Kurt
Huber

Diving was my passion. And with that passion came the challenge of earning higher certifications: the increasingly demanding CMAS levels — one star, two stars, three stars. One particular examination nearly cost me my life. Without the quick reactions of several people watching that day, I would not have survived. Even today, I remain deeply grateful to Rosi, my girlfriend at the time; to the quick-thinking sailor whose name I never learned; and to Dr. Hans Mueller.

It was 1978 at Rietli on Lake Constance. The water was cold. Seventeen degrees Celsius cold. We were allowed to wear wetsuits for the 800-meter swim and for the rescue exercise, in which we had to recover a fictional unconscious diver from five meters of depth. The tests were demanding. And the worst challenge — the twenty-five-meter underwater swim — still lay ahead.

My friend Marco went before me. He surfaced too early. As he came up, he shouted: “The guide rope isn’t tight — stay underneath it!” I heard him. And I did exactly that. I swam beneath the rope. Visibility was terrible. Almost nonexistent. I could feel the rope brushing against my shoulder and knew that when the rope ended, I would have reached the finish.

The last thing I remember is feeling a knot graze my shoulder. Then everything changed. Suddenly, it felt as if I were dreaming. Arrows of light shot toward my eyes from a glowing red universe. I tried to open my eyes. I couldn’t. They burned. Then I heard voices. Far away. Distant. Someone was saying: “He’s breathing again.”

A little later, I managed to open my eyes. There were people everywhere. Standing over me. Looking down at me. An unfamiliar man — Dr. Mueller — was kneeling beside me. I was shaking violently from the cold. My entire body trembled. Yet I could not move. I vaguely remember being lifted into an ambulance. The next thing I knew, I was in a hospital. Only hours later did I fully regain awareness.

What had happened?

During training, the guide rope had been anchored to the lakebed at the end, with a buoy marking the surface. On the day of the examination, that procedure was changed. The rope was attached approximately three meters farther away from the stones of the harbor wall. I didn’t know that. And because visibility was so poor, I unknowingly passed the finish point and swam directly into the wall.

The impact knocked me unconscious instantly. The current held me underwater and swept me around the wall to the other side, where I eventually drifted motionless to the surface in the middle of the harbor entrance.

Because I had technically passed the finish point, the next candidate was called forward. My examination was marked as completed. Nobody realized I was missing. Nobody was looking for me. At least not at first.

My girlfriend Rosi was watching. She suddenly began shouting: “He hasn’t surfaced!” At that exact moment, the mysterious sailor must have seen me. According to what I was later told, he jumped overboard without hesitation and reached me within seconds. He brought me back to shore. There, a doctor who had been watching the examinations — Dr. Mueller — immediately took over.

Years later, he admitted something that stayed with me: when he first saw me, he believed I was already dead. People later told me — and there were photographs I was never shown — that my face had already turned green and my fingers white. Yet Dr. Mueller never stopped working. Professionally. Methodically. Using every tool available. An AED. Oxygen. A resuscitation bag. Nobody could ever tell me how long the effort lasted.

What I do know is this: it was the first miracle of my life. I survived. The even greater miracle? I suffered no brain damage.

A tragic aftermath

The diving association removed the examiner responsible for the course. I was later told that he never recovered emotionally from what had happened. He never contacted me. Never spoke to me. Years later, I learned that he had taken his own life. Friends of his told me that my accident was not the only reason. But it had affected him deeply.

The lesson no one expected

My parents wanted me to stop diving. My girlfriend wanted me to stop diving. Anyone who had seen what happened believed the decision was obvious. And my response?

“Yes, right…”

Because despite everything — despite the accident, despite the hospital, despite coming within minutes of death — I wasn’t finished. Not even close.

In fact, only a little more than a year later, the story that would change my life was just beginning.