Tell us your most embarassing bloopers?

[newwavedivers]

Once, as a training divemaster, I was asked by my instructor to demonstrate clearing a partially flooded mask to a Korean girl doing the Discover Scuba Diving course.

I had problems communicating with this girl who does not really understand English well. Anyway, I slowly explained to her how to do the procedure and finally, both of us went underwater to kneel down and perhaps due to stress (I was nervous), I realized too late that I did not have my mask on. So I started giving her the sign that says "breathe in, breathe out." Of course the instructor was just beside and laughing his a-- off.

Anyway, we stood up again and I told her that we are going to kneel down again and do the skill. So we did and then I realized that, again, I did not have my mask on! Of course my instructor by this time was choking because of laughing too much.

:goofy:

[large_diver]

First boat dive after my AOW class -- I volunteered to navigate.....we surfaced 150 yards away from the boat because of my "outstanding" neophyte navigation skills. My buddy and I still laugh about it.

[King_Neptune]

Have you ever not seated everything properly and firmly before switching your freshly filled tank all the way on or maybe not checked those O-rings lately to make sure they are full of life and not all cracked out? Have you ever not done those things and about 3 seconds later you BLOW that O-ring into next week?

If you have been in that or a similar situation then you know that your heart flies out your chest and catches up or even passes that Time-Traveling O-Ring!

Now, if you haven't done this in the general airspace of a few dozen students getting ready to get in the pool for the first time and scared their fondest childhood memories right out of them, then you haven't really lived up to the full potential of just how embarrassed you can feel at this Frozen block of time.

While I was still in the Army, I often helped out at the local pool as I was placed in charge of some of the base physical fitness facilities.

Why is this so bad? Well, lets just say that they canceled ALL pool classes for the night because everyone refused to get back in the pool after TWO, Not Just 1 but 2, of the students had the "WARHAMMER Maneuver" scared out of them ...

I figured I now had Instructors, Students and probably the pool cleaner rather upset with me. There was 2 different dive shops sharing this pool and at first I thought they were rather upset that they now basically lost almost a full night that would have to be repeated ...

My saving grace...
The 2 "Party-Poopers" (sorry, couldn't help the pun) that soiled the evening, were a couple of Young "Butter Bars" ...
Which in the Army is a slang term used to reference the Bright Gold Bars on the shoulders of the first and lowest rank officer, a Lieutenant.

As many of the fresh Butter Bars did, these guys were cooler than cool and they knew EVERYTHING, just ask them! They acted like they thought they were Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer in "Top Gun" ... hitting on every female there and looking down their noses at everyone else.

The Lead Instructor for that group came over and told us all their story and how he had to warn them to stop harassing the ladies or he would kick them from the class, and also how they bragged to everyone that they looked so good because they were these super health nuts and ate all these Natural Foods, etc...

With tears in his eyes from laughing so hard, he then thanked me and said he would have paid untold fortunes to have had that on video!

When a few of the ladies had started to clap and everyone else joined in the applause, I couldn't help but laugh in almost painful relief!

Needless to say, that story lived on around there for a LONG time! Although most razzed me about being the hero of the day, I couldn't help but turn red everytime someone pointed me out...

=-)

[newwavedivers]

On my first ever course, I took out a couple of students on their first boat dive. I thought I did a pretty good job during the academic portion of the course and the confined water dive sessions.

Anyway, after we finished assembling and checking our equipment, I reminded them once again the value of checking equipment properly before diving all the time.

For no reason at all, one of the student's regulator started free-flowing. It should have been easy for me to open the regulator right there and clean it as the problem was most likely sand that got stuck somewhere. I didn't because I was totally stressed out. Did not even have spare equipment on board.

I ended up doing two dives, taking one down at a time.

Lessons learned:

Check equipment personally before the students arrive.
Carry spare equipment always.
Laugh about it and use it as an example to divemaster trainees.

:all:

[Walter]

............as a DM on a boat in the Keys. We were running a tad late getting in from the morning trip, so the afternoon crowd was waiting to load when we arrived at the dock. The switch from morning to afternoon divers went smoothly.

We were ready to go with about 20 divers on the boat and about 20 on the dock. I was standing on the dock to untie the boat. As I finished the last line I pushed the bow out from the dock to make the departure easier. As I pushed, I stepped on the gunwale. Normally, I'd walk to the rear of the cabin where the railing drops to a height of 4 inches over the gunwale and step into the boat. On this particular day, there were several divers working on their gear at that place. Rather than disturb them, I continued walking to the stern where there were no people in my way.

As I reached the stern, I lost my balance and fell overboard. As I was falling, I saw that 4 inch high rail and made a grab for it. I was able to snag it and swing around to stick a perfect landing on the swim platform. The dock erupted in applause, but I was sneaking a look up to the bridge hoping the captain hadn't seen it. I knew if John had seen my screw up, I'd never live it down. Turns out, he did see me, but since in his words, "It looked like you planned it." he never gave me a hard time about falling overboard.

WWW™

[Mario S Caner]

A couple of years ago while diving in San Clemente I was geared up and waiting for my buddy to get his gear and video camera ready to hit the water. Since I had to wait a couple of more minutes I had my Oakley sunglasses on and just chilled out and socialized. Well when he was ready he jumped on in and wanted to video tape my entry to start his recording.

Well, somehow I left my Oakley's around my neck when I did my giant stride entry, which my buddy was quick to point out... on film. Without skipping a beat I took my mask off and put my Oakley's on and proceeded to dive with them on. Thus what could have been a sticky, embarassing situation was avoided.


One other trip where we were gearing up in realtively heavy seas to complete a deep technical dive, I made a very embarassing mistake.

