Dive story told over the weekend

Ran into another diver this weekend and was told a story that I have been thinking about a bit. This story involves a couple, husband and wife. Both are inexperienced, in that they have 30-40 dives, I believe.

The couple went on what sounds to be an easy dive at a quarry. They were decending when husband thumbed the dive, starts the ascent while husband watches from above while wife is kicking and in a panic and just keeps sinking. wife finally gets to the surface and inflates BC, while husband talks to them about what had happened. Husband explains that while decending, he had some sort of a weird feeling, as soon as he went through the thermocline, where his chest started to pound and a feeling of frecking out. Wife was able to get herself under control and they dove a shallower depth, without incident. However, I was told that when these two were talking the next day about what happened, as the wife was upset with herself for not realizing how to fix the problem, it was said that with the neg. buoyancy, along with the dive being thumbed and husband leaving leaving her at depth, is what they felt caused the issue. But, when they were discussing this, wife wanted to know why husband did not come down to help, husband, replied, "what did you want me to do, I was only 10-15 feet away from you." The wife, told me that she said, "just let me drown." I am not sure if this person was just wanting to air what happened or what, but it started me thinking about what makes a good buddy or not. It also started me thinking about how to handle an issue such as this, when 2 people are diving and both start down the panic cycle, does this happen much? According to the person I spoke to, there was a 2 min. difference for the dive time between these 2 people. I do not know if they have compared dive computers at this point to see if they can make heads for tails out of everything. But something does seen off to me with this story.

My biggest issues with this story: Should the husband gone down to help wife, since he himself stated that he had some issue with the dive? As I was told, that the husband later told his wife that he noticed she was having issues. He could see that she was sinking. I think this person would like some feedback and at this point don't know what to tell her.

Being married, I can say I would definitely have gone back down to help her. Why was she sinking though? Why not add some air to the BCD to help you get back up? Also, what's the point of a dive buddy if they cant help you and vise versus when you need it?

There's too many breaks in buddy protocol. The first issue was that the husband left the wife in the first place. Buddy's should be within touching distance at all times even when descending and ascending.
How the husband managed to get 10-15ft away before noticing the wife's problem just screams lack of awareness.
The fact that the wife had an issue ascending in the beginning screams lack of basic skills that should have been learned in Basic OW.

Both these divers should train and practice in shallow water (say a 12 ft pool) or take a refresher course, or do both before they attempt to dive together again outside of a confined session. That's what you should tell them.
As for the incident that happened, it can go both ways.

A) The husband was not sure of his condition or what caused it. Worst case scenario, he descends to help the wife and goes unconscious. You now have 2 victims in need of rescue

B) Husband goes down and helps wife. But how? Inflate her BC, dump her weights? All these things are self help skills that every diver should already have. The wife made it to the surface on her own in the end. Does she even know what caused her to be so negative in the first place.

This all goes back to retraining and becoming proficient in your basic scuba skills:
- Buoyancy
- trim
- self-help (this includes a weight check and being properly weighted)
- situational awareness
- OOA drills
- and basic rescues if you were taught that in Basic OW.

This really sounds like a case of two people, neither of whom has anything but the most tenuous of dive skills.

Our SB member Gareth is in the process of writing a buoyancy masterclass, and the last installment involves a drill where you do a descent in controlled steps, shoot a bag at depth, and then do an ascent in steps. Practicing this kind of control in the water column would avoid situations where someone thumbs the dive, but his buddy continues to sink.

For me, if I had thumbed the dive, I would have waited for my buddy to acknowledge and return the thumb, and then I would have started up. If that person continued to descend, I would have come back down to them, grabbed their arm, stuck the thumb in their face, and started up again.

My ex-wife's father was a prominent divorce lawyer. (Note to self: don't marry the daughter of a divorce lawyer again. ) He used to tell the story of a man whose wife refused to share air with him during an out-of-air emergency. You can see how he met the man.

Self-rescue is best skill one can learn.

The wife panicked, and in her panic she couldn't think straight. Now she is blaming the husband for HER own mistakes.

If the husband had the feeling of "freaking out" and was headed for the surface, it's highly unlikely he would have had the presence of mind to help his wife or would have been able to "unfreak" sufficiently to make himself go back down again. To my mind freaking out=panic and things don't generally get better from that point on. Secondly, if the wife was kicking and still sinking, sounds like she was overweighted or at least overly negative-not so much of a controlled descent to begin with. She also seemed to lack presence of mind to put a shot of air in her BC. Seems like these sort of basic skills should be fairly well ingrained by 40 dives. They need to practice buddy drills in shallow water, IMHO. Anne Landers would recommend couples counseling.

Sounds like it could have really gone south quickly. Certainly agree that both divers need to be much more aware of each other, and communicate continually. The husband failed in the most basic buddy responsibility of letting his buddy know his conditions, and making sure they stayed a team.

She failed, in that she would have realized he was ascending if she were focused on the team.

Both divers need to practice more, especially buoyancy control, buddy techniques, and communication (of course, being married can make communication of any sort an issue )

Luckily, they survived their mistakes, and still have the chance to become better buddies, and divers.

The two of them should get different buddies untill they learn how to dive.


Bob
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I may be old, but I’m not dead yet.

a freaked out diver, is just as good as a panicked one,
cant help any one, nor be aware of others in need, and will for sure not dive again,
no matter what, until the freaking out feeling is gone again.
beeing aware of own panic feeling is VERY important,
having a VERY good relationship and thrust in your dive buddy is also VERY important,
if it is your friend or wife can also be very delicate, if things goes a bit wrong.
I prefer to dive with my wife, she is by far the best buddy over and under water I can get !
and I am sure she feel the same way.

oh and by the way, the more crasy dive stories you hear out there, on the boat or on your way out,
you be amazed, some gets better every time they are told.