Well they got me thinking, in over 200 dives I've had only one gear malfunction, this was during my cavern class during an OOA drill. What happened was I had to donate air, when the drill was over I dropped my backup out of my mouth and it started to free flow. I quickly put it back in my mouth and stuck my tongue in the mouth piece to try and stop it but this did not work so I promptly shut down that post and after a couple of seconds turned it back on and all was ok. After that incident I felt good about how I handled the problem, but that was two years and over 100 dives ago. We practice drills frequently (well maybe not as often as we should:shakehead:) but these are drills and at the start of them you pretty much know the outcome. This got me thinking is how would I react in a real emergency? How do you all practice for the day when things really go bad.
NJDiver_Chris
April 15th, 2012, 05:05 PM
Go down to about 8ft, typically in a pool. Shut off air supply and have to switch to pony bottle or switch to buddies octopus. Sometimes we take off all gear mask, fins, bc, everything, then toss it in the deep end, swim down and put it all back on. Hard to practice for equipment failures because they are difficult to replicate in many cases.
g1138
April 15th, 2012, 11:14 PM
I join in on all the basic classes, adv, rescue, and scientific dive classes I can. You get pretty good at handling yourself with a heavy task load if you're responsible for several other divers who have just hit the learning curve.
Demonstrating skills for the instructor is a plus too.
When I have some time to myself in the pool during class sessions I practice taking off my mask, shutting down, donating to buddy invisible etc etc while holding a constant depth. The shallower the better, makes it more challenging.
During ocean sessions I usually just play overwatch. You get some pretty good insight on problem prevention by watching students. If anything it helps as a good reminder to stay tip top.
Keith & Sharon
April 15th, 2012, 11:28 PM
If you practice your drills regularly and correctly, then any "real emergency" should just be another drill.
"Survival depends on being able to suppress anxiety and replace it with calm, clear, quick and correct reasoning..." -Sheck Exley
Hoomi
April 16th, 2012, 12:26 AM
Good thing Lloyd Bridges isn't still around, or we'd all have to have practice drills on what to do if someone cuts your regulator hose! :D
TSandM
April 16th, 2012, 01:57 AM
It's a great question. Doing drills definitely makes you more facile with the mechanics of the procedures for problem-solving, but it doesn't make your MIND any quicker or more effective. A lot of the technical training I've taken is designed to do exactly that . . . and at the end of one of those classes, you'd probably handle many problems absolutely in stride. But although those of us who take such training DO tend to practice drills, we DON'T tend to set up situations to challenge our effective responses to unplanned issues. I think we ought to do such things more often.
Inked Medic
April 16th, 2012, 02:26 AM
Repetition can save your life or the life of someone else.
g1138
April 16th, 2012, 02:31 AM
That's a good point to make TSandM. I try to do that in the classes I assist with, but I don't think I'd be able to do that for myself. It's sort of like the not knowing what you don't know basis.
Often times for rescues we teach students to go through the motions of stripping an unconscious diver of their gear while giving rescue breaths and keeping a 10 second count. After the skill I'll usually pose the question of what they should do if they surface 25yd from their dive boat; strip gear or immediately transport?
Other times I'll continually prompt students on the beach that their rescue breaths aren't going in, and they'll just keep going for a re-tilt until I mention that they probably would have broken their victim's neck after the 5th re-tilt. In a rare instance some will get the gears turning in their head and check their victim's mouth for obstructions.
The ironic thing is, I would not have thought to pose these problems to the students if they had not been posed to me at first. All these non-textbook situations I've ever prompted have come from hearing instructors or friends having to deal with that very situation in real life.
DivemasterDennis
April 16th, 2012, 03:02 PM
Even the best scenarios are never quite like the real thing. Let's face it, we try to avoid totally surprising our students. No need to cause a coronary or panic. But we can train regularly, we can get as close as possible to a "real thing" and to do that my friend Kevin and I recruit the most hard core and experienced divers around to participate in our rescue classes, and for training with each other. Still, the best we can do is train, repeat, improvise, and always teach prevention is better than rescue.
DivemasterDennis
The trouble with sh** hitting the fan is (1) it is usually something that you are completely unprepared for - you can mitigate this with drills, but it is quite hard to plan for the unexpected, and (2) like the Titanic, every disaster usually involves a combination of more than one thing going wrong, and at least one or two bad decisions along the way.
We all know that you are not supposed to dive with a head cold. Or with a bit of gear held together by duct tape. Or using borrowed gear that doesn't fit well. Or ... etc. But we all do it from time to time.