When you have multiple cylinders and you gear up, you sit down, don your straps and then get up and throw yourself overboard... Well I sat down, donned my gear, got all of my accessories and regulators situated just as I liked them and looked up to see a couple of the guys snickering... I quickly found out what they found so amuzing when I tried to get up. Turns out I forgot to undo the bungee cords that kept my gear from rolling around the boat. Doh! what a rookie mistake. They laughed, and I reluctantly joined in... :Peace:

[caymancase]

We ended up with an extra diver on our boat for our morning trip and didn't have enough tanks on board so we decided to borrow a couple of tanks off of a friends boat. With my boyfriend driving our boat and me being the "borrower" we pulled up to our friends boat. I deftly (yea right!) grabbed onto to other boat and ended up hanging by the railing! With no footholds, thank you very much. My BF, being the comedian that he is, thought this was great and left me hanging for awhile! As I yelled in my best "Dudley- Do Right Nell" voice "Help..help" our boat full of divers and all the people on the beach laughed uproariously. Oh Brother! He finally "rescued" me.. what a guy!
And, Mario, I'm always "trying"(not on purpose) to dive with my Oakleys on... get ready to make that giant stride and..oops! Casey

[Tom]

I came up from the first dive of the day and flipped my weight pockets on the back of the boat. When the ladder cleared I slipped out of my BC, which was immediately grabbed by the mate, then climbed aboard. I helped my wife do the same and headed for front of the boat to get my glasses. As I passed the seating area, the mate was already putting my weight pockets back in and hanging the BC on the back of my seat. Came back with my glasses and a new air tank was in position. Fifteen dives over a few months with this boat, mate and divemaster without a hitch.

After lunch we got ready for number 16. Checked my equipment, weights were in properly, velcro stuck, handles handy, etc. Put in some air and did a giant stride. Floated comfortably for a few minutes until everybody was wet and the new guy did another equipment check with the divemaster.
Then with a pull on the air dump and a full exhale everybody but me disappeared under the waves. I just bobbed like a cork. Seems I'd checked everything about the weights except whose weights I had. I swam back to the boat and got some more weights and quickly caught up with group. No current, 35 feet so I just dropped straight down and they were waiting. One of the other guys had figured it out quickly when the 12 extra pounds got him to the bottom in about 1.7 seconds.

Now I have my name on the handles. I'll probably find something else dumb to do someday, but that won't happen again.

Tom

[DEEP SEA]

As a United States Navy Divers, we trained with different countries on occasion. This was one of those times. The Indian Navy sent over some commandos to cross train. They were to take basic scuba. It was early in training, you know the times, clear the mask drill. This one guy would go underwater and take forever to clear his visor or mask whatever you want to call it. As soon as he surfaced the Chief in charge of training would yell at him to go down and do it again. He kept taking forever and each time the Chief would fire back again, again. Finally, after about 5 times the diver surfaced and the Chief barked AGAIN. :fury: The student sadly looked up and in his best English said, "Please Chief, I cannot drink any more water". :bonk:

This guy was pulling his face mask down past his mouth and drinking the water out of the mask to clear it!

[turnerjd]

Teaching neophytes to fill tanks...........

We had gone away for a w/end with some people in our club that had just finished their O/W, and were doing their first 'recreational' (rather than training) w/end. We always tried to get little extra bits in, so I was explaining how to fill tanks from the coin operated filling station.

There we were, I explained about looking at the O-ring to make sure it was sealing, took it out showed them, and it was fine, so it went back in. We then put the filling whip over the valve and did it up, coins in and away we went.
*Bang*
- the o-ring blew immediately. OK says I this sometimes happens, close all valves, take off whip, replace o-ring with one from my save a dive kit. Put whip back on again, and open valves.
*Bang*
-New o-ring blows. Hum, a bit unusual says I, valves off, fit another o-ring, and valves open again.
*Bang*
- o-ring number 3 blown, neophytes start laughing, close valves, look up at what the neophytes are laughing at

- big notice on the SIDE of the compressor that I hadn't seen saying that number 1 whip (that I had been using) was damaged and wouldn't seal.

Did I feel like a prat or what!

Jon T

[detroit diver]

nt

[Mario S Caner]

I agree with Detroit Diver, I'm still rolling! I'll always remember that one!

[newwavedivers]

:goofy: I'm going nuts!

How about these?

- Ever seen a diver wearing shorty coming out after a confined water session with chocolate dripping down to his legs...??? (know what I mean?)

- A divemaster forgot to change his tank and was down to 60 bars. He was going to guide a couple on a deep dive (120'). After the dive, he came up with 50 bars of air still in his tank. Turns out he was using the alternates of the couple without them even knowing.

- On a private dive, ever seen a diver swimming with only one fin? Hehehe, funny site. Guess it's not funny for him because he has to buy all of us a case of beer as penalty for forgetting a piece of personal equipment.

I tell you guys, diving is fun... sometimes from the things other people or us do.

Enjoy!

P.S. I like that oring going BANG BANG BANG 3x. :goofy:

[DEEP SEA]

One time my partner and I was going to be interviewed by a local news paper. The paper was going to shoot stills of us underwater in a local High School swimming pool. As we were getting ready, the High School swim team was sitting in bleachers near the pool watching us. I went to put on my Viking Dry suit which I had not worn for a while and the entire neck-dam came off on my head. It stuck look gooey putty on my head and hair. I told the news report they will have take the pictures of my partner because I couldn't dive my suit. My partner made fun of me and said, come on, just put the suit on, who cares if it floods, were only in a pool. Sounded OK to me, I'd just strip down and get in. So I put the suit on and finished suiting up. The Latex hood part of the suit seemed to be working fine. Due to the fact I was using an AGA full face mask, it sealed up the suit and kept the water out.

I jumped in and sat on the bottom waiting for my partner and the news shooter. After about 5 minutes I called up to the topside help via underwater communications to find out what was up and where my partner was. I was told he was hamming it up in front of the kids. Well about 2 minutes later I saw this big splash and in came my partner. As he swam up I could not believe my eyes, his dry suit was not zipped up! :all: That was not the worst, he had kept on his street clothes showing off in front of the students. His shirt and sweater was bubbling out the back of the suit. When I told him he let out a string of words I can't even start to put down on paper. He told me to quickly zip up the suit (like it was going to help). I tired but only managed to mingle his shirt and sweater in the zipper. Now for the good part.

