Christ R. That's some crazy ****..
I think being trapped would feel worse,
Rocky
I found both of those experiences frightening after it was over. However, in my case, when stuff happens like this my brain goes into extreme puzzle solving mode and I don't feel any emotions until after it's over. Not only on scuba. It happens to me during any kind of emergency.
The only time I ever had the thought during a dive that I wasn't going to make it was during a rescue exercise. I was playing the victim and lying on the bottom in about 10m of water waiting to be "rescued". When the rescuer found me he was alone (as I said before, in the 80's we didn't care as much about silly things like safety protocol).
I was laying face down and when he rolled me over to lift me he knocked my regulator out of my mouth. I actually did have an octopus. By the mid 80's they were fairly common. However, the idea of actually attaching it where you could find it had not taken hold yet and it was behind my shoulder somewhere... along with my primary.
The rescuer then proceeded to carry out the most unusual lift you've ever seen..... actually it's a lift you used to see in first-aid books at the time but it wasn't the protocol his instructor taught him. He basically slung me over his back with my chest to his back and my arms extended over his shoulders. He had a good grip on me and started ascending.
I didn't have a regulator and I didn't have a hand free at that point. Initially I thought I would just sing it out and we'd be on the surface in a few moments. Students usually surface way too fast.... except this one.....
He took his bloody time. about 1/2 way to the surface, I started having serious doubts as to whether or not I could hold on. I started pulling an arm free to look for my reg but the harder I tried to get an arm away, the harder he held me. After the fact he said he thought it was a challenge associated to the exercise.
At no point did a voice in my head say, "oh God"... more like "sort this out or die".
so I let myself go limp and as soon as I felt his grip on my arms loosen I RIPPED my right arm away and used it to spin him around. Initially I opened my mouth and pointed to the opening where my reg should be and then tore the reg out of his mouth (demonstrating just how calm and collected I was at that moment) and put in mine. No standard signs, no standard protocols but pretty clear communication, if I do say so myself. LOL
This led to us buddy breathing (something we were taught in OW at the time) and surfacing like that.
Nobody got hurt but it did tell me one thing about myself. I'm pretty sure I have a breaking point at which I can panic. In fact, I'm pretty sure everyone has such a breaking point. I'm happy to know, however, that my breaking point and the point at which I die from not being able to solve the problem are probably only seconds apart.
R..