Dont Try This At Home
It has been twenty years since I had my one and only real diving scare, and I was very fortunate. I have never told many people about it, but maybe others could profit from my mistakes and avoid learning the hard way, as I had to. Many new divers visit Scuba Board, maybe my experience can help someone else avoid an accident.
I realize that when we are young we all feel pretty much invincible. Its not exactly a conscious thing, but when I was a teenager I know my friends and I took an awful lot of risks that were, at the very least unwise. People who know me today may think that I am still a risk taker, but this is a relative thing. I have learned to be more careful, sometimes by the trial and error method.
Some lessons leave a stronger and longer lasting impression than others. I had to learn the hard way that the rules one is taught in a Divers Certification course really are rules you ignore at substantial risk.
I first certified in 69-70 when equipment and techniques were quite different than today. We all had some great adventures and minor misadventures, few ever kept a log, and we dived whenever and wherever we wanted. We never dived where we felt the need to use the old Navy dive tables wed trained on, as we were not diving deep enough or so repeatedly that we sensed any risks. Luckily no one suffered any injuries, and only later did I see how careless we had gotten.
I gradually drifted away from diving sometime in the late 70s, with school, career, motorcycles and other interests taking up my time. For me diving in upstate New York had been mostly freshwater lakes, with an occasional cold water trip to Maine or Massachusetts. I lost interest.
I got a chance to dive again in 1985, when I went out to California for my youngest brother Dales wedding. He and I drove down to Monterey Bay, where he often dived.
Dale showed me some newer types of diving gear I had never seen before. He had a dive computer and something he called a Buoyancy Control Device, and he gave me a quick explanation of its use. Seemed pretty straightforward to me, so we stopped at a local dive shop and I rented similar equipment for myself. I was surprised that the shop didnt even ask for my C-card, but what the H---, I knew I was experienced at this sport, right? Wrong!
What a dive it was! Dale said he had never seen the Pacific Ocean as calm as it was that day, with almost no swell. The sea was like glass, so we got to go out of the bay into deeper water, and we had a fantastic dive. Spear fishing was exciting and I was as relaxed as I had ever been, and warmer, so my air lasted a lot longer than before.
Unlike the equipment I learned on there were now gauges readable onboard this new fangled BC. I was surprised how long I was able to stay down and quite surprised when I realized that I had gotten down below 80 feet. The water was so clear that the surface looked no more than 25-35 feet above. I worked my way towards shallower water, where Id intended to dive.
When it came time to surface I had worked my way back to about 45-50 feet where I could surface near the boat, as planned. This is when things started to go wrong very quickly.
I found that I could not control my assent at all. Even though I was trying to vent the BC, as Dale had explained that Id need to do, I was not able to slow down. No 15 foot decompression stop on this trip, I was not even able to kick myself back down, I was on the surface far too quickly. I did a quick scan and everything seemed ok, even though I was quite shaken by the loss of control. I headed back to the boat.
Dale and I were stowing gear when I began to feel a burning in my eyes, which I assumed was salt irritating them. Gradually the pain got worse until I was squinting to see. When I commented on this, Dale looked up at my face and I saw shock and fear in his eyes, and he immediately began grilling me on my assent, which being embarrassed I had said nothing about.
The area at the bridge of my nose and between my eyes was swollen up like a balloon which was making eyesight very difficult. I was experiencing an embolism from a longer and deeper dive than we planned, followed by a very rapid, uncontrolled assent and no decompression stop. Exactly what we had always been taught to avoid, but which I had to face I had just done.
Looking back I was extremely fortunate to have avoided far more than the horrible bruising that I caused myself. My brothers wedding photos show me looking like several people took turns beating me with a pipe. Things could have turned out much worse, and I learned a very painful lesson that changed my attitude about scuba diving safety rules. I no longer take them lightly.
Now, twenty years later I love diving even more than before, but I never, ever will dive with equipment I am unfamiliar with, untrained on, and inexperienced with again. I seldom miss a chance to observe and listen in on even a beginners OW class, and welcome the growing practice at many dive resorts, of giving every arriving diver a short in-pool review/assessment session before they take them diving. There will never come a time I cant learn something new or useful by listening to the experiences of other divers. I would much rather learn from the mistakes of others, than repeat those lessons personally. I have tried that road and survived once: I might not be so lucky a second time.
