Dives You Regret

[Vegan Shark]

We all love diving, but I'm sure everyone has a dive they regret making. What's yours?

I was dieing to get my new double 14Ls wet (steel 100s), and anxiously checked weather and swell models all week. A typhoon in the Philippines was screwing up our weather, but it looked like Sunday would be much calmer. So I woke up early and headed to the nearby seawall--a site usually filled with divers, but this morning there was not a single diver in sight. Only 100 or so surfers. I took a look at the waves smashing into the stair entry, and then the beasts the surfers were riding a little further out, and thought "eff this."

But having already suited up, and waited all week, I couldn't give up. I stayed around, watching for a couple hours, hoping the waves would die down like the swell models said they would. Finally I geared up and headed down the stairs, but lost confidence that I could make it without slipping and losing my fins with the waves pounding into me. A dive guide and two students soon appeared behind, and after seeing me retreat the dive guide started second guessing herself, and went back to call her boss. He showed up 20 min later, said it was fine, and got into freediving gear to help the 3 divers in and hold them steady. I watched them swim out, ragg-dolled time and time again by 7 ft waves they couldn't get under since it was too shallow. And once again I thought eff that.

But eventually I convinced myself to head in. Now it was low tide, so shallow that it was more rock climbing than diving, latch onto rocks and pull forward just to keep from getting tossed up and back to shore. I'm not sure if it was the stress, or Japan makes bizarre positively buoyant steel tanks, but even with full double 100s, in a wetsuit, I could barely sink. If I got within 20ft of the surface I would pop up instantly. Tired of fighting the swell and buoyancy issues, I called the dive after 12 min. Planned on crawling back through the shallows, but buoyancy issues took me to the surface further out, and I rose right in the middle of a giant wave, with a surfboard grazing my head. That could've been really ugly. I lectured myself all the way back to shore, and got to enjoy crawling hands and knees up the stairs. Beach crawl exits, sure I don't mind those, but stairs? At least I had a new experience.

Not the worst dive I've had by any means, but just one of those lessons in learning to listen to your instincts. I know plenty of people have died diving in conditions they shouldn't have, because they drove a long way to the site and didn't want to waste their time, etc. For me the lesson was that new gear and ****ty conditions just don't match. There's always tomorrow, no shame in saying screw it and heading home. Blowing bubbles isn't always worth it.

 

[Storker]

Good post and good reminder! Fortunately, I've been able to listen to my inner voice so far, so no 'oh sh!t' or 'come to Jesus' moment for me. At least so far...

My worst dive experience - except for really crappy viz, which you can take as an exercise in compass navigation, or leaky DS seals (ugh!) - was in my new DS, with totally crappy buoyancy control, shooting my dSMB before I had stabilized my depth at 5m. I thought that the sausage would help me to stabilize my buoyancy, which of course was totally wrong. Lesson learned. After stressing out from yo-yo-ing like crazy, I started to get dizzy. I though 'screw it, if I'm going to have problems I wanna be on the surface', inflated my wing and corked deliberately. Luckily, I've always been trying to teach my son that when we're diving, we're not dad and son, we're two equally responsible divers, so when we got up he had grasped the situation and took over all communication with the boat tender, directing her in the increasing wind and chop while I was still trying to collect my bearings.

 

[MB NZ]

Just one dive out of 750 dives. I screwed up the navigation and my buddy and I ended up somewhere we shouldn't have been. After 1.5 hours on the surface, we got a chopper ride home. We were briefly in fear for our lives, but embarrassment became the stronger emotion.

 

[Donnah]

We all still remember this dive. In Cozumel, windy day, 5 experienced Coz divers. At the dock, we were informed that it was too windy for the boat to pick us up at the dock; we would have to go to the marina. First clue. We were ready to dive, so we took a taxi to the marina to meet the boat and a few other divers. The minute we left the protection of the marina, it all broke loose. Tanks rolling around on the deck. We had to hold on to the sides of the boat to stay in our seats. Second clue. Got to the dive site. Instructions were to immediately drop down to the bottom at 30 feet and wait until we were all together.

I and my two buddies jumped in, dropped, and dug our hands and fins into the sand. I could tell that something was going on topside, but couldn't see anything. We waited....and waited. Conditions were such that ascending to see what was happening didn't seem like a good idea. After 5 minutes, we looked at each other and made a mutual decision to let go and drift with the current. I figured that if we didn't meet up with the rest by the time we were through half our air, we'd ascend and have a signal party until the boat found us. Finally, off in the distance we saw bubbles and someone doing a big OK sign. It was the DM, swimming against the current to find us. We rejoined the group, looked around a bit more and ended the dive. During the stop, one friend came over and looked at my gauge, then nodded. I had tons of air. He wasn't worried about my air, he thought he might need a pony. DM cut his safety stop short -- he had drained his tank. Getting back on the boat was an experience. I crawled back to my seat with the tank still on my back and announced loudly "There is no way in H... I am doing the second dive! This is crazy!" The others agreed. We went back to the marina and shortly after the harbor was closed.

