What constitutes an emergency?

[Diving Dubai]

So far, most of the scenarios of emergencies can be mitigated by training, and practice.

One I'll put out there for discussion is mother nature, specifically down currents.

First an analogy: You're driving, hit a wet or icy patch and your car starts to skid. You can learn how to recover from one, and by applying the correct inputs you generally can. But sometimes - perhaps you over correct of the surface has less grip, what ever you do doesn't' work and you end up in a ditch.

In my diving area, down currents are frequent. I get hit by anywhere between 6 and 10 a year.

Most are insignificant, others not so.

You can mitigate the risk by being prepared. More gas than you'd usually carry having a switch of air in case you get sucked down below your MoD and being accustomed to serious currents in general. Or keeping away from sites that have them.

But there is no specific training nor practise you can engage in other than actually being in one

You're reliant on instinct in dealing what mother nature throws at you. I would suggest that all but the smallest ones, can be classed as an emergency.

While there are some articles written of how to get out of one, in my experience these methods only apply to a few types and then you are required to remember how to do it, muscle memory through training and practise just doesn't apply.

Even then it's more instinct and reaction more than deliberate thought.

And you have to accept that in rare occasions mother nature will beat you, whatever you do or try.

 

[TMHeimer]

In OW class, divers are taught to clear their masks. For nearly all experienced divers, dealing with water in the mask is such a normal part of diving that they barely notice when they clear the mask. Yet, we recently had a thread in which a diver admitted to making a panicked ascent to the surface when water got in the mask.

At all levels of diving, we are taught how to respond to incidents. At all levels of diving, these incidents occur, and different people react differently. Some follow their training; some go into full blown panic. The difference depends upon both your training and, I believe, your natural temperament.

A well-known cave diver told me a story that will stand in contrast to the diver who panicked and bolted to the surface with water in the mask. He and another diver were planning a serious dive with two scooters each, with stage bottles along the way. There had been some kind of a electrical power problem the night before that I did not understand, with the result that they went into this major dive with scooters that were not fully charged. They were quite surprised when both scooters failed for each of them. The last failure occurred when the the main character in this story was being towed by his buddy. As soon as that last scooter died, the buddy unhooked from both it and his towed buddy and began kicking rapidly toward the exit. Getting to where they had staged their next bottles with their current air supply was in serious question. This was a likely death scenario.

With his buddy disappearing in front of him, the diver began a slow, calm, and relaxed exit. He enjoyed the scenery along the way. When he got to the stage bottle, his buddy was there. His buddy had barely made it on the gas he had. As for him, because of his slow, calm, relaxed exit, he still had plenty of gas.

Exactly. Whether it's classified as an emergency or just an unsettling situation varies with each diver. Someone mentioned the process--stop, breathe,...,breathe, etc. Once I was returning on a shore dive and actually cramped up in both legs AND arms, if you can believe that. Was in only 8' of water, looked at my 1/2 full air supply, and knew it was no emergency. Managed to surface (the one and only time I ever somewhat used my BC as the proverbial "elevator"), took a compass reading, went back down and pulled myself along the bottom to stand up depth. Did my 2nd dive with no cramps. I've been in several "uncomfortable" situations, cramping and due to unexpected currents, but not yet in a real emergency. Knock wood.

 

[JXT71]

So far, most of the scenarios of emergencies can be mitigated by training, and practice.

Basic emergency management is a constant cycle of preparedness, mitigation, response, and recovery. You would hope mitigation would contain an emergency, as that's the point of it. But when it fails, you're left to directly respond to something that's out of control and all you have is your training, equipment, and experience - or at the very least, someone else does and they are in a position to assist you.

I can relate to accepting occurrences when nature just wins, but your example is about recognizing a hazard that cannot be reasonably mitigated or prepared for - and then just going in anyway while relying on instinct. If that's how you roll, we can all just take that as your risk vs gain. For everyone else, relying on instinct is not a good base for handling emergencies or heading into danger. Some academy I went to had a saying: "You will not rise to the occasion, you will default to your level of training."

 

[Neilwood]

Basic emergency management is a constant cycle of preparedness, mitigation, response, and recovery. You would hope mitigation would contain an emergency, as that's the point of it. But when it fails, you're left to directly respond to something that's out of control and all you have is your training, equipment, and experience - or at the very least, someone else does and they are in a position to assist you.

I can relate to accepting occurrences when nature just wins, but your example is about recognizing a hazard that cannot be reasonably mitigated or prepared for - and then just going in anyway while relying on instinct. If that's how you roll, we can all just take that as your risk vs gain. For everyone else, relying on instinct is not a good base for handling emergencies or heading into danger. Some academy I went to had a saying: "You will not rise to the occasion, you will default to your level of training."

Unfortunately this will probably only be true if you practise your drills - become complacent and fail to practise them and they will likely fail you in the face of any incident. As the saying goes - to fail to prepare is to prepare to fail

 

[jlcnuke]

I'm going to put a slight spin on the perspective of the conversation than some. My background is HEAVILY based in procedures. First, with 12 years in the nuclear world in the Navy (operating, maintaining, supervising, and teaching theory/operation of nuclear power/propulsion plants), and the last 10 years writing procedures (and other technical matter) in the power industry. As such, I have a very extensive background that includes "emergency procedures" (as you might imagine, that's something we take pretty seriously in my current and previous careers).

An emergency for us is any condition that has the ability to cause loss of life, serious injury, or serious damage. Note that it just needs to "have the ability" to do so... we hope that we can tack on "IF actions are not taken immediately" for those situations (well, in reality, we always tack that on as we wouldn't do it if we were aware of a way it could cause death or serious injury/damage with no chance of preventing that from happening).

