Lost Diver Bill Crawford

    I read the SB thread. Some of the posts from the people who knew Bill Crawford, including Chad touched me, they were so simple and genuine. I felt an affinity for him even though I never knew him. He sounded like the kind of man I'd have liked to be around.


    Chad, I don't pretend to know what you're going through now, I'm very sorry. I know you will come out of this stronger in the end. Please copy your SB post describing the events of that day here, along with some pictures of Bill.


    My condolences,
    Dan

    Bill and I met at his house at 6:00 AM on Saturday 6/19/10. I left my truck there and we headed to Freshwater Bayou in his old Explorer, pulling his 18’ Whaler. We talked about oil, diving, fins, spearguns, how sorry we were for Lindsey (he missed the trip due to a blown eardrum caused by an infection). Mostly we talked about how happy and excited we were to get this chance to do what we love.


    We got there at about 9:30, launched and headed south. It was pretty calm and the forecast was for it to get even better. Our plan was to stay out overnight – sleeping on mats on the deck of his boat which would be tied to a rig. We have done this many times, but it had been a while and with the oil situation we were doing our best to soak in every bit of it. We were like two kids going to Disney World – in fact as we got close to the first rig that we were going to dive we commented that it looked like Snow White’s castle to us.


    We dove two rigs between about 11:00 AM and 12:00 noon – shooting trigger fish, mangrove snapper, grouper, and a big cobia. Bill was as happy as I had ever seen him. We gave four mangrove snapper to a boat that was fishing at one of the rigs we were diving. The guys in that boat took some pictures of Bill gaffing and pulling the cobia into the boat. I hope that they read about this and get in touch with someone who knew him, as those were the last pictures of him. After he took a few pictures of me with the cobia, we took a break and ate a few bites of the conch ceviche that I made the night before. We then headed to the next rig, Vermillion 124-I.


    It was a small, square rig in 75’ of water. Upon arriving at the rig we tied the boat to the south corner of the rig since the light current was causing the boat to drift to the south. I later watched a piece of seaweed drift past the rig and saw that it took about 10 minutes for it to move 30 feet (the current was very light). The visibility on the surface down to 35 feet was about 6 feet. From 35 feet to about 60 feet the visibility opened up to about 40 feet. From 60 feet to the bottom at 75’ there was little or no visibility. While not great, these were conditions that we had often encountered, and had dove many times. Unfortunately, these conditions make it very difficult to keep an eye on each other. I made 3 freedives between the time of 12:32 and 12:41. Each dive was about 90 seconds long with the rest of the time spent on the surface resting and getting ready for the next dive. I didn’t shoot any fish during these dives. There we numerous red snapper around, but none over 20 pounds, which was the minimum size that we had set for this trip.


    After surfacing from my 3rd freedive, I decided to head back to the boat so that we could head out to the next block and clearer water. When I got close to the boat I raised my head above the water and noticed Bill’s gun floating on the surface about 15 feet behind the boat. I swam to the gun and found that the line was cut about 6-inches from the muzzle. I could see that it was a clean cut, indicating that Bill must have cut it with his knife. I immediately knew that it was BAD!!! and dove down looking for him. I made several dives, but didn’t see him. I then got in the boat and yelled for him as well as untying from the rig and looking for him down current of the rig. While doing this, I flagged down another boat that was nearby and asked them to continue searching down current of the rig. I returned to look at the rig and made the call to the coast guard to report him missing. Other boats in the area heard the call and joined the search. A nearby rig also had their helicopter searching very quickly. After a while the coast guard helicopter arrived and started searching. At around 5:00 PM I headed in to make the necessary calls and get some scuba divers together so that we could search for him on the bottom.


    Marcel and I were back at the rig at approximately 12:00 noon on 6/20/10. While waiting for the Rafe’s boat to arrive with all the scuba equipment, I made a few freedives and found that the conditions were much the same as the day before. I followed a rig leg down and found that there was little or no visibility on the bottom. Rafe, Rok, Wil, Vinny, and J. arrived at about 12:15. We put on scuba gear and searched inside the rig on the first dive. While we couldn’t see, there was enough structure down there that we were able to feel our way along beams, pipes, etc. We didn’t find anything on this dive.


    During our surface interval, and while the tanks were refilled, we worked through the details of a plan to tie a rope to the rig leg that Bill’s boat had been tied to the day before and sweep along the bottom with each guy holding the rope and touching the guys hand next to him to be sure that we didn’t miss anything. On the first pass we didn’t find anything before running into the rig. The diver closest to the rig leg then felt his way over the other divers and took his new position farther out on the rope. Each diver did this and we started the second pass. I can’t thank these guys enough for being down there with me – I’m not sure I could have gotten through it if I hadn’t been able to touch the guy’s hand next to me. There was very little difference between what you could see with your eyes open or closed. About half way through the second pass I knew that we had found him when I heard the diver next to me start yelling (this was our signal that we had found him). We all slowly came up with him.


    It was about 3:30 pm on 6/20/10 when we found him.
    We called the coast guard and let them know that they could call off the search and made the call to his wife Cindy on Rafe’s sat-phone. I personally know how tough each of these guys are, and I don’t think they will mind when I tell you that everyone was openly weeping at the conclusion of that call.


    Here’s what I think happened:


    He shot a big fish, probably a cobia based on the fact that we were too shallow for AJ’s and we had shot one on a nearby rig.
    His line got caught in the bands. I know this because one of the bands on his gun was turned around backwards in the muzzle (wishbone in the muzzle instead of the band). Also, the line was cleanly cut 6-inches in front of the muzzle. In addition, the reel spool was full, the drag on the reel was functioning properly, and the line was not buried in the reel.


    Either the fish was strong enough that he couldn’t pull it to the surface, or it got wrapped around the rig.


    Bill fought the fish and tried to untangle the line. He was not able to swim the fish up or get the line untangled. He decided to cut the line. He made that decision too late and didn’t make it back to the surface.


    His wife, Cindy told me a story about him yesterday. When he was 6 years old his mother made him take piano lessons. Apparenty, it was a pretty long walk to his piano teachers house and he would take his pellet gun along and most days he would show up with a mess of squirrels, which he would leave on the porch during his lesson.


    Bill’s friend,


    Chad

    i am not sure why, but that siloutte shot of him with the bull mahi is one of my favorite spearing images I have ever seen.



    what a tragedy to lose such a good man and fine ambassador for our sport/hobby/way of life

    i like to spear fish

    Thanks Griswold for the information, I am deeply saddened by the loss of your good friend and to all of us in the spearfishing world, my condolence's go out to Bill's family.

    I had heard of bill long before I had heard of this forum and can honestly say that this story touches me every time. I tell my friends that another great has been lost, and I get goosebumps just telling the story. I am very sorry for his family and friends. RIP Bill

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