The Audrey Mestre Tragedy : Who Owes What to Whom ?
Posted By Paul Kotik on 27 October 2002
The details of Audrey Mestre's last dive are still in quarantine, but a striking feature of the increasingly shrill demands for investigation and disclosure is the embedded axiom that the IAFD, Pipin Ferreras and/or the Mestre family are obligated , obligated to, variously, the freediving community, the press and the public at large. They owe us a full account of what happened, it is said, they owe us ! Those who are unsatisfied with the disclosures made to date attribute this perceived reticence to base motives, in language one usually associates with political scandals.
It is quite remarkable.
What, in fact do Pipin Ferreras, the Mestre family and/or the IAFD owe anyone in terms of disclosure of information related to the circumstances and manner of Audrey Mestre's fatal accident? A dispassionate review in the context of mainstream, conventional morality, ethics and law suggests that the answer is not much. The data retained by the IAFD, Pipin and the Mestre's is, as best as I can determine, private property. Until such time as there is a regime change in the United States of America, its owners enjoy all of the protections afforded private property, which are many and strong.
The notion that there is, nevertheless some sort of overriding obligation to relinquish control over this private property is widespread and unquestioned. Is there, after all, some substance to this idea?
The strongest arguments for such an obligation are those built on moral, on ethical and on legal grounds, respectively. The weakest is based on a bizarre concept of celebritie oblige.
The moral case for full investigation and disclosure, which is asserted by most of the critics, cites the potential yield of enhanced safety for future no-limits divers. This argument is, however, valid only to the extent that the data inform us of new knowledge, something we did not previously know about the physiology or physics of deep sled diving. If previously unknown, something new was encountered in the heretofore unexplored depths and caused this dive to fail, then some moral obligation to the freediving community may be said to exist.
The insiders would, in that case, have knowledge which if disclosed could make it unneccesary for other people to acquire it at the cost of human life. It is not, however, a very compelling obligation. The business of no-limits world records is, after all, a business. New knowledge acquired by the IAFD in this tragic manner is, arguably, a proprietary business asset, one which may give the IAFD a competitive advantage in setting world records going forward. This asset, if it exists, was acquired at a cost which cannot even be measured, and has commercial value in the future. The act of disclosure itself, regardless of the content, would be very painful to those close to Audrey. The moral case for altruistic, free distribution of this asset is therefore very weak.
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