He went over to the pool ladder and was trying to get out. He must of weighed about 400 pounds. He looked like that little dough-boy pizza kid on the TV commercials. As he was struggling to get out, his tank fell out of the back pack and start hanging him. I jumped up behind him and gave him a big push and he flopped on the pool deck like a big whale. As he was laying down deflating and water pouring out everywhere, one of the kids in the bleachers yelled out, "Hey mister, what kind of suit is that?" Without hesitation, my partner blurted out, "It's a dry suit".

The news paper lady looked at me with my hair still full of sticky Latex and my partner dripping wet and asked, "Are you sure you're professionals?"

[Mario S Caner]

DeepSea, tell me it ain't so! LOL! Another good one. We have to start logging all of these good ones down... what would be even better is if you have a copy of the tape handy... LOL!

[Swamp Rat]

Deep Sea that was a great story I could just picture that.

[got4boyz]

This was a great post to read. Thank goodness I don't have anything to share "yet", but I'm sure it'll happen in time since I've very new to this! :)

[DEEP SEA]

Come on guys, I know you have to have some funny stuff to share! Lets have some fun with this one.

[scubabunny]

Ok..how about this one. Here you are, working in a retail diveshop. You just finish helping the last couple drop lots of money on 2 complete sets of dive equipment. And, they trust you...cause you are a professional and know what you're talking about. And they leave for that evening's boat dive very happy.

Now, remember, you work in a dive shop so therefore, you forget what its like to dive (off a boat at least...cause you are always working!) Well, believe it or not, a spot opens up at the last minute on this boat dive, so you close the store, close the register, and you stop at the house and get your gear to get to the boat before it leaves the dock.

You get there...breathe a sigh of relief..and get your gear set up. And you know what you are doing...cause you are a professional. Now...you look at your gear, and something just doesn't seem right. So you check your air...and you check your BC..and everything seems fine. Then you have your dive buddy check everything. You have air...inflater is hooked up...computer is working. Then the Captain looks at it and says "so, is this a new aerodynamic way to dive?"

Here, I..the dive professional..hooked up my gear backwards, with the tank facing away from the BC and the screw nob on the first stage aimed towards the back of my head! (Like I said, I didn't get out much, and I was "stressed")

The couple I just helped spend lots of money on gear just looked at me...and looked at their gear...and just, sort of smiled...and double checked everything!

That about says it all! (hangs her head in shame!)

[got4boyz]

Good one Scubabunny! I did the exact same thing this past weekend in my refresher course.

Of course I had more on an excuse! ;) I got certified two years ago, went on a dive trip to Cozumel and haven't been diving since!

[scubabunny]

thanks alot honey...you made me feel soooooo much better!
*grins and winks*

Seriously, it was a stupid thing to do...but believe me, I am now completely paranoid about that!

[King_Neptune]

LOL

I don't know anyone that hasn't done that AT LEAST once .. hehe

=-)

[DiverCCRN]

OK, here goes....

Myself and a couple friends decide to do a NJ Shore tour of beach dives over the course of a weekend. We each have 4 tanks and bunches of gear including my new lift bag that I wanted to try out.

One of the dive sites is the Manasquan Inlet Train Bridge dive. This is a tide dependent dive and visibilities are usually terrible. Anyways, this site is on our list so we all gear up, I strap my new liftbag to my BC and wait for slack time. We hop in and all head straight for the bottom, which is only about 20-30 feet. I take out my shovel tool and start digging in the mud got the heck of it and I hit something hard. I uncover some of the top and side to find its the shape of a chest with rope handles.I clip on my new 100lb lift bag to the rope handle and put some air in it as I try to alert my buddies that I needed help digging this box out.

We all surfaced with this box still stuck in the mud and my lift bag still clipped on and FULL of air... this thing wasn't moving. I told my friends about the box and notions of a "Treasure Chest" start swimming around in our minds and things get frantic. I go back to my truck and grab a second 50lb lift bag and jump back into the now 0ft vis after digging in the mud. Thank got the lift bag clipped on is bright yellow. After clipping on my second bag and filling it full we continue digging the Treasure Chest free. After freeing the chest fromteh mud and 150 lbs of lift on it, Its still not floating. I grab on to the other side and hand my weight belt to my buddy to hold and I inflate my 30lb BC full and am able to get this thing moving towards shore.

A short swim to the beach and 3 people drag it up on the beach. We all look at it with gold coins in our eyes... as we start to wipe the mud off we see are able to see what it is...

It said AC DELCO MARINE BATTERY. All that work for NOTHING. Oh well... the lift bag worked anyways.

[DevilTron]

I was watching experimented divers dive under the ice of Lac Delage in Québec, Canada when the people around started laughing.

One of the divers, a woman with already 200 dives, just got out of the water saying her lamp wasn't working. The dive master checked it and told her:

"You bring a lamp under water without checking it before?!"

We started laughing.

Then the dive master cried in laughter and told her:

"Even worse! You bring a lamp under water WITHOUT BATTERIES! Don't told anybody but she has 200 dives done!"

hehe well I TOLD you

[DameDykker]

I once was on a dive with potential currents leading to open water and a lane for large ships. Therefore, each buddy pair was carring a surface buoy. I was carrying the one for my team. To free my hands during entry I cliped the inflated buoy to my BCD. Then when we wanted to descend my buddy went down all-right but I just couldn't get under. Even trying a jack-knife didn't do it. Actually I tried several times before I remembered the buoy, which was right in my face! Embarassing.

DSAO

[DEEP SEA]

DSDAO, your buoy experience brought to mind one of my many exciting diving experiences. Many years ago when Viking Dry Suits first came out I was given one to wear when I demonstrate equipment. I was told you have to wear a lot more weight when diving one. Well, what is a lot more weight? I figured 60 lbs would do, and it did. I stepped off the back of the boat and the next thing I knew I was standing on the bottom (about 50 fsw) knee deep in silt mud. :confused: Mistake 2: I figured with a dry suit and that great valve that filled you up with air, you did not need a BC. So, standing on the bottom I start putting in the air. Wow, before long, I was weightless, kind of hovering over the bottom. Felt a little big however. Well, I saw a nice lobster in a hole and went for it. My feet went over my head and to my surprise, all the air filled my legs up about 10 times their size. Of course it blew my fins off. By the time I did all the stuff they told me to do in the event you ever have a blow up (knees to the chest, bla, bla, bla) I was breaching the surface. For those who were lucking enough to be looking to the port at the time I blew to the surface, they got to see a giant, orange whale pop out about 2 feet out of the water (so everyone said).:loopy:

That was the fastest ride to the surface I ever had!

