# How many people get paralyzed from diving accidents each year **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 28, 2019, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524 "2019-01-28T03:54:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2019, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/1 "2019-01-28T03:54:35Z")
I was on another forum and lots of people seemed to know someone who either died or was paralyzed from a diving accident, usually from diving into shallow water or hitting a rock on a dive. So how often does this happen? the only cite I could find was this and its from Turkey. > **[500 critically injured, killed each year in Turkey after diving headfirst...](https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/500-critically-injured-killed-each-year-in-turkey-after-diving-headfirst-into-shallow-waters-116334)** > > Some 500 people each year in Turkey break their necks, either dying of respiratory failure instantly or suffering spinal cord injury and mostly becoming wheelchair-bound as a result of diving headfirst into shallow waters, with the figures reaching... ---
**Author:** ![GMANCANADA](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gmancanada/32/2837_2.png) [@GMANCANADA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GMANCANADA)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2019, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/2 "2019-01-28T11:26:02Z")
Are you talking about Scuba diving or just diving into a swimming pool or lake from the pool deck or shore? ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2019, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/3 "2019-01-28T15:34:27Z")
It does happen. I know one. He went to the pool with some friends to celebrate graduating high school, some alcohol was involved, he hit his head on something and has been a quadriplegic since. He went on to college and is now a math teacher at his alma mater, although he needs an assistant. How often? IIRC there have been other cases over the years. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2019, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/4 "2019-01-28T15:43:46Z")
Charles Krauthammer the columnist was paralyzed from waist down in a dive while he was a medical student , he died last year from cancer. We have a local woman who was paralyzed from a fall into a pool at party. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2019, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/5 "2019-01-28T22:27:54Z")
> [@GMANCANADA](#): > > Are you talking about Scuba diving or just diving into a swimming pool or lake from the pool deck or shore? The latter. The fact that so many people personally know someone this has happened to makes me think it is much more common than I expected. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2019, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/6 "2019-01-28T22:44:48Z")
since Charles Krauthammer was a medical student he said he knew right away what had happened to him. He went on to finish medical school and was a psychiatrist before becoming a political columnist. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/7 "2019-01-29T00:27:18Z")
Remember gospel singer and one-time best-selling Christian author Joni Eareckson Tada? That’s how she became paralyzed. Incredibly, she’s lived this way since the summer of 1967; however, she’s had breast cancer and it looks like she’s recently had a recurrence. > **[Joni Eareckson Tada](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joni_Eareckson_Tada)** > > Joni Eareckson Tada (born October 15, 1949) is an evangelical Christian author, radio host, artist, and founder of Joni and Friends, an organization "accelerating Christian ministry in the disability community". > Joni Eareckson was born in 1949 in Baltimore, Maryland, the youngest of four daughters, to John and Lindy Eareckson. Joni was named for her father, John Eareckson, so her name is pronounced like "Johnny". Her father participated in the 1932 Summer Olympics as an alternate for the Unit... There used to be a water park in my town that had a wave pool, and some years back (probably 20 or so), a 40-ish woman was bumped off her air mattress at the wrong time, hit her head on the bottom, and was paralyzed until she died about 10 years later. The story behind THAT was quite tragic, because she had recently been widowed, with several teenage children, and a friend had given them tickets to the water park to cheer them up. The mother’s death was from her oxygen catching fire while she was smoking. :eek: Here in the upper Midwest, the quadriplegics are more likely to come from ATV accidents than pretty much everything else put together. (ETA organ donors too) ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/8 "2019-01-29T01:07:19Z")
I’m not finding the number you want, but here are a few that you might be able to extrapolate from: Diving is the [#4 cause of spinal cord injury](https://www.shepherd.org/resources/injuryprevention/diving) for men and #5 for women. Over 17 years (1990-2006), [there were 111,341 emergency room visits in the U.S. for diving injuries](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18676525) to people 19 and younger. 38.2% were injuries to the head or neck. Lacerations and soft tissue injuries were 57.2% of the injuries, so spinal injuries had to be less than that. ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/9 "2019-01-29T01:11:51Z")
[Here are some better numbers (PDF).](http://www.divingboardsafety.net/AIR_report.pdf) In the 26 years from 1973-1998, there were 1,443 spinal cord injuries in the U.S. from diving, or about 55/year. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/10 "2019-01-29T03:07:35Z")
> [@TroutMan](#): > > [Here are some better numbers (PDF).](http://www.divingboardsafety.net/AIR_report.pdf) In the 26 years from 1973-1998, there were 1,443 spinal cord injuries in the U.S. from diving, or about 55/year. That number seems kind of low. I did find this. > **[Spinal Cord Injury | Types of Spinal Cord Injuries | SpinalCord.com](https://www.spinalcord.com/types-of-spinal-cord-injuries)** > > Find out everything you need to know about spinal cord injury types, symptoms, SCI rehabilitation, and the latest in spinal cord injury research. > [@](#): > > Diving Injuries > > Propelling head first into the water is an inherently dangerous activity. If the water is too shallow, the diver inexperienced, or there are objects or people in the diver’s way, the injuries can be immediate and catastrophic. 1,718 (7%) men suffered spinal cord injuries due to diving accidents in 2014, with 122 (2.1%) female divers experiencing SCI. However diving injuries are something like the 4th most common cause of spinal injuries. Behind auto accidents, falls & gunshots. ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/11 "2019-01-29T03:49:44Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#): > > That number seems kind of low. I did find this. My number seemed really low to me too. Looking at that report more closely, they first say 11K SCI injuries per year but then the table show numbers based on 1/10 that. And I think there were looking at polls only. Or maybe there’s just a lot more “hold my beer” guys in 2014 than the '90s. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-get-paralyzed-from-diving-accidents-each-year/828524/12 "2019-01-29T14:22:33Z")
as a kid I was taught put your arms in front of you when diving, that way your head does not hit the bottom of the pool/lake/etc first. I assume they still teach that but not everybody takes a swim lesson .