The three have been named as Kevin Coughlin, 51, Scott Stanley, 55, and Jonathan Walsweer, 38. A fourth member of the group, Howard Spialter, 52, surfaced safely.
The men were described as experienced divers who had explored the wreck together before. But, according to Monroe County Sheriff's Office, they made some crucial errors.
Officials stated that the men descended to a deeper part of the wreck not normally accessed by tourist divers and without many apertures to open water, yet had not prepared a detailed dive plan. They did not use reel lines, were diving on single cylinders, and deployed stage cylinders only high up in the wreck, near the entrance.
They became lost, probably after kicking up silt. According to a Sheriff's Office detective, the lower part of the ship contained more silt than higher areas.
Spialter swam in the right direction and managed to leave the wreck. Coughlin was found alive by rescue divers near an exit, raised and given CPR but remained unconscious and died in hospital.
The bodies of Stanley and Walsweer were recovered next day by divers of the Key Largo Volunteer Fire Rescue Department, near the bottom of the wreck and about 27m from the nearest exit point.
Friends of the three rejected the official account of ill preparation. They said the men were experienced, responsible wreck penetrators. The dive should have been easy, such that 'something else' must have gone wrong.
They said the fact that the divers had set up stage cylinders showed that they had a dive plan. And if they had entered without lines, according to their friends, they would have deployed strobe lights as exit guides.
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