Accidents and Incidents:What mistakes have you made?

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OK, after reading these my memory got better and I have to admit I got to 60 fsw once and realized the hard way that my tank was only partially turn on...hasn't happened again however. :)

I badly misread a current chart once as well and was pulled out like a flag on a flag pole...that hasn't happened again either. :)
 
Last summer, in the Caribbean, my buddy and I were first off the boat and as we got to the wall, we turned right. We didn't notice that all the others behind us went left - INTO the current, as you're supposed to do. On the positive side: because we were all alone, a sea turtle came and swam with us for 10 minutes. On the negative side: When we turned with half a tank, that current hit us in the face and we both thought, "Oh Sh*it!" (There is no PADI signal needed for that moment :D).

So by the time we got back to the boat, he was LOA and I was almost OOA. But thanks to things I learned on this board, I knew to start moving up slowly near the surface (not on the surface because the waves would have been too rough, just below it). This reduced our air consumption and also meant that if I really had gone OOA, I could get to the surface air quickly. I did my safety stop there as I swam along and made it back with half a bar. Not good, but a potentially bad situation avoided, thanks to SB! :)

Trish
 
I've weighted myself and others in one manufacturers Al80 and then switched to a different brand of tank for the second dive. This resulted in a very poorly weighted team because of the varying buoyancy characteristics of various Al80s.

I've not adjusted my weighting for freshwater.

When I started using DIN valves, I forgot which way to turn the valve to loosen it (hard to use the right hand rule when you can face the valve from two directions).

In the same vein, I've forgotten to bring the right hex wrench to remove a din-to-yoke donut when I only had a din reg. Luckily, I did have a yoke-to-din spin on adapter.

I forgot to tighten one fin strap during my advanced open water class. My fin came off while I was descending and this resulted in an uncontrolled flailing decent onto our divemaster. After the dive, he merely reminded me to "look down while descending."
 
Last week in the caves in Florida ... remembered just a few seconds too late that I'd forgotten to connect the QD on my P-valve ... :shocked:

... Bob (Grateful Diver)
 
I was wearing a 10-lb weight belt as well as two 2-lb in my BC back pockets, and two-2lb in my integrated pockets, for a total of 18 lbs. Loading the boat, I realized I had forgotten my two 2-lbs. I mentioned to my dive buddy I might need help getting my 7mm down - not unusual.

Once at dept ~60', I was having a terrible time with buoyancy - oh, well; I grabbed a handy rock (and the DM was grinning . . .) Had a good dive after that, and still hung on my buddy for the safety stop.

Chagrin when arriving at the boat . . . "Did someone forget their weight belt?" . .

Lesson learned - diving 14 lbs light, and "getting away with it", showed clearly I was over-weighted.
 
remembered just a few seconds too late that I'd forgotten to connect the QD on my P-valve ...

Oh, I've done that one, too -- it's not a happy feeling!

JAX, I tried to do a dive with a new diver a few months back and forgot the 6 lbs I put in my camband weight pouches. I knew it the minute I tried to descend, but I knew the dive would be shallow and short, so I didn't go back for more weight. Trying to stay down at the end of the dive was . . . interesting. It's always amazing to me, how little rocks weigh underwater!
 
On my 12th dive, with 800psi left, I started to chase down a turtle for a picture. After kicking my butt off, leaving my buddy behind, and not getting any closer to the subject, I looked at my gauge and was at 60 ft with 300psi, and nowhere near the boat. By the time I got to the boat, completed my safety stop, and surfaced I was somewhere below 100 psi.

I learned early to stick with my dive plan and my buddy and that photography is secondary to breathing!
 
One of the divers on the boat was all puffed up, talking like an expert, and I fell for it.

"Just follow me" he said, and pointed out that there would be "a little" penetration on the wreck, but "anyone can do it".

I found out inside a tight wreck that he didn't know what he was talking about.
The 4 of us who followed him ended up royally pushing the limits cuz we couldn't back out at that point. I had done this
AGAINST MY BETTER JUDGMENT,
which we all do have,
and there's the lesson I learned.
 
Think I've made most mistakes over the years - some of us learn things the hard way.
Gone in in conditions that were way no suitable, struggled to regain the shore again in one piece, jumped off without thinking about exits and falling tides - very long surface swims.
Borrowed someone elses American twinset - ho hum weighting was way off, superglued to the seabed. JUmped in with a single cylinder weightbelt on a twinset by mistake - buddy was impressed with how fast I dropped to the wreck.
O2 solenoid jammed on at 80m on a very tidal wreck -counting to 10 to calm down doesn't work the first time.
Forgot to get someone to zip up my drysuit - it's extremely difficult to climb a ladder with 4 cylinders on whilst fully flooded
 
I learned a lesson last year being helpful. I was diving with a guy that was on his first and second dives after OW, and he clearly didn't have buoyancy control down. We were at about 30 feet when he put some air in his BC... he put in too much, and started to go up, got confused about which button did the dumping and pumped a bunch more air in his BC. He was a little below me when this all started and as he went past I grabbed the back of his BC and dumped mine (I couldn't reach is shoulder dump). We went up, but not too fast so I just went with him, figuring I would help him figure it out on the surface. He surfaced, and I popped up just behind him. He turns around and says "Hey, what are you doing here?"

I started to tell him what was up, but all I got out was "Well, I came up with you" when he grins and pulls his shoulder dump and sinks like a rock.

This is where I made my mistake. I was so intent on following him back down in the bad vis (all I could see was his bubbles) that I forgot to clear my ears until way too late. Cost me about a month of diving from an injured ear, plus a trip to a specialist to get myself OK'd to dive again.

Looking out for your buddy is great, but you can't let that get you task loaded enough to get yourself hurt instead.
 
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