Drills and skills are great. But ultimately accidents don't happen in the classroom, and they rarely happen as planned in textbooks. As Lynne says, mental agility and an ability to keep calm in the face of difficulties are pretty crucial when encountering something unplanned.
4sak3n
April 16th, 2012, 04:41 PM
I love that flow chart Bob! It strikes just the right balance between humour and levity whilst clearly showing what I take many, many sentences to explain to my students. Would you object strenuously if I were to use it in my courses?
IDMike
April 16th, 2012, 04:51 PM
Had my first situation yesterday at an Underwater Easter Egg Hunt. I dove to 11ft to grab an egg off the bottom when suddenly my primary regulator started free flowing, I lost visibility, and panicked a little. I couldn't get it to stop, but I still had 2500psi, I understood that I could breathe and ascend but I couldn't see, my ascent was too fast and I did not like the state of mind I was in.
Overall the thought process was there but the pacing was all wrong and I wasn't sure enough of my ability to handle the situation. I'm not entirely sure I could have calmed myself down and avoided injury at any significant depth. I've been on 8 dives before this one (counting my 5 SD certification dives), so I know it's a matter of needing practice on my part but wow when anything goes wrong it really goes fast. Thanks for this thread. It's great to see people at a much higher level than myself still practicing safety drills and staying prepared.
NWGratefulDiver - Your flow chart is perfect.
NWGratefulDiver
April 16th, 2012, 05:09 PM
I love that flow chart Bob! It strikes just the right balance between humour and levity whilst clearly showing what I take many, many sentences to explain to my students. Would you object strenuously if I were to use it in my courses?
Be my guest ... I just created it in response to this thread ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
dumpsterDiver
April 16th, 2012, 06:02 PM
Recreational divers don't normally do this, but it might be useful to go through in your mind exactly what you would do when each piece of equipment fails. I actually do this myself, I do NOT like betting my life on any one piece of equipment or system.
None of us can survive all dives if everything fails, but we should be able to survive single item failures.. so WWYD:
Reg freeflows
Reg stops
BC starts inflating by itself.
You notice that you are at 100 feet and it is getting hard to breath and the guage is in the red.
mask strap breaks
regulator mouth piece falls off and you start choking
weight belt falls off (or if you are lucky you catch it on the back of your knees)
you get tangled in fishing line around the first stage and can't see it.
Fins strap breaks and you lose a fin.
You lose your buddy
You get lost underwater and have no idea where the anchor line is.
You jumped in and you forgot to turn your air on.
You are caught in a current that is taking you where you don't want to go.
You computer stops working or you can't understand it.
Your computer says you are in deco.
Your BC is leaking bad and not holding air.
Your dry suit gets ripped.
You are trying to make an exit on a rocky shore and the seas have increased dramatically.
A few sharks come around and appear agitated and aggressive.
A Moray eel tries to bite you (or does bite you)
You've totally exerted yourself and now find yourself gasping for air on the bottom and you begin to feel a strong (and natural) urge to bolt for the surface.
You've pulled yourself down an anchor line and when you get to the bottom, you find that you are drastically under-weighted.
You crawled under a ledge to catch a lobster and now you are wedged and seem stuck.
You come to the surface and there ain't no boat where you left it.
You've gone way deeper than you intended and you are scared and narced.
Then we can go into scenarios where your buddy has problems, does stupid things, requires help etc.
It probably helps to at least envision what you would do when stuff like this happens. And if you keep diving long enough, probably a lot of those things will happen sooner or later.
4sak3n
April 16th, 2012, 06:24 PM
Be my guest ... I just created it in response to this thread ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
I see. Well played sir.
Aqua-Andy
April 16th, 2012, 06:26 PM
Thank you for all of the responses. TS&M Hit it on the nail with what I was trying to get at. We can drill and practice all we can but the fact is, with any drill you know what is happening at the onset of the drill. Even in training you are expecting to have problems thrown at you. I guess we will just practice as we did before (maybe more often) and hope we are prepared for the day when it really does hit the fan. Bob thanks for the very entertaining flow chart, I'll have to attach it to a slate and keep it in with me.
Jim Lapenta
April 16th, 2012, 06:42 PM
In July I'm doing a workshop with Doppler to look at this kind of stuff. While geared towards tech divers I am seriously looking at taking the lessons learned and doing a similar type deal for recreational divers. Every OW diver should have some idea of what to do in an emergency and how to do it. The only way is practice and setting up scenarios and then doing them. It is no different than the rescue skills that used to be a part of every OW course. Now only a few have them.
richkeller
April 16th, 2012, 06:57 PM
If you practice your drills regularly and correctly, then any "real emergency" should just be another drill.