[Fishkiller]

Before my OW class which was to start in a month I rented a wet suit and went out to the lake to swim around I stopped at a place that not only divers used but fishermen shore fished, I made a mental note not to swim near them so not to get them mad or scare off any fish. I swam this way that way did serval snorkle clearing manuvers then my son wanted to go fishing got out changed clothes and was getting ready to get the fishing gear when here walks this same family that I saw and heard, while snorkling, carrying a bucket of fish, I asked them how the fishing was? what they used for bait? ect. when the father says "fishing was pretty good until this ()*&^*(&%swimmer scared all the fish away ". my son didn't hear those words as he was still changing his clothes.

now being a large guy 6'2" 280 lbs I smiled and replied "don't you mean the Whale." that mans eyes open so wide stepped back as his wife dropped her ice chest gasped. I laughed out loud and said "hey if your son thought I looked like a whale then I probly did, he's honest"

he apologized so many times I lost count

and I will not wear all black anymore.

[Remora]

Deep Sea your story about you and your buddy has got to be the best I've heard in a while!! I have a coupla experiences of my own to relate. Just between us right!! :)

The first takes place on a picture perfect day about 6 miles off shore with a boat full of hard core techies. On this boat it is not uncommon for even the slightist mistake not to go unnoticed and be the cause of much good natured ribbing for the rest of the season! I was a little preoccupied by diving a new computer and had spent an inordinate amount of time figuring out the profile manually, once done I checked and rechecked my rig, geared up and was first over the side. My longtime buddy was right behind me and we went through our inwater check in practiced precision. Once complete we started the descent...started the descent...to no avail, well there is still a weight belt nailed up to the Capt's cabin with my name on for all to see!! Talk about being humbled!!

The next event of noteworthy mention happened while I was asked to stand in for an instructor who couldn't dive to finish off his AOW class. We were doing the deep and wreck dives off a RHIB. I got the call and hustled down to the shop to pack my gear. Headed off to the warf where said instructor had the RHIB and students all ready to go. I quickly assembled my gear put it abaord then attempted to don my drysuit... only catch here was that I had grabbed the shop owner's wifes suit instead of mine! The students ( who were a little bit edgy anyway) were mortified! The instructor boat drive offered up his 4/3mm that he had worn for boat driving duty to which I accepted. The water at depth was 42 deg F, to this day these students still remark at how blue I was at 90'! I just tell them it was narcosis and the effects of light refraction that made them see the pretty shade of blue!!!

Not to be overly long here but the last one I will relate to this very private forum happened while I was conducting an O/W class. We were all kneeling on the bottom of the pool and doing reg R & R. This one lady removed the reg and replaced it seemed to gag a bit then returned the OK sign. I asked her to do the skill again as I wasn't satisfied she was comfortable with the skill. Again the same results. Again I asked her to do the skill again, she refused by shaking her head no and developed rather large eyes. On seeing this we stood up and I asked her what the problem was, it seems she was inhaling before exhaling and didn't like the taste of chlorinated water!!

Good people good times!

[got4boyz]

Reading all of these has been very funny! It will help me not feel so bad when I finally do something really stupid! LOL

Being pretty new to all of this, I'm sure it won't be long! :)

[DivingGal]

Like got4boyz, I can't claim a real "embarrasing" moment -- yet. But I know, my turn will come. I've helped a few newbies out of potentially - well red faces - in fact just last Saturday. The very last o/w (confined of course), one of the students is getting his gear together, when I heard the cry of "oh no" then *!&@*!&@. I hurried over, figuring equipment failure, but no. Much to my relief it was a case of "I forgot my swimsuit". You have to remember that it's the dead of winter here, so any of his street clothes were not appropriate as a temp solution. Fortunately for him, I had been trying on a dry suit earlier, and had brought my skin to help out the fitting. We all had a giggle, although the main colour is black, the accent is sort of a zebra stripe. We called him "Tarzen" for the class.

Some of the tales here have kept me laughing!

[Swamp Rat]

Wasnt mine but another guy. During ow check out. Everyone had their gear on for check out and being sure to do everything right. The dive master looks down at a couple of guys and said "those calf pads on your wet suits works much better as knee pads".

[tgreaves]

ok ok.. heres a good one.. In the water, ready to go with fins on and everything.. Except for my regulator.. And no, Im not a padi diver (people have asked me before when I tell them the story)

[scubadweeb]

Though I'm not a professional diver, during a trip aboard LCDII many (I fear) suspected I was the professional entertainment...

While surfacing from a wonderful dive I noticed there were some pretty hefty swells above. Having never before experienced such rough seas, my entrance onto the boat was quite eventful. Instead of hanging onto the rope tied onto the ladders & waiting for a calm moment to go up, I grabbed onto the ladder (for dear life) and was rocked & beaten for a good minute! It wasn't funny then however, it is now. I learned a lot from that day and worse yet - my husband caught the whole event on tape. The crew wanted a copy to demonstrate to other new divers how NOT to come aboard!

If that weren't enough, the last day of the trip the seas were so rough, we had to head back early. We couldn't dock the boat (because of rough seas) so we were going to go to shore via a dinghy. With complete grace & style that only a clutz like me can muster I placed one foot into the dinghy while leaving my other foot firmly on the big boat! Needless to say, the boats began to separate and within a few seconds my bottom was "dern" near touching the ocean & I accomplished something I hadn't been able to do since I was 10...the splits! All turned out well in the end - only my pride was hurt...