Ours is a great sport, but a lack of proper training and/or even a little lack of caution can cause real problems. Mine was a painful and humbling lesson that could have easily been avoided if Id stayed current with my training. Jim
It has been twenty years since I had my one and only real diving scare, and I was very fortunate. I have never told many people about it, but maybe others could profit from my mistakes and avoid learning the hard way, as I had to. Many new divers visit Scuba Board, maybe my experience can help someone else avoid an accident.
I realize that when we are young we all feel pretty much invincible. Its not exactly a conscious thing, but when I was a teenager I know my friends and I took an awful lot of risks that were, at the very least unwise. People who know me today may think that I am still a risk taker, but this is a relative thing. I have learned to be more careful, sometimes by the trial and error method.
Some lessons leave a stronger and longer lasting impression than others. I had to learn the hard way that the rules one is taught in a Divers Certification course really are rules you ignore at substantial risk.
I first certified in 69-70 when equipment and techniques were quite different than today. We all had some great adventures and minor misadventures, few ever kept a log, and we dived whenever and wherever we wanted. We never dived where we felt the need to use the old Navy dive tables wed trained on, as we were not diving deep enough or so repeatedly that we sensed any risks. Luckily no one suffered any injuries, and only later did I see how careless we had gotten.
I gradually drifted away from diving sometime in the late 70s, with school, career, motorcycles and other interests taking up my time. For me diving in upstate New York had been mostly freshwater lakes, with an occasional cold water trip to Maine or Massachusetts. I lost interest.
I got a chance to dive again in 1985, when I went out to California for my youngest brother Dales wedding. He and I drove down to Monterey Bay, where he often dived.
Dale showed me some newer types of diving gear I had never seen before. He had a dive computer and something he called a Buoyancy Control Device, and he gave me a quick explanation of its use. Seemed pretty straightforward to me, so we stopped at a local dive shop and I rented similar equipment for myself. I was surprised that the shop didnt even ask for my C-card, but what the H---, I knew I was experienced at this sport, right? Wrong!
What a dive it was! Dale said he had never seen the Pacific Ocean as calm as it was that day, with almost no swell. The sea was like glass, so we got to go out of the bay into deeper water, and we had a fantastic dive. Spear fishing was exciting and I was as relaxed as I had ever been, and warmer, so my air lasted a lot longer than before.
Unlike the equipment I learned on there were now gauges readable onboard this new fangled BC. I was surprised how long I was able to stay down and quite surprised when I realized that I had gotten down below 80 feet. The water was so clear that the surface looked no more than 25-35 feet above. I worked my way towards shallower water, where Id intended to dive.
When it came time to surface I had worked my way back to about 45-50 feet where I could surface near the boat, as planned. This is when things started to go wrong very quickly.
I found that I could not control my assent at all. Even though I was trying to vent the BC, as Dale had explained that Id need to do, I was not able to slow down. No 15 foot decompression stop on this trip, I was not even able to kick myself back down, I was on the surface far too quickly. I did a quick scan and everything seemed ok, even though I was quite shaken by the loss of control. I headed back to the boat.
Dale and I were stowing gear when I began to feel a burning in my eyes, which I assumed was salt irritating them. Gradually the pain got worse until I was squinting to see. When I commented on this, Dale looked up at my face and I saw shock and fear in his eyes, and he immediately began grilling me on my assent, which being embarrassed I had said nothing about.
The area at the bridge of my nose and between my eyes was swollen up like a balloon which was making eyesight very difficult. I was experiencing an embolism from a longer and deeper dive than we planned, followed by a very rapid, uncontrolled assent and no decompression stop. Exactly what we had always been taught to avoid, but which I had to face I had just done.
Looking back I was extremely fortunate to have avoided far more than the horrible bruising that I caused myself. My brothers wedding photos show me looking like several people took turns beating me with a pipe. Things could have turned out much worse, and I learned a very painful lesson that changed my attitude about scuba diving safety rules. I no longer take them lightly.
Now, twenty years later I love diving even more than before, but I never, ever will dive with equipment I am unfamiliar with, untrained on, and inexperienced with again. I seldom miss a chance to observe and listen in on even a beginners OW class, and welcome the growing practice at many dive resorts, of giving every arriving diver a short in-pool review/assessment session before they take them diving. There will never come a time I cant learn something new or useful by listening to the experiences of other divers. I would much rather learn from the mistakes of others, than repeat those lessons personally. I have tried that road and survived once: I might not be so lucky a second time.
Ours is a great sport, but a lack of proper training and/or even a little lack of caution can cause real problems. Mine was a painful and humbling lesson that could have easily been avoided if Id stayed current with my training. Jim