"Survival depends on being able to suppress anxiety and replace it with calm, clear, quick and correct reasoning..." -Sheck Exley
"Plans are useless but planning is everything."(Gen. Eisenhower) Practicing the same drill over and over again is useless because odds are it is never going to happen in exactly the same way you planned. More often then not it is going to be a couple of small, seemingly unrelated problems that occur the same time that will cause you the most trouble. Everyone understands what the big problems are and prepares for them but it is the small stuff that gets most people. Practice but change the drill every time. What you will end up practicing is how to problem solve under pressure, working the problem rather then have the problem work you to death.
Colo Hippie
April 16th, 2012, 07:17 PM
The first thing I do when getting ready to dive is to remind myself and my dive buddy to remain calm, remember where we are (diving) and think/talk through a few common scenario's. It works for me so I remember the basics.
sig_hup
April 16th, 2012, 08:03 PM
I have one that you won't believe...because I didn't believe it and it happened to me.
I was doing training to be a NAUI instructor and we were in an open water sample classes. We each had our skills we had to teach and were being drilled on what to do if a student has a problem. Well mine was to teach the out of air drill. I did mine then instructed the "student" who started to do the drill but then freaked out and paniced to get to the surface. They had their regulator in so I thought it was the "standard" freak out drill. Little did I know that they were actually out of air and bolted the 20' to the surface.
Well he was pissed, and I was confused as I had an extra regulator ready to hand to him.
Sabanist
April 18th, 2012, 09:02 PM
Recreational divers don't normally do this, but it might be useful to go through in your mind exactly what you would do when each piece of equipment fails. I actually do this myself, I do NOT like betting my life on any one piece of equipment or system.
None of us can survive all dives if everything fails, but we should be able to survive single item failures.. so WWYD:
Reg freeflows
Reg stops
BC starts inflating by itself.
You notice that you are at 100 feet and it is getting hard to breath and the guage is in the red.
mask strap breaks
regulator mouth piece falls off and you start choking
weight belt falls off (or if you are lucky you catch it on the back of your knees)
you get tangled in fishing line around the first stage and can't see it.
Fins strap breaks and you lose a fin.
You lose your buddy
You get lost underwater and have no idea where the anchor line is.
You jumped in and you forgot to turn your air on.
You are caught in a current that is taking you where you don't want to go.
You computer stops working or you can't understand it.
Your computer says you are in deco.
Your BC is leaking bad and not holding air.
Your dry suit gets ripped.
You are trying to make an exit on a rocky shore and the seas have increased dramatically.
A few sharks come around and appear agitated and aggressive.
A Moray eel tries to bite you (or does bite you)
You've totally exerted yourself and now find yourself gasping for air on the bottom and you begin to feel a strong (and natural) urge to bolt for the surface.
You've pulled yourself down an anchor line and when you get to the bottom, you find that you are drastically under-weighted.
You crawled under a ledge to catch a lobster and now you are wedged and seem stuck.
You come to the surface and there ain't no boat where you left it.
You've gone way deeper than you intended and you are scared and narced.
Then we can go into scenarios where your buddy has problems, does stupid things, requires help etc.
It probably helps to at least envision what you would do when stuff like this happens. And if you keep diving long enough, probably a lot of those things will happen sooner or later.
Whoa, that's a bunch but I'll try and please someone tell me where I go wrong
1. Keep it in my mouth, clear it in an attempt to correct the problem, get buddies attention, turn tank off then on again, abort the dive if all else fails
2. Switch to alternate, abort via cesa if air wont work
3. hold deflator button, hang on to buddy, abort dive
4. Get buddies attention, give ooa signal and get his reg, start controlled ascent
5. Manually hold mask to face, clear it, assess
6. This one is tricky, it depends on if i have any breath left and which is faster, first try to get aas, but I suppose I press the regs free flow button and hold it up to my mouth to breath manually