[OceanSpirit]

Back in the dim and distant past when I was still dry behind the ears, I went diving in Tenerife. There were 8 guys on the boat on this day and I had the distinct impression I was the least experienced. All had top line kit and the air of quiet professionalism. I, on the other hand, started off by connecting up my reg 1st stage round the wrong way and only discovered my mistake when I found that my 2nd stage and octopus were on the left. With that sorted out, I flopped into the water and lost my cylinder and weightbelt. Luckily, the belt narrowly missed the guide and the tank was hanging off the BCD strap. The other guys tried to help but were hampered by the fact that they couldn't stop laughing. I am wiser now.............honest!

[DrAtomic]

Gotta share this one... on my own account... ;)

About my 20th dive or so and into my AOW course the instructor allowed me to plan and guide the group (with him behind the group) on a reef we dived about 4~5 times earlier. I was really excited, did my pre-checks and buddy checks, everything fine... Since I was leading the group I had to go in first. I jumped in, signalled ok, took my regulator out, and all of the group jumped in. I signalled to start diving, everybody ok-ed, and there I went...
I cleared my ears (tough ear drums, need to clear often) and took my first breath of air at about 2 meters down and took in a lot of water... In all the excitement I'd forgotten to place my regulator back into my mouth and still had my snorkel in my mouth... :eek:

I popped out of the water again, placed my regulator back in and when I came underwater and joined the group there where a lot of flooding masks around me... :rolleyes: Boy did I feel embarased...

Right up untill this day my girlfriend asks me kindly before every dive with a veeeeeery big smile 'Don't you forget to put your regulator in?'

DrAtomic

[Cactusdiver1]

My most embarrassing moment was just after being certified in 1980. Being a young single guy and the same with my dive partner Bert, we went to a Friday night showing of the movie The Deep. Knowing that the movie kinda freaked me out, being a new diver and all, Bert and I decided that a spur of the moment road trip to California for a day of diving was just the thing to prove our male macho level.

We jumped into his MGB convertible and cruised to San Diego.
( save your trip to profiles..I live in Arizona) Anyway..I wear glasses. Back then I didn't wear contacts and was too new to know anything about prescription mask lenses ( like I could have afforded them anyway)... so diving was a up close sport for me, with anything in the distance being a blur.

Stay with me..I'm getting there.... anyway we leave the beach and swim into the bay...Bert and I are pointing out different things to each other. All of a sudden Bert points to something ahead of me. I saw a fish and gave him the typical "ok" cool sign.

Bert shakes his head and "firmly" points again. I look harder and see some type of underwater plant and again give him the typical "ok" cool sign.

Again, Bert shakes his head 'NO" and very firmly points ahead of me. I squint and look..and slowly start to see what turns out to be a large fishing net stretched across an area in front of me...I start to give Bert the ol' "OK..I see it when he is still pointing at the net.... as I swim closer I see a large item...fish type item...looks kinda black, 5ish feet long....big fins on back....BIG FINS ON BACK!

All the thoughts of The DEEP came flooding back (sorry about the pun) and the first thought was SHARK :sharky:

The second thought was if there is one...there is more.

I hit the surface and swam back to shore , as Bert describes it, "leaving a wake that you could water ski on". Hitting the shore wasn't good enough.. I continued to crawl about as far up the beach as possible.

Being the good dive buddy that I was , I then looked back to see where Bert was. Bert was on the surface laughing so hard he was swallowing water. You see, Bert has good eyesight under water. He saw several things I couldn't...one was it was a dolphin, not a shark. Two, was that it was very much dead, and the movement was simply the current moving it in the net.

He also got a great view of my face and my immediate exit of the immediate area....all the way to shore.

Bert wasn't the only ones entertained, as the beach was pretty crowded that Saturday.
:snorkel:

[Cactusdiver1]

One more....

One very funny time for me didn’t even include water, but desert mountain countryside. Living in Arizona, carrying a gun in your vehicle was/is a normal way of life. :makeday:

Back in the very early 1980’s, I ran across a guy who was in the Coast Guard and had acquired some scuba gear as payment for a debt. He didn’t dive, and didn’t want/need the gear.

Trying to figure out what I could do to get the gear, I mentioned trading for something. After discussing what few items I had, we settled on a 6-shot revolver that I carried in my car. In Arizona we have to protect ourselves from snakes, mountain lions, wild dogs, drunk cowboys etc.

Anyway, this particular weekend, my dive partner Bert and I were on a camping trip to the mountains with our “fiancés”. :1st: After some great grilled steaks, and a couple (who counts) of beers, we all crashed for the night inside the one big tent that we had brought.

At about 2AM, all hell broke loose as some drunk cowboys in a 4-wheel drive truck of some type decided to turn the camping area into the Baja 1000 off-road race. Whoopin & hollerin’, racing the engine while spinning donuts in the dirt, the noise was scary enough being in the tent. All of a sudden they let loose with what ever fire power they happened to have firing shots into the air from several weapons.
:mgun:

Protecting our ladies in distress, waiting for either a 4X4 to come over the tent or bullets ripping through the canvas, I started thinking about how vulnerable I felt “unarmed”. Right about that time, from Bert’s side of the tent I heard "a hell of a lot of good your scuba equipment is going to do us now” .
:whack:

[PhotoTJ]

Back in 99 I had a nice little Bayliner 35 in Marina del Rey, and I 'used it to my advantage', shall we say, with a few ladies in a local bar. (Stand up to leave, mention loudly, "I'm gonna go crash on my yacht" Oh yeah, not enough o's in Smo-o-o-o-oth!)

I execute this ploy to perfection one evening, and the young lady in question would just love to cruise around the marina a few times. OK. (Cue ominous music) I turn on the blowers, crank the engines, and away we go. (At this point I should mention, I had only owned the boat for a month.)

As we are motoring out, the starboard engine dies, the handling gets a little squirrlly, the port engine dies, and we are drifting towards a buoy. I go to the bow and push off, promptly fall overboard, and the breeze blows my boat and company away from me. I hear her say, "Are you ok? What fell in?"

