Forgotten at Sea, Scuba Diver Is Rescued by Boy Scout, Wins $1.68M Judgment
Corrected: For nearly five hours after Daniel Carlock was accidentally left behind by his charter dive boat, in the Pacific Ocean some 12 miles off the shore of Long Beach, Calif., he thought he might be about to die.
But the aerospace engineer got lucky—twice. Rescued in 2004 after he was spotted floating in the ocean by a Boy Scout in another boat, he has been awarded $1.68 million by a Los Angeles County Superior Court jury, reports the Los Angeles Times.
Although Carlock wasn’t on the boat operated by Ocean Adventures Dive Co. and Sundiver Charters as it moved to a second dive site and then returned to land, a dive master marked him as present on a roster of divers, the newspaper notes. Meanwhile, the Boy Scout who spotted him just happened to be gazing in Carlock’s direction through a pair of binoculars, on a vessel that had veered off its intended course in order to avoid a freighter.
Carlock testified that he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and skin cancer as a result of the experience.
The Times article doesn’t include any comment from the two defendant companies.
Additional coverage:
Associated Press: “Diver abandoned at sea gets $1.68 million”
Last updated at 2:45 p.m. to correct that Daniel Carlock was lost for nearly five hours.
