Vertigo on deco

[TSandM]

I don't have any issues with vertigo in any setting other than diving. But I have a lousy sense of balance -- I could never walk a balance beam in school, even if it was only 4" off the ground. I'm intensely dependent on my eyesight for orientation, apparently, and when I'm deprived of it (or when the visual input doesn't make sense, as inside a wreck that's lying in some weird position) I'm a bit of a mess.

It takes a very definite set of circumstances to get me into trouble these days. I have to be in midwater, in poor viz, in motion (not just hovering), and lose sight of my entire team. Thank goodness, all those things together don't happen very often.

 

[Rhone Man]

Lynne, any chance you could have had some mild ICD, switching from the Helium to the pure O2?

 

[TSandM]

I hadn't gas switched yet. And I've had this happen to me a lot of times on pure 32% dives.

I could have made this whole thing a bit smoother if I'd had enough bandwidth to signal Peter that something was wrong, or even to give a "hold" signal. But for the time the vertigo was going on, I have everything I can do to cope with it; there was nothing left with which to think of signaling anybody. The first "outside" thought I had was when I saw Peter flash my hands, and my thought at that time was unprintable, but to the effect that no way was I going to look up at him!

 

[Rhone Man]

I hadn't gas switched yet. And I've had this happen to me a lot of times on pure 32% dives.

Sorry - re-reading your post I should have worked that out from the depth.

 

[ScubaInChicago]

I hadn't gas switched yet. And I've had this happen to me a lot of times on pure 32% dives.

I could have made this whole thing a bit smoother if I'd had enough bandwidth to signal Peter that something was wrong, or even to give a "hold" signal. But for the time the vertigo was going on, I have everything I can do to cope with it; there was nothing left with which to think of signaling anybody. The first "outside" thought I had was when I saw Peter flash my hands, and my thought at that time was unprintable, but to the effect that no way was I going to look up at him!

I've had this happen at one time or another....I tend to fixate on my BT and mentally lock in the depth and avoid corrective movements other than breathing. It's my way of looking at the horizon....

I've heard of people who get reverse blocks and go loopy and unless they have a good buddy or a line to grab onto are in for a long ride in one direction or another....

Diving has a way of making you feel alive at times.....

 

[Kevrumbo]

Yeah I get that too with alternobaric vertigo (one ear releasing pressure before the other on ascent) with the same result: the entire universe around me feels/looks like it's spiraling into a black hole. Very tough to keep from bolting to the surface in panic; very difficult to hold the deco stop when you've just switched to your eanx50 bottle. . . (I guess that's why I like hanging onto uplines, just in case).

 

[clowndog1]

I am fairly new in SCUBA. Right off the bat I noticed that I was always getting dizzy during my deco stops and was really bad when I watched my bubbles go past my face. The only thing that seemed to help was closing my eyes for a few seconds...Im convinced however that may not always work should it arise again. Suggestions anyone?Thanks for the info!

 

[ScubaSam]

Lynne - Thank you for posting. Great for a newbie like myself to learn from your experience. Am happy that both Peter and you are safe.

 

[DA Aquamaster]

During instrument flight training it is common for an instructor to induce vertigo in the student. This may involve waiting until the student is very task loaded and in turbulence already, possibly in a maneuver of some sort (holding pattern for an approach perhaps) and then ask them to pick up approach plates off the cockpit floor (simulating dropped approach plates). This requires fairly rapid bending and twisting head movements to accomplish and will usually induce vertigo. The student is then faced with the challenge of flying the remainder of the approach while dealing with vertigo with only reference to the instruments.

As you noted a diver does have some "instruments" - mostly your own bubbles rising to the surface, and once you get on the bottom the improved visual references help stop it.

My thoughts are that:

1. Your original plan to scooter back up the slope of the bottom to shallower water made a lot of sense in terms of avoiding having to deco in mid water and in terms of covering your bets with terrain navigation and compass navigation as opposed to just compass navigation. It is also a very sound plan in terms of your known history of vertigo issues in mid water. it also makes sense in terms of ensuring a slow ascent. My suggestion is to lay that out as "THE" plan next time you do that or a similar dive.

2. Scootering in low viz in mid water is problematic, but don't forget there are other options. Just because you have two scooters on the dive, does not mean you have to use both of them. You can clip your scooter off, grab his butt D-ring and have one scooter tow both of you together, just like you would in an OOA situation where you absolutely positively need to stay together. Driving or riding, you could maintain a steady head position and, if being towed, could even close your eyes. If the viz is bad and you are not in an enviroment that will tend to keep you together one behind the other, this is probably a far better plan than trying to scooter independently. It is also a great opportunity to practice a gas share on your scooters.

You also have the option of just shooting a bag, ascending up the line in midwater using the line for visual reference, then recovering the bag at the end of the deco and scootering back in on the surface or just under the surface.

 

[Rick Inman]

I was not at all happy that this happened to me, but I was, in the end, very pleased with myself that I got it stopped without ending up on the surface.

That's what I was thinking - nice job!

I've had vertigo once on a shallow dive years ago, and I crawled up the bottom slope until it went away at about 10'. I did NOT enjoy the feeling of being totally out of control of my place in the water.

For this reason, I practice blue-water ascents on non-deco dives (meaning withOUT a line), but I won't do one on a deco dive unless everything went south and I had to.

It's also why I don't like doing deco on a wimpy 4' sausage. If everything goes bad, I want something I can really put some weight on. Again, we practice all the time sending up a little sausage with a spool and letting the spool drift in front of us, or even doing dirty-water, gauge-only ascents - and I like knowing I can do it. And deco on a line to the boat means drifting near the line, but not touching it (if I can help it). But if I have an hour of deco, and shooting up might mean pulling a Bicker-Brother, I want a bottom or a wall or a nice fat bag or a line if it should turn out that I need it.