I catch the boat, drag myself aboard, saying, "Me! Are you impressed yet?" She found this funny, or so I judged by her collapsing on the deck, laughing till her face hurt.

Fortunatly, I had towels, and a couple changes of clothes on board.

First thing the next morning I had the boat tuned up.

Not enough o's in Smo-o-o-o-ooth!:D

[VaScubaGirl]

Ok so a bunch of us were reef diving and one girl spies an arrow crab and plucks it up and puts it on her palm to looka t it better. The poor thing is visibly shaking and all of a sudden...WOOSH out of nowhere this fish snatches the crab out of her hand...it's little legs just wigglin' out of it's mouth. She had this "oh my gosh I murdered a crab" look on her face and we laughed so hard that there was more than one regulator that went flying!

[bermudaskink]

Fall off boat to do a deep dive in Dominican Republic. Going in a team of three. My two buddies were quite rude and did not wait for me and began their descent in the murky water before I had even hit the surface. All of a fluster I checked my gear and began my descent. Upon arrival at the bottom my masked had fogged up badly and I realised I had forgotton to spit it in and rinse it. I had to keep flooding and clearing to keep it from fogging up. Eventually I got so sick of flooding and clearing every 10 seconds and I wondered how I could get my spit onto my mask while underwater.

:doh:


I had a wonderful idea! I took my mask right off, pulled the skirting back and licked the inside all over. Then replaced it. Alas it did not work and I later realised that I was narced - what a stupid idea!!!!!. :bonk:

You should have seen the look on my buddies faces! After the dive they asked me "where did you learn that method of mask defogging?". I told them I was just trying it out and that it worked really well and they said one day they would have to try it themselves! Ha ha - that'll teach them not to leave their buddies at the surface!! :)

[Boogie711]

Just so you know - licking your mask works. I do it all the time.

To defog, you need a surface surfactant (sp) to break up the water condensation. Spit saliva vs tongue saliva - it's all saliva that acts as a defog. The saliva doesn't care how it gets there.

Multiple references to mask licking here... (http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=29574&perpage=20&display=&pagenumber=2)

[bermudaskink]

OMG! That's funny that it actually works for some! :) I hadn't ever heard of it working before.

NetDoc and you had the same weird imagination as me :) but for me and others it hasn't workedl. My guess is that the sea water gets all round your tounge and prevents enough spit getting onto the mask. NetDoc and you may have super spit or very talented tongues or something.... who knows?

I have since recommended it to others for a laugh and they have pushed me overboard after trying it out on a dive cos it didn't work at all.

It's pure entertainment to watch your buddy lick their mask underwater.

;)

[diverrick]

While I was still a young pup of 17, I was a cadet in the local Fire Dept, that had a underwtaer search and rescue outfit
My best friend and I had enrolled in a OW class, in order to dive with the outfit. We were allowed to go along for the training dives, but no tanks until we were certified. so My friend and I were just snorkeling around. The drill was to search for a ficticious aircraft that had supposedly gone down in the quarry. After a hour of searching, one of the divers asked if a car, would do, as he had found one down there. They hooked a reference line down to the rear bumper, and were working on running the plates thought the police to see who it belonged, to. My buddy and I got permission to hold our breath and go down to look at it. we were really excited to do this, as it was after a"car" so down we both went. I was in the lead on the rope. I knew what we were going to see, but the terrain was not even, and there was a knob with a bush on top, we had to go over, following the rope. when I topped over the rope I ran straight into a green slimy, chrome, and red thing (the tail light) It scared the bejesus out of me, and I couldn't get out of the water fast enough. I didn't care what anyone else thought, I was getting out of there. Turns out, my buddy had the same reaction. the whole dive team got a belly full of laughs when they saw up coming up like twin polaris missles. Kinda embarrasing for two macho young man.

[ScubaJewel]

I led a trip to the tropics of about 10 people. I was diving in just my swimsuit (no wet suit) Somehow I didn't get my weightbelt on tight enough and while standing on the back of the boat and after making sure I had everyones attention I began giving instructions to my group when my weightbelt slipped off of my hips pulling my bikini bottom off with it.

The two male divemasters from the charter company quickly dropped to their knees to help untangle my bikini from my weightbelt as I stood there trying to cover myself up.

Its a story I still hear about from time to time.

Julie

[Seadiver5]

I was diving in the tropics in a current swept area, the divemaster told us to jump in and swim quickly to the bottom.

I deflated my BC all the way and jumped in. I thought it was a little hard submerging but I wrote it off to the current. The dive went fine until I realized I forgot my weightbelt on the boat.

I cut my dive very short so I didn't need to make a safety stop and I headed up, Feet first, Kicking to slow my ascent. It all worked fine and It has never happened again...

Kevin

[Sebastian]

On my first ever scuba dive on the Great Barrier Reef. I was 12 years old at that time.

I was waiting at the back of the boat ready to jump in. In the water just a bit submerged I saw the divemaster and a girl doing a regulator drill.

I saw her take her regulator out of her mouth and put it back in.
"Hmm I thought...piece of cake...now i'm gonna impress the DM"

So when it was my turn to jump in and he looked at me (just a few inches below surface) I proudly took out my regulator and suddenly there were bubbles everywhere

I obviously held the mouthpiece upwards...gave me quite a shock
Other than that everything went fine :)

[ScubaJewel]

A similar thing happened to me on my first check out dive Sebastian but I was 22 at the time but I acted like I was 12...

Julie

[doole]

Right, so I'm on a dive boat in Panama, about to do a dive in some fairly fast water, but I'm reasonably confident. Done lots of fast water.

So I'm all geared up and sitting in the tender, we stop at the reef, the helmsman is working like a dog to keep the boat centered and saying things like, "water good, rocks bad."

I chuckle in my usual suave way, put one hand on my mask and reg, the other on the back of the mask strap and back roll in. The very last thing I see, a millisecond before the water washes over my mask, is my boots sillouetted against the sky - with no fins on them.

I just managed to snag the end of the tow rope as I rocketed past and hauled my panting self back to the boat to get my fins.

