Reef_Haven
Contributor
How would you handle this situation?
My buddy and I and 6 others were diving a 100' deep reef, seas were running 3 - 5' with a pretty strong current. The boat was tied up to a mooring ball with tag line. There was no discussion of emergency recall. No guide or DM in the water, the captain and deckhand stayed on board. Each buddy team would be diving seperately, not as a group.
After boarding from our dive we watched the following situation play out.
Two divers surfaced about 2-300 yards down current from the boat and inflated their SMBs. They had overshot the mooring line and spent their safety stop swimming against the current, to try to be within sight of the boat when they surfaced. Apparently neither had a spool to deploy their SMB before surfacing.
The deckhand borrowed one of our SMB's, inflated it and tried to signal back to the two divers who were now floating away, that we had seen them. There was no indication they saw his signal. By that time the 3rd pair had boarded the boat and said the 4th pair had just reached the mooring line.
After 3 or 4 minutes the last pair had still not surfaced and the other pair were out of sight, so the deck hand began banging on the ladder with a lead weight to try to call the divers up. He did this about once minute for the next few minutes, even though someone mentioned they probably were in deco. When they finally surfaced one diver was OOA. They too had missed the mooring line and by the time they had worked their way back to the line, they had gone into deco. They still had a 5 minute obligation when they surfaced.
No oxygen was given, no signs of DCS and the other two divers who drifted away seemed to be in good spirits when picked up.
I guess my question is IF you got into a situation where you had a Deco obligation and there was an Emergency Recall, what would you do?
My buddy and I and 6 others were diving a 100' deep reef, seas were running 3 - 5' with a pretty strong current. The boat was tied up to a mooring ball with tag line. There was no discussion of emergency recall. No guide or DM in the water, the captain and deckhand stayed on board. Each buddy team would be diving seperately, not as a group.
After boarding from our dive we watched the following situation play out.
Two divers surfaced about 2-300 yards down current from the boat and inflated their SMBs. They had overshot the mooring line and spent their safety stop swimming against the current, to try to be within sight of the boat when they surfaced. Apparently neither had a spool to deploy their SMB before surfacing.
The deckhand borrowed one of our SMB's, inflated it and tried to signal back to the two divers who were now floating away, that we had seen them. There was no indication they saw his signal. By that time the 3rd pair had boarded the boat and said the 4th pair had just reached the mooring line.
After 3 or 4 minutes the last pair had still not surfaced and the other pair were out of sight, so the deck hand began banging on the ladder with a lead weight to try to call the divers up. He did this about once minute for the next few minutes, even though someone mentioned they probably were in deco. When they finally surfaced one diver was OOA. They too had missed the mooring line and by the time they had worked their way back to the line, they had gone into deco. They still had a 5 minute obligation when they surfaced.
No oxygen was given, no signs of DCS and the other two divers who drifted away seemed to be in good spirits when picked up.
I guess my question is IF you got into a situation where you had a Deco obligation and there was an Emergency Recall, what would you do?