10. Look for a minute iaw the dive plan, surface and deploy smb
11. Same as above
12. Put snorkel in, turn it on
13. Let buddy know, swim out of it, reassess
14. Use other instruments, forget computer, ??
15. I don't know for sure but I would do a series of stops at ascending depths prior to safety stop
16. Fin my way to surface, if too negative, dump eights, of course always let buddy know
17. ??? Never dive dry
18. Tough, I might try to get to an alternate exit point with fewer rocks, go as far as I can subsurface
19. Try not to turn my back to them and get big and defensive in an attempt to deter them, make my way out of the water
20. If he tries, leave it be, if he does, assess the damage and get out of his ao
21. Stop, think, look at gauges to reassure myself, surface in control
22. Let buddy know and thumb dive
23. Don't panic, if necessary, remove bc and free myself, bang tank to alert others of my problem
24. Inflate bc, deploy smb, wait, if within a couple miles, start finning for shore
25. Don't panic, ascend, reassess, at least that's the idea
Bob DBF
April 18th, 2012, 10:19 PM
The trouble with sh** hitting the fan is (1) it is usually something that you are completely unprepared for - you can mitigate this with drills, but it is quite hard to plan for the unexpected, and (2) like the Titanic, every disaster usually involves a combination of more than one thing going wrong, and at least one or two bad decisions along the way.
We all know that you are not supposed to dive with a head cold. Or with a bit of gear held together by duct tape. Or using borrowed gear that doesn't fit well. Or ... etc. But we all do it from time to time.
Excellent points.
My personal rule is when the second issue occours, head back and be ready for the third, if it happens it will probably will be a gem. Before this rule I had some much more exciting dives than I do now.
Bob
------------------------------------
I may be old, but I’m not dead yet.
dumpsterDiver
April 18th, 2012, 10:24 PM
Whoa, that's a bunch but I'll try and please someone tell me where I go wrong
1. Keep it in my mouth, clear it in an attempt to correct the problem, get buddies attention, turn tank off then on again, abort the dive if all else fails
2. Switch to alternate, abort via cesa if air wont work
3. hold deflator button, hang on to buddy, abort dive
4. Get buddies attention, give ooa signal and get his reg, start controlled ascent
5. Manually hold mask to face, clear it, assess
6. This one is tricky, it depends on if i have any breath left and which is faster, first try to get aas, but I suppose I press the regs free flow button and hold it up to my mouth to breath manually
10. Look for a minute iaw the dive plan, surface and deploy smb
11. Same as above
12. Put snorkel in, turn it on
13. Let buddy know, swim out of it, reassess
14. Use other instruments, forget computer, ??
15. I don't know for sure but I would do a series of stops at ascending depths prior to safety stop
16. Fin my way to surface, if too negative, dump eights, of course always let buddy know
17. ??? Never dive dry
18. Tough, I might try to get to an alternate exit point with fewer rocks, go as far as I can subsurface
19. Try not to turn my back to them and get big and defensive in an attempt to deter them, make my way out of the water
20. If he tries, leave it be, if he does, assess the damage and get out of his ao
21. Stop, think, look at gauges to reassure myself, surface in control
22. Let buddy know and thumb dive
23. Don't panic, if necessary, remove bc and free myself, bang tank to alert others of my problem
24. Inflate bc, deploy smb, wait, if within a couple miles, start finning for shore
25. Don't panic, ascend, reassess, at least that's the idea
Well you tried .. there are way too many topics for one thread, but you did mess up big time on three of them, that I saw when scanning.. the first one shows that your OW training was really bad (or you forgot it)....
Inflator sticks.... press purge and or vent and disconnect inflator hose... this is a VERY common failure! You need to practice this and then do oral inflat..
Mouth piece falls off and you are having trouble...you do not signal to your buddy and try to get any help from him... you switch to your octopus and THEN communicate with your buddy..
If you are stuck and wedged under a ledge... it is 99.9% sure that you will not have room to remove bc/tank.... You have to push forward, grab the waist strap, do a pelvic thrust and then exhale and wiggle your butt and tank side to side and try to slip backwards... The last one is my own method...
If computer fails... well it depends on depth and time etc. Take a look at your buddy's computer and most people would abort the dive in a controlled manner....
mmcdanie
April 23rd, 2012, 01:35 PM
My buddy and I used this decision tree yesterday. Tank to yoke o-ring developed and slow leak half way thru the dive. We ended the dive right away. Saw this video of an o-ring replacement underwater, definantely out of my skill range and not something that I'd consider practicing. Is this an advanced skill that is taught in a certification?
changing O-ring 80 feet deep Holguin Cuba - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6JgLB7Nlns&feature=endscreen&NR=1)
fisheater
April 23rd, 2012, 01:50 PM
Doesn't sound particularly healthy for your reg, especially in saltwater.
