05/17/2008
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Staff photo by David Leamingfrom the Kennebec Journal
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from the Morning Sentinel
Outdoors Writer
"There are no good days. The call always comes on the worst days, and it's always in about the worst conditions."
-- Jeremy Judd, member of Maine Warden Service dive team
Jeremy Judd keeps going back to a day two years ago, a day in the dead of winter when a snowmobiler plunged through the thin ice on Sebago Lake.
That snowmobiler was never recovered. His family was never able to give him a proper burial, never able to tie up all the loose ends.
Never able to say goodbye.
"His sled was in eight feet of water," said Judd, a game warden working in the Gray-New Gloucester region of the state. "If he would have just stood up on the seat, I probably could have reached him. It was that close."
But below where the snowmobiler had crashed through the ice was a wall of rock, one descending nearly 180 feet deep in the large lake. Panicked, Judd said, the man likely didn't realize just how shallow the water was and he started trying to swim to safety before he succumbed to hypothermia. The bottom of that wall was too deep for the Maine Warden Service's dive team to inspect, and the body was never found -- presumably having drifted to the bottom of that wall.
All 10 of the dive team's members are trained to go as far as 100 feet; beyond that, they need a special order from their colonel.
"Even then, 140 or 150 feet is the max we can go," Judd said. "We can't go down and look around any deeper, because there are just too many variables."
Pressure from the water, Judd said, can make a diver feel almost intoxicated at that kind of depth. Motor skills deteriorate rapidly while the brain cannot function properly. It's so easy for even the most skilled divers to make mistakes in that setting that it is considered unsafe.
"They put themselves into some scary -- really scary -- situations," said Blaine Kopp.
Kopp knows that all too well. Last November, he and his family watched as the Maine Warden Service dive team searched for his father after a boat capsized on Great Pond. Thomas Kopp's body was discovered the next day.
Thomas Kopp was the dean of admissions at Colby College in Waterville. On Friday afternoon at Colby, the admissions staff at the college made a donation on Kopp's behalf in a subdued ceremony on campus.
Their tiny office raised $3,500 and with it they gave the Maine Warden Service's dive team the one tool it didn't have at its disposal -- the "TK Cam."
Cutting-edge technology
Asked what the equipment is specifically, even Sgt. Terry Hughes of the Maine Warden Service isn't sure. It is various, cutting-edge technological components comprising two underwater cameras fitted with halogen lamps -- one for shallow water and one for depths up to 250 feet.
It comes in a portable, waterproof deck unit with an on-board battery, one that can stamp DVD images with dates, times and GPS information. It's also designed to fit in a large backpack, making it effective enough that divers can take it with them into even the most remote of locations.
Long story short, the cameras can do the work of several divers in a fraction of the time by surveying underwater scenes even in light so low that divers can't see even a few feet in front of them. It also keeps minute details significant to underwater rescue operations.
"We're in unknown areas with harsh conditions," said new Maine Warden Service colonel Joel Wilkinson, who was the head of the service's dive team before his promotion this week. "It's dark, and it's deep. Now we can look before we send divers in, and it gives you an idea of the terrain you're dealing with."
Blaine Kopp worked closely with Hughes on configuring the equipment to work best for the Warden Service. Kopp is a marine scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey and has his own underwater survey equipment, which he defined as rudimentary and specific only for certain research.
The personal equipment did, however, aid in the recovery of his father last November. It was a no- brainer then, said Colby's associate dean of admissions, Nancy Morrione, that Blaine should work with the Warden Service.
"It was very emotional and very time-consuming for Blaine," Morrione said.
But Blaine Kopp said he felt like he did nothing extraordinary -- he said he's felt as though he's just been asked to play in a large room full of toys.
"We really just wanted to give (the dive team) a lot of flexibility," he said. "This way, when they're put into any specific situation, they have everything they need right there."
Hughes said he likes the name for the device the best.
"The good thing about the legacy of this gift is that in 10 years someone's going to ask, 'What's the TK Cam? What's the TK for?' " Hughes said. "Tom's legacy is going to go on and on."
Bringing closure
It was almost 15 years ago that Jeremy Judd began diving recreationally, and it wasn't until 2001 that he joined the Maine Warden Service.
Signing up for the dive team was just a natural extension of his love of being in the water.
"For me, it was just a way to add on to my love of diving," Judd said. "I could improve my skills and have the opportunity to dive more and learn more."
But hearing Judd's stories of not being able to see the trim board in his own hands while diving into icy cold waters in the winter, or hearing about having to plunge into raging spring rivers to see what's under an embankment, suggests that diving as part of a search and rescue mission is a lot different than scuba diving off a tropical coast somewhere.
"In recreational diving, you pick the nice, sunny days to go out. You pick the nice water," Judd said. "I do a lot of recreational diving still, but I don't go out if it's cold or rainy or whatever."
Or if it's potentially dangerous.
But Judd said he finds his satisfaction from diving with the Warden Service in a completely unexpected place.
"For me, it's about finding closure for the families we work with," Judd said. "Most of the time we're called in, realistically, it's for recovery. That's our job -- we're like well-trained dogs. It's hard when you go out on a call and have to call it off without finding the person.
"But that's what lights the passion in us to try and do a good job, to go out there and help bring some closure to the families. And it's also closure for us in some cases."
Like with that snowmobiler on Sebago Lake a couple of winters back. Through the gift on behalf of the late Thomas Kopp, the Maine Warden Service is hoping to shed some light on a few more search and rescue missions and bring closure to the people who need it.
And that includes both the victims' families and the divers themselves.
Travis Barrett -- 621- 5648
tbarrett@centralmaine.com
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