Complacency can hit ANYBODY; or why you should NEVER hurry when diving

[TSandM]

We DO have a system for identifying full versus used tanks . . . and it works pretty well. This tank snuck through because it was new to us.

And yes, I have a passel of dives and I still screwed up. I think that was the point of posting this . . .

 

[=C=]

Thanks for the post. So very True.

Rushing complexity leads to errors.

Made me think about all the times I have been rushed. Reminds me that with a simple gear setup there's little to go wrong and with my current setup there's plenty to botch.

Remember when diving was a tank, a reg, mask and fins?

 

[kanonfodr]

Lynne,

It's refreshing to hear a story such as this from someone as experienced as yourself, reminds me that anybody can screw things up at any time. Especially since being in a rush is a pretty common scenario with some folks. Here's to it being a simple mistake and not something life-threatening.

Peace,
Greg

 

[laurin]

I think it's not necessarily complacency we're talking about, unless you're really hard on yourself and count letting yourself be distracted by time pressure.

For me, rushing and letting other people make me hurry have been the #1 reason for different "situations" in diving, by a large margin. Luckily, the worst (this far) was doing half a dive with the manifold closed, and the rest have been mostly forgetting to connect the primary light and such. Embarrassing nonetheless.

Lately, I've been trying to make a point (mostly to myself) of taking my time in preparing for the dive by mixing the gases, assembling kit, packing and checklisting (and re-packing) early enough. It's been nice; a lot less stuff gets left behind and I actually have time to do all the small fixes before having to fix them on-site.

Also, when doing the pre-dive-checks I've been trying to make it clearly my time - I'm a pretty laid-back guy (off-line, at least), but I'll at least try to snap a bit at someone if they interrupt my head-to-toes on the boat and start all over again.

Maybe it would help if we made students say aloud "man, would it be stupid to die because of skipping this" before doing any critical pre-dives.

Boat diving is the place where things tend to happen, in my experience, as it's always a bit crowded and there's a some time-pressure too, to get out of the way of others, at least. It would be interesting to hear how people manage this in places with really tight timing, we don't really have to care about slacks/tides in the Baltic.

Generally, at least in the club I dive in, new divers are given enough time to prepare slowly and carefully, but once divers themselves feel they should have a "routine" (at around 100 dives) they'll start to hurry and rush their buddies. When training dive leaders we try to get across to them that it's then their responsibility to slow things down, but quite often it's the new dive leaders who are doing the rushing, as they want to get diving started.

//LN

 

[Cave Diver]

Thank you for posting Lynne

Hurrying is the cause of many things that go wrong .. whenever I hurry at work I envarably end up doing something that causes me to remember why I should not hurry

The faster you do something, the longer it takes.

We DO have a system for identifying full versus used tanks . . . and it works pretty well. This tank snuck through because it was new to us.

Something to consider - If you get tanks from anyone else again the first thing you should do is pull the analysis tape off of it. This will force you to analyze it before you dive it and keep you from making a similar mistake on the fill again.

 

[Blackwood]

Not really directly to a point, but we have a system around our house that helps figuring out which tanks are full and which are empty.

I have a nerdier way of doing it. All of my tanks are labeled. I have a table that I fill out whenever I put a tank in my garage, listing the contents and fill pressure in the specific cylinder.

 

[Dyno Bill]

It wasn't my intention to do anything other than infasize the need to have a system that doesn't allow for errors. If I leave a task to another person I am entrusting them with my life and as importantly the life of someone I otherwise may have helped in the course of a dive. To allow timing of an event to alter a pattern set in place other than perhaps childbirth..... that takes precedence isn't a warranted distraction. Perhaps as I have gotten older my delivery of opinions has lost it's soft edge, if so I apologize. When I hook a reg on a tank I attach all the hoses then I open the valve/ valves observe the gauge and draw from each reg and hit the inflator every time. I don't turn the valve off again, thats my primary air supply check. When I get into my rig I do the same thing, it becomes habitual. I have done it so many times it probably takes me under 5 minutes, not including a wet suit to be at the gate.

 

[nwbrewer]

laurin,

I think it was a mixture of both rushing and complacency. The first 2 of the times Lynne would normally check her pressure we skipped due to being in a rush.

The final time, during the SADDDDD brief it was complacency. Everybody was in the water, nobody was in a hurry. We called tank sizes, so we knew what everybody was diving (there were 7 of us in the water) but nobody asked for pressures.

Jake

I think it's not necessarily complacency we're talking about, unless you're really hard on yourself and count letting yourself be distracted by time pressure.

For me, rushing and letting other people make me hurry have been the #1 reason for different "situations" in diving, by a large margin. Luckily, the worst (this far) was doing half a dive with the manifold closed, and the rest have been mostly forgetting to connect the primary light and such. Embarrassing nonetheless.

Lately, I've been trying to make a point (mostly to myself) of taking my time in preparing for the dive by mixing the gases, assembling kit, packing and checklisting (and re-packing) early enough. It's been nice; a lot less stuff gets left behind and I actually have time to do all the small fixes before having to fix them on-site.

Also, when doing the pre-dive-checks I've been trying to make it clearly my time - I'm a pretty laid-back guy (off-line, at least), but I'll at least try to snap a bit at someone if they interrupt my head-to-toes on the boat and start all over again.

Maybe it would help if we made students say aloud "man, would it be stupid to die because of skipping this" before doing any critical pre-dives.

Boat diving is the place where things tend to happen, in my experience, as it's always a bit crowded and there's a some time-pressure too, to get out of the way of others, at least. It would be interesting to hear how people manage this in places with really tight timing, we don't really have to care about slacks/tides in the Baltic.

Generally, at least in the club I dive in, new divers are given enough time to prepare slowly and carefully, but once divers themselves feel they should have a "routine" (at around 100 dives) they'll start to hurry and rush their buddies. When training dive leaders we try to get across to them that it's then their responsibility to slow things down, but quite often it's the new dive leaders who are doing the rushing, as they want to get diving started.

//LN

 

[TSandM]

When I hook a reg on a tank I attach all the hoses then I open the valve/ valves observe the gauge and draw from each reg and hit the inflator every time. I don't turn the valve off again, thats my primary air supply check. When I get into my rig I do the same thing, it becomes habitual. I have done it so many times it probably takes me under 5 minutes, not including a wet suit to be at the gate.

DynoBill, I do exactly the same thing. I DO. Everybody who dives with me knows I'm a PITA about checks. What really shook me about this was that I managed to omit THREE separate times when I habitually check. Habits formed over five years and almost a thousand dives failed me --and maybe partly because they had BECOME habits, and not something I had to think about any more.

 

[Dyno Bill]

Well TS, we hopefully get subtle reminders from time to time that do little more than remind us. I doubt you will have a repeat from that brain fart anytime soon. I read where when we do similar tasks even like driving to work our unconscious mind takes over. How many times have you got to work after a 30 minute drive and recall little about the drive unless something exciting happened like a near accident or something. I do believe the mind does stuff out of repetition without little input from us. Maybe that explains your experience so keeping focused is maybe the answer as well.
Bill