[chrpai]

Once at the surface with a 7mil hood on and water in my ears I could hear a reg slightly freeflowing but I couldnt tell from where. I said to my buddy someones reg is freeflowing to which he not so kindly pointed out that it was me.

BTW has anyone else noticed that some of the more vocal know-it-alls around here are remaining suprisingly quiet?

[El Orans]

During a practice session my buddy gave me her regulator a part of a buddy-breathing exercise. For some strange reason, yet unknown, I thought it was her octopus so I didn't give it back... After all there was no need to, right?

A good thing we were practising in the shallow end of the pool...

[Mobius1]

ok.. heres one really stupid thing i did on a kyack trip

i ran over a stump and kind of sank my kyack and yelled out over the raido

"this is the flaming-anus calling i am sinking going down fast! need help over."(dont ask why its named the flaming anus)

but the troop came round the bend and they were cracking up cus i was on the stern, the bow of it was sunk and they just reamed me for it..

now i did this same thing again only this time i forgot to close the 3 inch drain in the stern of my kyack and i ahd to go through surf to dive. and the kyack started to sink. as this happened i was busy donning my gear and i strapped myself in my seat on my kyack broke my paddle down to one blade
i grabbed my friends 2 50 pound lift bags and put them on the bow and stern inflated them
but my boat was still 3 feet under
so i resorted to paddleing with my hands.

my friend was too busy laughing like a mad man at my perdicament to help me into shore. so now my friend always bugs me when kyacking using the nickname he gave me.... which is in the third person and it pisses me off when he refers to me this way "the sub captin who needed water wings"

they never will forget that heh.

[chrpai]

(dont ask why its named the flaming anus)



You aren't getting off that easy! WHY is it called the flaming a***?

[Mobius1]

well its a long story(not really)

well on a trip 2 years ago they called my boat the flaming anus because i had to do the old squat and dump method and i lit the crap onfire with white gas.. so the others saw it and they called my boat the flaming anus..


When your scout's you do such stupid things that you cant comprehend them a lot of the time.

[frankzeg]

Stupid stuff checklist for myself:
trying to use snorkel instead of regulator: check
diving into water with sunglasses instead of mask: check
forgetting weight belt: check
forgetting fins: check
closed cross-over valve on doubles- yielding impressive air consumption: check
forgetting drysuit inflator hose hook-up: check

I think my favorite was on a dive trip to the Coronado Islands. While rigging tank I stepped away for just a sec only to see the BC/tank tumble to the deck. Quickly recovering I grabbed it up and proceeded to finish gearing up. Got in water and all seemed OK at first but darn it did seem like I was having to kick to stay at the surface. By my BC is inflated right? Wrong. Amazing how much air can leak out of a punctured BC bladder with just a teeny hole. By sheer coincidence that hole was right at the top- just where the regulator would pinch it if it happened to fall. This pretty much ended that dive day.

I think making these mistakes is good for you: it keeps you humble- at least for a while.

[H2Andy]

well, on my sixth or seventh OW dive, my buddy and i got to the anchor line
to start our descent, and he said he was having trouble getting negative and
sinking. so i said, hey, i have no trouble with that, look at me and do what i do.

so... i get vertical (one hand on the line) and de-inflate my BC. nothing. i exhale
all the way. nothing. i am turning blue holding my breath out. nothing. i can't sink.

waddle waddle waddle, head down this time. i kick, my fins flapping out of the water.
nothing. this is ridiculous.

so i grab a hold of the line with both hands. yank myself down the line. it's like
i am trying to crawl UP a vertical wall, that's how hard it is. and the whole time, i
just want to pop back up to the surface.

luckily, at about 15 feet, my brain turned on.

i had forgotten to put on my weight belt.

my buddy laughed his **** off while i had to climb back on the boat, put the belt
on, and get back in the water.

[6Gill]

On a recent dive trip to the Mexico's Yucatan Pn. my dive partner and I were the first off the boat into the water. We were waitng for the rest of the group to enter (to include the DM). My dive partner suggested that I switch to snorkle, which I did. Now normally, I never switch to a snorkle after entry from a boat. Soooooo.....guess what! When my partner gave me the signal she wantedl to descend, I let out all my air (BC & Chest) and started to descend. Much to my suprise, my first breath was pretty wet. I had to resurface coughing and sputtering to switch to my regulator! I really doubt that I will switch to snorkle on boat entries much in the future. :snorkels:

Oh and the sunglass thing....yeah me too! As a young Deputy Sheriff Rescue/Recovery diver, I was a member of the USCG Unlimited Hydro races rescue team at the Gold Cup (& Seafair) races. I was assigned to ride in the USCG helicopter during the races. My job was to exit the helo with full SCUBA gear (Usually at a height of 20 to 30 ft. because they didn't land on floats like they do now.) and rescue the hydro driver if I could find him and get him into the basket so they could winch him up to the helo and take him to be treated. (Leaving me there, soaking in the hi-octane aviation fuel, untill a small boat picked me up.) The helo normally followed above and behind the racing boats on each heat.

The races are normally held in August and the temp's run a little warm, which can cause the helo hovering problems anyway and in this instance it was the first heat of the race and they had a full fuel load on board. Since it was the first heat and I just had gotten on board, I was getting comfy and getting myself & gear situated and had my brand new aviator Ray Ban sun glasses on my face. I normally sat on the canvas bench facing the door and was able to watch some of the race that way, We took off and almost immediately the USCG crewman signaled me to get to the door and jump. Now I'm a good sized person 6'2 220 and with a 3MM suit and single tank (No BC in those days) fins, mask two hose regulator. I slipped into my fins (Duck Feet)

I was a little cramped at best in that cabin. I managed to get into the door in a sitting postion with legs (fin clad) hanging in the breeze. All I could see was small splinters of boat debris and the wash from the helo's hovering blades. I also noticed that we looked pretty high. The crewman was giving me the signal to make a hasty exit. I jumped, making an effort to keep my body in an upright position and keeping a good grip on the tank harness crotch strap and the other on my mask. (Actually sun glasses.) :shades:

