Close encounter of the painful kind? How about bitten , stung or rammed anyone ?

[dumpsterDiver]

I would have to say this is a pretty impressive pain encounter list. You have to have some of this on video! If you or others do post video please include the best part the screaming audio that goes with it, its probably the best part!

I think most all of that was pre-video era...i have lotsa screaming in my other videos.

oh yeah, once when testing some new rubber gloves (that were slippery UW and deemed unusable later) I was trying to stab a fish in the head and it kicked and i ended up going into my wrist with a stilletos knife, instantly causing numbness and some paralysis (and pain of course) in my thumb. Thumb and wrist were unbearably painful with certain motions for weeks-- shooting pains and went to see a hand/neurosurgeon.. but opted out of the recommended surgery and eventually recovered with hardly any residual nerve damage after 18 months. That was self inflicted, not sure if it counts?

 

[jaycanwk]

While diving in fresh water, rock bass can be rather aggressive/territorial at times. I've been head butted by them when they charge me, then slapped in the face by their tail when they spin around and dart away dislodging my mask.

 

[diver 85]

This Lesser Electric Ray popped me pretty good on my right forearm right after I took this shot, hurt for well over an hour & thought I was gunna see a nice 'cut' under my skins when I pulled it up but NOTHING, only pain---on a shore dive in front of Castle Comfort Lodge, Dominica....Was only the wife & I & she 'witnessed' it all----& laughed very loudly UW(afterwards she said that's what you get for harassing the wildlife---which I never got closer than 2 or 3 feet to.)..

[/URL]Lesser Electric Ray---shore dive @ Castle Comfort Lodge by GEAUXtiger, on Flickr[/IMG]

 

[Akimbo]

I was about 13 and decided it was time to get closer to the sea lions that inhabited the Breakwater in Monterey. So I bought a block of frozen squid and put it in a goody bag for the swim out figuring it would thaw by the time I was ready to try hand feeding like on TV.

Well, I was right about the thawing part. Vis was about 15' as I am chugging along above a sand bottom and I suddenly felt this current pushing me sideways for about a foot. That was new but I didn’t see anything and kept on swimming. It happened a second time… OK, I’m a slow learner. The third time I caught a glimpse of a bunch of teeth on a male sea lion about 3x my weight flash by. I emptied that goody bag and swam in the other direction in one of the fasted integrated movements I ever executed. That pretty much ended my curiosity in hand feeding marine mammals.

 

[knotical]

Brushed against a man-o-war. Way painful!

Accidentally punched a spiny sea urchin – got several spines in my hand through a leather glove. No real pain, just tattooed for a few months.

Stupidly feeding fish and learned that blood from my finger isn’t red at depth. Luckily just a mild bite.

Zapped by a Caribbean “sea wasp”. Just mild pain and a swollen lip for a day.

So, four times in a bit over 1000 dives. That’s clearly too many incidents, since at least three of them were partly or wholly my own stupid fault.

 

[AdivingBel]

Had a goliath grouper escort me out of a hold on the Adolphus Bush off Big Pine Key. I knew to shine my light around and look before I went in, but I didn't see anything. After looking around a couple of minutes, I felt something brush up against me and there he/she/it was. Wasn't agressive, just escorted me out one of the openings. I didn't need to change my wetsuit or anything (well, I was gonna pee in it anyway :tmi2. I'll remember it fondly.

 

[drbill]

Been bumped by a number of sharks (although not bitten), stung by many species of cnidarians, impaled by sea urchins (including fire urchins in the Philippines)... but the greatest insult was to be speared by my dive buddy! Nothing serious though.

 

[drrich2]

Got stung on the legs and hand by a Caribbean sea wasp on ladder entry at Buddy Dive Resort in Bonaire (like a cross between getting cut & burned; intense). Got stung on the calf by fire coral on exit shore diving Bonaire as the surge was shoving me back & forth (like a wasp sting only smeared around instead of focal). I've 'rubble crawled' - diving just off the bottom in the rubble strewn shallows of Bonaire, and so I've been at risk from scorpionfish, and I've snorkeled right over sea urchins, but thus far blessed not to be nailed by either.

Since this thread may serve as a reference for some, I'm linking a couple of threads by other people with more interesting encounters than I've had.

1.) DevonDiver posted My first stonefish/demon stinger incident...ouch, ouch. From what I understand, the pain a stonefish can cause a human can be terrible. And there's more damage to be done than 'just' the pain. I've never dove where these things occur, and if I ever do, they're possibly #1 on my 'watch out for' list.

2.) Rick Murchison posted Dummy of the Day Award. He got nailed on the hand by a bristle worm.

3.) BallastBelly asked How Painful Is A Torpedo Ray Shock. It links to another thread with 1st hand accounts.

4.) Has anyone mentioned titan triggerfish yet? Never dove where they are; from what I understand they guard a nest, their 'zone of protection' expands as you go up (like a stereotypical tornado funnel cloud, if I understand correctly), and they can hit hard and bite a chunk out of you.

5.) Alert Diver Online has the article A Shark Tale. A guy speared 2 lion fish & headed back to the boat, a 3 - 5' Caribbean reef shark went for one & got his left hand.

Richard.

 

[dmoore19]

Sting Ray bite on my finger. It happened at Sting Ray City and yes I was feeding it. Instead of keeping my hand closed as instructed I opened my hand and one of my fingers got a bit of a smashing. Same dive, one of the snappers wanted some of the squid before the Sting rays knew I had it. Otherwise no stings or other bites.

 

[daniel1948]

My story is pretty tame compared to some of the above. Whew! That's some scary stuff some of you have experienced!

My story:

Little Cayman. The DMs made a habit of spearing lionfish and giving them to groupers, in hopes of training the groupers to eat lionfish. (For non-divers reading this, lionfish are an invasive species in the Caribbean and have no natural predators there.) As is to be expected, all this did was teach the groupers to pester divers for food. (When will we ever learn that feeding wild animals always leads to bad behavior from those animals?) So on this dive, a really big grouper started bumping my mask and generally being a nuisance. I broke my cardinal rule (touch nothing but the water) and pushed the fish away. It came back. Push. Bump. Push. Bump. Finally I picked up a handful of sand and threw it at the fish's face, and it darted forward and bit me on the ear, drawing (a very small amount of) blood.

At that point the DM finally realized what was happening and came over and got the grouper away from me.

A couple of days later we went to a restaurant for supper and they had grouper on the menu. I ordered it, as a revenge meal. It was VERY good. Now, any time a restaurant offers grouper, it's my first choice. Like a super-villain I'll never forget the affront. Besides, did I say, it was really good?