The silent witness: using dive computer records in diving fatality investigations.

ABSTRACT

Downloaded data from diving computers can offer invaluable insights into diving incidents resulting in fatalities. Such data form an essential part of subsequent investigations or in legal actions related to the diving incident. It is often tempting to accept the information being displayed from a computer download without question. However, there is a large variability between the makes and models of dive computer in how the data are recorded, stored and re-displayed and caution must be employed in the interpretation of the evidence. In reporting on downloaded data, investigators should be fully aware of the limitations in the data retrieved. They should also know exactly how to interpret parameters such as the accuracy of the dive profile; the effects of different mode settings; the precision of displayed water temperatures; the potential for misrepresenting breathing rates where there are data from integrated monitoring systems, and be able to challenge some forms of displayed information either through re-modelling based on the pressure/time profiles or by testing the computers in standardised conditions.