What divers do VS What divers should do - Emergency Situations

[Lucas Cordina]

Please never swim up on your own. Anything could happen in those few minutes where you are alone! believe me when I say that.

You go down as two you come up as two.

I don't think he meant he wanted to ascend by himself, I think he meant that he could manage himself during the ascent, the rescue diver didn't know this however, and didn't allow him to use his BCD inflator, causing them to go up too fast.. Or, at least, that's what I gathered

But as you said, going up by yourself is a big no-no unless it's an absolute must

 

[Kilili]

Please never swim up on your own. Anything could happen in those few minutes where you are alone! believe me when I say that.
You go down as two you come up as two.

That's a personal choice, not a rule, and certainly not something I do. I know this is hammered into the heads of novice divers, but you will encounter many, many experienced divers that do as I.

My dive trips are to SE Asia. Most of the buddy teams are couples traveling together, and for many couples solo diving is the norm.

When you have some more experience, you may choose to do the same.

 

[Laurie S.]

Yeah overexertion can be a pain, I swim way too fast, with the grace and efficiency of an obese ballerina, so I experience that quite a bit!

So I'm curious, if there was no body to be found, what was the criteria for passing the course? Or was he just watching from a certain spot to see if you did the search patterns rights? Because that seems like it would make you panic if you're still looking around and there's nothing to be found!

The boat was anchored right next to where we were swimming the square, so he was able to observe us easily. He even commented on how my buddy was running a race. I'm very good at finding things because I'm a professional archaeologist and walking searches and looking for something is a big part of what I do. When we didn't find him after the first square, I was suspicious that he had left. He was fighting off a cold, and wasn't in the best of shape to begin with. He simply bailed to the boat and watched us go through the drill.

 

[dallaskincaid]

I haven't had enough dives under my belt to really have an emergency, but I think the big thing is staying calm. Nothing makes you make worse decisions than if you panic. I've had a couple of stressful situations in low visibility that mostly pertained to losing my buddy (Once in a night dive). Once I thought it through and realized that I have air, I have a general idea of where the boat is, I'm not going to die in this, I was able to concentrate on the problem at hand and resolve it.

 

[windapp]

I had no intention of swimming up on my own, especially when I was fighting off what could potentially turn into a full on panic attack. I meant swim up under my own power without assistance.

 

[CamG]

Greetings Lucas I have been involved with a few issues both training and personally.

While assisting a Deep Diver class my student buddy had a free flow at 120'.
He was stressed but functioning well so I was prepared at any time to offer assistance.
He switched to his alternate that immediately began free flowing as well so leaving the reg in he deployed his pony bottle.
Once he had switched to his pony, I shut his back gas off.
We were close to a down line so we ascending slowly to 60' where while doing a 1 minute stop I turned his back gas on.
No free flow so he switched back to back gas and we finished our ascent with a safety stop with no more issues.

On a boat dive in Lake Huron my wife took a cross wave that dislodged her mask.
She spat her reg and was smacked with another wave and started choking immediately.
The whole thing went from nothing to something very fast and she became despondent.
With out a beat the DM reactions took over; before she could grab me I put her in a tank cradle, replaced her reg, took over her buoyancy, and swam her back to the boat!
A little embarrassed but safe and thankful for good rescue training!

My next tale is a personal one that happened in late winter early spring.
We were diving deep 120' I was on air and leading the dive.
I was with a group but we never actually assigned buddy teams.
We visited a wreck and turned the dive keeping our bottom time with NDL limits.
This is where it gets crazy obviously narced I pushed it a bit, about 4 strong kicks and like a hammer I was spinning out of control!
I could not catch my breath, my mask was flooded, and I realized I was sailing upward!
My head was going crazy screaming "You are going to DIE!"

When I reached 70' my narcosis relented and I was able to dump my DS and BC.
I regained breathing control and cleared my mask.
Gathered my wits and found my group and my buddy!
The whole incident was less than several minutes but it shook me to the core!

It took me a week and several conversations to decide that the culprit was C02 and narcosis.
I took immediate action and trained to understand how to avoid a repeat incident.
Not had any issues with it since but it was a intense lesson that I was glad to have had good training.

The difference between survival and death can be the training you receive and the skill sets you master, while diving within your level of training / experience.
There can be little to no margin of error in high stress moments that will determine a positive or negative outcome.
If you dive long enough you will see or experience stressful moments underwater or at the surface.
Be ready for them! TRAIN FOR THEM SO YOU WILL BE ABLE TO SURVIVE OR HELP OTHERS!

CamG Keep Diving....Keep Training....Keep Learning!

 

[BabyDuck]

mine has something to do with the 'dive pariah' story, in that i signaled 'ok' but didn't communicate.

we (buddy & i and another team of 2) were finishing a dive in manatee. the mouth of that cave is narrower than the cave so the flow out is screamin' and up a slope. you have to be very careful not to get caught in the flow and blown out past your stop depth.

so i had paused at the bottom of the slope and done my best to empty my drysuit, wiggling all around to get the bubble to the valve, and started crawling up the slope. i tried to keep my fintips down, but the flow caught them anyway and turned me upside down. i grabbed a log and was holding on, upside down, when my feet filled with air and the feet of my suit with fins attached came off the feet of my body. larry looked at me from across the cave mouth and i signaled 'ok', because, hey, i wasn't dead or in pain or panicking. however, i couldn't let go and i couldn't turn over and i couldn't get my fins/suit feet back on. he says that he suddenly realized that i was upside down *and* eight feet tall & he knew what had happened. so he crawled over and jammed my feet back on and pulled me back down into some semblance of order. i would have been better off to have done the 'so-so' signal so he knew something was up immediately & didn't just think i was horsing around.

i since found out my suit inflator self-inflates, and i think that was part of what was happening. i had much more bubble than i thought i did and wasn't compensating for it. anyway, no panic, even though i was getting pretty wet breaths, too, since i was upside down. it was all just annoying.

but at least it was funny. i think bob & polly enjoyed the show. plus polly had to help me put the she-p back on, so it was a banner day for her.

 

[billt4sf]

Suggest you take a look here:

Accidents and Incidents

- Bill