What had happened topside at the beginning of the dive was this. Instead of a giant stride, one of the divers did a giant belly flop. The boat must have jinked at just the wrong time. She flew off the boat, got the breath knocked out of her, mask off, reg out. Her buddy and the DM jumped in and got her sorted out. By the time they ascended, they had drifted way past us.

The DM was a bit worried. He said afterwards that he knew that we would stay together and have a plan. We did what he thought we would do, but he was really glad to see us.

 

[Hintermann]

I have had 2 or 3 poor dives either due to confusing dive briefing by the divemaster or my own poor planning but they were all good dives in themselves and so I cannot say that I 'regret' any of them.

The only dive I really regret is one of the few dives that I have done in the UK many years ago. It was at Chesil Beach in Dorset. I was training for AOW and the morning's Deep and (to my surprise) Navigation dives had gone well. I then had a bad lunch and was feeling rather queasy as I returned to do the afternoon dive. It was the PPB part of AOW and the friendly Instructor looked at me and asked if I wanted to postpone the dive. Having driven for a couple of hours to get there, I stupidly decided to go ahead. I just could not breathe properly or concentrate and after 15 minutes of misery, swam to the shore and barely managed to whip off my mask and reg before throwing-up while still on my knees. The tide did not help and it was quite a mess - one that I'd rather forget.

 

[Searcaigh]

Weather wise I have always been sort of sensible, so never had any issues there.

I do regret making two dives when I knew my ears were not clearing well, on both occasions to photograph frogfish when I had never seen them before in Malaysia and second time in the Philippines (Giant frogfish), and ended up with a perforated eardrum and an infection on both occasions ruining both trips. Certainly instilled some paranoia and perhaps common sense in to me, and called off a few dives just because my ears were not feeling right.

 

[Akimbo]

I can't think of any that I regret, but quite a few I would do better. I have learned a lot more from screw-ups than dives that went as intended.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Only one. Assisting with OW classes as a DM. Did 8 dives in one day, planned on 5 the next. Woke up second day slightly congested. Suspected allergies so took a 12 hour Sudafed. It wore off sooner than expected. Reverse block that resulted in total paralysis of the right side of my face, excruciating pain, required in water recompression to be able to get the pain down enough to drive home. Three days of 800 mg ibuprofen 4 times a day, eye that watered for 3 days, tingling and numbness took a full three weeks to resolve. Since then I have canceled a few dives when they just did not feel right. No more rocket drop descents, and deco schedules are planned for nice slow ascents.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

I've had more than my share of bad dives, but none that were as life threatening as a post dive experience. I took three friends out for a couple of wreck dives several miles offshore. The ocean was flat and dive conditions were great. We surfaced from our second dive to find that the wind had come up and it was difficult to climb aboard the boat. After pulling our gear onboard we pulled anchor and headed for safe harbor. Before long it was Victory at Sea out there. Waves were crashing over the top of my boat and we were making very little headway into the oncoming waves. My buddy Don was driving while I was holding on for dear life. I heard the sound of chain being pulled quickly through the windlass and in a split second the anchor and chain were wrapped around the props. I yelled to Don to put the motor in neutral but it would not shift. He turned it off and we looked over the stern to see the anchor, chain and broken props. We were still three miles from shore.

I called Vessel Assist but they were on another call and we had to wait in the tumult for an hour. We finally were towed back to my slip to unpack and assess the damage. I had to call the mechanic to immediately haul the boat out of the water. Aside from the broken latch that released the anchor, the gears in the outdrive had been stripped and the aluminum hull on the stern had cracked and was now taking on water. Repair estimate was well over $11,000 on a boat that was only worth $5,000. The insurance company totalled it and gave me a check for $5,000. I paid off one of the credit cards I had used for boat repairs and went back to beach diving for several years.

If I hadn't had Vessel Assist coverage we would have likely lost the boat offshore and found ourselves bobbing in ten foot seas with gale force winds. The weather predictions that day called for mild winds in the afternoon.

My old boat, the Giant Stride

 

[drbill]

I can't say I regret any dive, but given that I've been diving for over 50 years I probably don't remember ones I should. I've come back from each one and so far have never been bent or suffered anything serious. I certainly have made a few mistakes... like picking up a bottle from the filled rack and not being able to check to make sure it was full (no SPGs back then and the topside pressure gauge was missing) and ending up at 90 fsw with no air, not orienting my electronic compass priot to a dive and ending up surfacing well outside the dive park in a boat traffic lane and deciding not to rig up my pony on a planned shallow dive but ending up with no air at 80 fsw due to a clogged debris (dip) tube in my tank. I don't regret any of those dives as they all were "instructional," but I do regret not having taken the steps I should have to make them more enjoyable!