did last week with a very large Unified Dive Team but after seeing such criticism as Jim Gabriel (probably an alias for some spineless fool) expressed I have become compelled to share my point of view.
Not to many divers in the world know the feeling of anxiety that can come over them as they descend 260ffw through pitch black water to look for several human corpse. And not many divers in the world know the feeling of having a family member of one of the desist hugging them for doing what they thought may be impossible, recovering the body of their husband, brother, father, son.
Although being a part of possibly the deepest public safety dive to date in the United States and a part of possibly the largest Unified Dive Team to date consisting of L.A. County Sheriffs, San Bernardino Sheriffs, L.A. County Life Guards, Two Helicopters and Crew, Several Chaplin’s, Homicide Detectives, Six Boats, ROV’s, the latest in Sonar detection devices, County Supervisors, Coroners, Media, L.A. County Prisoners, Private Physicians, ………., bringing the families some closure, whether large or small, was where the real joy came from. And I am quit sure that all of my team members share the same feeling.
I have read the papers and am bummed that little to no credit was given to some of the Key Players of ooooour immediate team who really made it possibly. I would like to give special thanks to UDT divers:
Patrick Farina
Terry Lee May (alias “Crash”)
Scott Brooks
Bob Titus
Mike Kane (alias “Showtime”)
Kendall Raine
But without the faith that this type of a project could be done safely on open circuit SCUBA from Sergeant Michael Connolly and Sheriff CVT diver Mark Lonsdale and the L.A. County Supervisors these recoveries may never have taken place.
I would also like to thank the many other who helped but it all together but the list is just to large and I don’t even know all of their names.
John Walker