Training, experience, and practiced responses is how we mitigate the potential impact of an emergency situation, but it doesn't diminish the fact that it IS still an emergency. That's why our emergency procedures have "immediate actions" that you do automatically, you have them memorized and practiced and you know them by heart, so that the emergency situation can be stopped/contained and things placed in a "safe" condition from which you can perform the "follow-up actions" in a less urgent manner.

Running out of air is an obvious emergency because if you don't do "something" about it right away you will die. Once you've gotten to a secondary source of air of adequate volume to get you safely back, you've completed your "immediate actions" and can then proceed to determine the correct course of action for you at that point (generally calling the dive and safely getting back to the surface). Your mask falling off is unlikely to result in death or serious harm for most divers, so it probably wouldn't be an emergency for most (though it may cause one for some divers as "panic" could very well be an emergency on a dive).

That you know what to do in response to an emergency doesn't make it no longer an emergency, it makes it an emergency you're theoretically prepared to deal with (though you really don't know how you'll actually deal with it until it happens).

 

[Dsix36]

One other thing to consider while pondering the sometimes fine line between incident and emergency, might very well be the mindset of the individual diver at that particular moment. Almost any extremely minor incident can almost immediately become a full blown emergency if the diver panics.

All the training and practice in the world is still no guarantee of how a diver will respond in a real life scenario rather than mere training. Some people are just hardwired differently than others.

 

[Landlocked123]

I do not believe that all things that happen to divers under water can be classified as emergencies across the board. It depends on the level of skill and training related to the occurrence. I will give you an example. I am very used to low viz to no viz diving. Have been doing it for years. I am also very accustomed to diving with a flooded mask... Cold 45 degree water in my face at 120-130 feet in 2 foot viz.. Does not bother me one bit. I have had a mask knocked off my face in near zero viz... I was fine. That is because i have hundreds of dives in this environment. I always find it funny that folks fear water in their mask. Now, put me in the ocean, where I do not have hundreds of dives, and throw me into a situation with currents , say a strong down current on a wall, and to me that is an emergency, where others who dive those types of dives all the time may be much better equipped to react even to a point as to not even seeing it as an emergency. Its all about your abilities, contingencies, training, and experience. That is my 2 cents

 

[The Chairman]

Everyone's risk tolerance is different, which I think was your whole point.

My daughter freaks when we encounter any spider, and we have lots of spiders on my 10.82 acres. If it's a banana spider, I reach up and grab it, crushing it in my fist. If it's a black widow, I do the "wild thing" dance, find anything with a ten foot handle, beat it to a bloody pulp and destroy any eggs I can find.

We all have things which flip our wigs. Training can not prevent you from going into a panic. Oh, it might mitigate the onset somewhat, but panic, by it's very definition, is unreasonable. For many people the surface is the only thing that will resolve their panic. While I've never panicked, I know that I am not immune to it. There are a lot of divers who feel immune, and hopefully they'll never cross that point where they finally figure out that they are not immune. Me? I keep panic at bay by diving conservatively. T-Bone and friends were planning to do the "Gran Traverse" at Peacock Springs. The night before I went with him to have dinner at Paul Heinerth's place here in cave country. There were some big names in attendance for a simple, albeit wonderful dinner of hamburgers off the grill. Yum. The dive came up with the proposed trek and I politely declined as I felt I wasn't really ready for that. One of the Cave Instructors present was quite taken with my decision and actually thanked me for it. How many of us have been thanked for calling a dive even before we got to the dive site? I have to admit, that I did not panic on that dive. When I feel I'm ready, I'll make that dive. I already have the training and the experience. So, I don't mind being known for my ultra conservatism when diving. It keeps me far, far away from finding myself in trouble, possibly heading into an emergency where the panic troll lives. The panic troll is someone I never want to meet.

 

[Jack Hammer]

It's an interesting topic as the goal posts can move and the definition of what constitutes an "an emergency" vs just an important to resolve inconvenience can vary quite a bit depending on the type of dive and the conditions.

 

[TMHeimer]

My daughter freaks when we encounter any spider, and we have lots of spiders on my 10.82 acres. If it's a banana spider, I reach up and grab it, crushing it in my fist. If it's a black widow, I do the "wild thing" dance, find anything with a ten foot handle, beat it to a bloody pulp and destroy any eggs I can find.

We all have things which flip our wigs. Training can not prevent you from going into a panic. Oh, it might mitigate the onset somewhat, but panic, by it's very definition, is unreasonable. For many people the surface is the only thing that will resolve their panic. While I've never panicked, I know that I am not immune to it. There are a lot of divers who feel immune, and hopefully they'll never cross that point where they finally figure out that they are not immune. Me? I keep panic at bay by diving conservatively. T-Bone and friends were planning to do the "Gran Traverse" at Peacock Springs. The night before I went with him to have dinner at Paul Heinerth's place here in cave country. There were some big names in attendance for a simple, albeit wonderful dinner of hamburgers off the grill. Yum. The dive came up with the proposed trek and I politely declined as I felt I wasn't really ready for that. One of the Cave Instructors present was quite taken with my decision and actually thanked me for it. How many of us have been thanked for calling a dive even before we got to the dive site? I have to admit, that I did not panic on that dive. When I feel I'm ready, I'll make that dive. I already have the training and the experience. So, I don't mind being known for my ultra conservatism when diving. It keeps me far, far away from finding myself in trouble, possibly heading into an emergency where the panic troll lives. The panic troll is someone I never want to meet.

YES. And I HATE all spiders as well. My only true phobia. I kill them when they enter the house when the weather turns cold. I even go out of my way to kill them outside. Kill them all I say, kill them all! Remember "Archniphobia"--yikes. Think it stems from a movie I saw when I was maybe 5 years old....