Well, I hit the water pretty hard, but in a good body position and when I surfaced I couldn't figure out why one eye was seeing grey/green with water spots and the other was clear. I reached up to my face and to my dismay :icon10: felt the bent frame of my sunglasses with only one lens intact. Luckily, I had put my mask around my neck when I had boadered the helo. so it would be handy. So, I knocked of the sunglasses and put my mask on. I was then able to find the Hydro driver and get him into the basket for the hoist. :beret:

[diver josh]

well i was tagging along with an open water class and they were doing a drill to buddy breathe to the surface and one guy next to me was giving me the out of air signal and i thought he was telling me to level off because i started to float up (3 min safety stop at 15 ft) i was like i am level then i realized he was doing the out of air signal and i was like i am not in your class then i finnaly realized that he was out of air (his 3rd time in a row) i gave him my octopus and he put it in his mouth upside down so i took it out of his mouth and turned it around for him so he didnt get a mouth full of water

[cancun mark]

I am unfortunate in the fact that I have had a student die on me and while I dont nomally think of death as funny, this was.

It happened in the classroom.

I had a huge class (20) and knew that I would lose some during the mandatory medical in order to meet ratios. One guy had written yes next to epilepsy and asthma on the medical form. I knew that he would be rejected by the doc and told him to save the $40. He got furious at me and I decided to let him argue with the doc rather than me.

The nurse arrived to call out the questionable people and he was first.

He promptly stood up, turned purple then white and collapsed in full arrest on the floor. The nurse was screaming to get oxygen (which really is not that helpful to a non breathing person) I jumped on him and wacked him hard on the sternum.

I had seen this work on baywatch and figured what the hell.

At that point the doc, and 5'2" aussi lady ran in screaming "WHAT THE F**K DO YA THINK YUR DOIN???" and with amasing strength threw me across the room with visions that I had killed him and then said "YUR NOT DOIN IT HARD ENOUGH"

and proceeded to hit him even harder than I had.

He came out of frib, came around two minutes later and the before he could utter a word the doc screamed "BEFORE YOU GET THE F**K OUT OF HERE......

YOU OWE ME FOURTY BUCKS"

I didnt know whether to laugh or cry, I think I did both.

[scubadoguk]

Falling asleep during a lecture ! I was giving the lecture at the time :54:
Yes I was out alnight with a lady and I was tired out ooooooooooooo I wish I was that young again :sappy:

[waterduder2003]

I was instructing 8 new students in Ft. Lauderdale Florida and we had finished up the first dive of the morning. We were doing our safety stop at 15 feet when the pain hit. The pain told me that last nights beer and mexican food hadnt been the best of ideas on a weekend dive trip. I signed my divemaster to continue the safety stop and get everyone on board, then headed back down to the bottom to take care of business. I pulled off my bcd, and dropped one leg out of my top farmer john wetsuit. I got the jumpsuit part of my farmer john down to my knees and "started my business" when I stepped on my bcd inflator which immediately began to fill with air. I struggled with it to no evail. Sand had somehow lodged in the unit and try as I may, I was pulled to the surface by my second stage mouthpiece. All had boarded the boat and stood watching my naked tangled ass. Ill never live it down. Never.

[carolinadiver]

And your the professional !? Don't need that visual.

[ScubaBaby]

Being caught having "extra curricular activities" after class with my instructor by the instructors boss was a bit of blooper to say the least!!!

[Tommyboy]

I'm DM'ing with a bunch of students. The instructor is explaining how to do a descent while we're all on the surface. S - signal she says, O - orient she says, R - reg in mouth she says, T - mark your time, D - descend which I promptly do with the students.

As I'm sitting on the bottom I get a mouth full of water. I forgot to change from snorkel to reg. Needless to say I switched and hacked through the reg.

The students ribbed me hard that night when we went for beers.

[Strife]

While taking my OW class we had to walk across some reef to get into deeper water. While walking I spotted a Star Fish and tried to point it out to my dive buddy. She turned around to get a good look just as a wave hit her in the back. Her being a smallish person with the weight of a full scuba unit pushing her off balance, the wave knocked her over. I tried to stop her fal by grabbing her shoulder to steady her. Unfortunately, I stepped in a hole while doing so and fell into her. This stopped her fall, but I really didn't notice as I was trying to clear my vision after catching her tank valve in the forehead. We were the first ones in the group with everyone behind us to see the incident. This also meant that nobody could see my face. As we got over the drop-off into deeper water I started feeling somethhing dripping off of my nose and passed off as water. The instructor, who had been in front of me when this happened turned around to brief us on the dive and immediatly(sp?) asked what happened. I told him and asked why only to hear him tell the Divemaster to take me out of the water, I will not be diving. I wondered why until I wiped the "water" running off my nose and my glove came away red.

Needless to say, I now bear a striking resemblance to Harry Potter between the eyes.

My instructor/dive buddy now refuses to walk near me or take me into rough water for a shore entry. Something about klutz?

[ONESPEED]

:bump:

[wrybosome]

Not mine, but pretty funny if you haven't already seen it.

J5mCCLLWBZQ

[TheScubaBOB]

Diving at one of the local spots we tried to enter as cloe to our objective as possible but the entry poitn was bad. Too steep down to the water and a couple of feet of muck for a soft bottom, so at the end of the dive we decide to exit at a different point.

Well the selected exit point has a better bottom but the slope is still somewhat steep. I decide to fling my fins up onto shore as far as I can so I have both hands free to help with the exit.

I reach back as far as I can with my right hand holding the fins and "swing for the fences" as they say. When I released them the fins went flying and landing a good distance up the slope....

Unfortuantely the flashlight that was strapped to my right wrist didn't make the same maneuver. It reached the end of the lanyard and swung back around... 3mm hood isn't sufficient protection from a flashlight stuffed with 8 AA Batteries! I almost knocked myself out cold!

[mts0628]

Moved to Post Funny Stuff Here (http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/humor-games-clips-yarns-tales/164953-post-your-pretty-funny-stuff-here-26.html#post4432236).