Diver out of air? Not really? Cozumel.

[Cave Diver]

While the diver in the video doesn't seem very accomplished, I can't tell by it if he is out of air or not, I'm not sure how others can. All I see is a DM give him his 2nd reg.

The reg free flows considerably when the switch is made until the DM turns it upside down ( @ :23-:26 seconds in). If he was OOG that wouldn't happen.

The 2nd diver looked like he is into cave diving based on his kicking technique.

A lot of people may use a frog style kick. Based on all the hand finning I see from all the divers in the video, including the DM I sure hope they're not cave divers.

 

[Cave Diver]

Each day this guy who used to dive with a horsecollar and j-valve ran out of air without knowing it and completed his dives sharing air with the DM until they got him a bigger tank at the end. No sitting out dives, no penalty, no advice, no talking to that I was aware of. People need to be monitoring their gauges and managing their gas supply, at the very least, and following the DM's instructions to tell him when to turn the dive.

Wait for the "there doesn't seem to be a huge number of deaths related to this issue, so it's no big deal" argument...

 

[boulderjohn]

I would hope the need to share air would be extremely rare and not routine!

Let me try to explain this again.

The shops that do this want to make the longest possible bottom time for the entire group. What they do, on almost every dive, is share air with the first diver who reaches a certain PSI. That PSI level is nowhere near out of air. When a second diver reaches that point, the first one gives the reg back and they complete he dive normally.

I realize this is a difficult concept to grasp, but it is not an OOA situation.

 

[Down2bizDiver]

The DM appeared to give him a weight where it says it's a BCD adjustment. Another not a big deal in the big picture. Not sure why this is posted as a near miss or a lesson learned.

I went back and reviewed the raw video. I can't tell exactly what is happening, but at the spot I labeled "BCD Adjustment" the DM is not giving him weight. That comes later.

When you look at the "BCD Adjustment" segment take a close look at his regulator hose ... it is high over his head, backwards, coming off the wrong shoulder. If you look closely at the video you ought to be able to see other problems I have not called out.

I am a new diver myself, although I have more than 265 dives, and a couple dozen below 100', they are all in the last 16 months. What I witnessed, and tried to condense into a short video, was rather scary to me.

I was in the water with this diver and in my opinion the ultimate outcome very well could have been a disaster. He was not a cool, calm, collected, self confident experienced diver dealing with a minor problem ... he was in a panic and serious trouble when he took the DM's octo at 100' below the surface.

The action of the DM in continuing the dive is also contrary to all the PADI OW and AOW training I have received; and during this dive the DM was giving instruction to a student diver! (see related video) That is why I posted here ... near miss and, in my opinion, a bad example for the student.

The incident would have been of lesser concern to me had these events happened at 30 - 40 feet.

One of the lessons here is "when you have new to you (especially used) gear and haven't dived recently, check it all out in shallow water before going deep."

 

[boulderjohn]

That is why I posted here. It would have been of lesser concern to me had these events happened at 40 feet.

If that is what you saw, then it was not the situation I thought possible.

Who was the operator?

 

[Mike]

A lot of people may use a frog style kick. Based on all the hand finning I see from all the divers in the video, including the DM I sure hope they're not cave divers.

I don't see it very regularly at all (frog kick) but maybe I'm not looking.

I agree all the hand use points to a newbie. Or it could be the guy just got out of his comfort zone for some reason and is just having a bad time of it. I don't know. I don't see how anybody could know anything from that video. I don't see much good or bad, just another day of diving. Everybody starts off with less then 1000 dives under their belt, everybody starts somewhere.

 

[Mike]

I went back and reviewed the raw video. I can't tell exactly what is happening, but at the spot I labeled "BCD Adjustment" the DM is not giving him weight. That comes later. When you look at the "BCD Adjustment" segment take a close look at his regulator hose ... it is high over his head, backwards, coming off the wrong shoulder.

If you look closely at the video you ought to be able to see other problems I have not called out. I am a new diver myself, although I have more than 265 dives, they are all in the last 16 months. What I saw, and tried to condense into a short video, was scary to me. I was in the water with this diver and in my opinion the ultimate outcome very well could have been a disaster. He was not cool, calm, collected, self confident diver dealing with a minor problem ... he was in a panic when he took the DM's octo at 100' below the surface. That is why I posted here. It would have been of lesser concern to me had these events happened at 40 feet.

So did he survive the dive?

How many dives did you have under your belt when you didn't have 265 dives?

 

[Ayisha]

John, that may be what is happening in this video, but you are ignoring the fact that it also happens to OOG divers. The OOG diver also does not go back to their own reg since they do not have any gas to use, such as two of the divers I mentioned. They completed the ascent to the surface with the DM and stayed attached until the diver was at the ladder. That also happens.

There is not enough information before the reg exchange to figure out why there was a reg exchange, but it seems that the freeflow didn't start until the exchange, the exchange seemed to be initiated by the DM, and the tank was definitely not empty. It supports the assumption that the diver was LOA or the air share was prearranged rather than the diver suddenly being OOG.

Just because this is a common practice does not make it acceptable to everyone. Divers are trained that they should adhere to the rules they were taught in o/w, and continuing a dive by airsharing when LOA and especially OOA are certainly not any of the rules taught and should not be advocated by professionals. Let's hope no one else has a catastrophic emergency. It would be fairly simple for the instructors or DM's to instead teach people how to lower their gas consumption in a variety of ways to extend their dive safely and proper gas management skills. So if sharing air when OOA is planned to double the dive time, does that qualify as planning the dive and diving the plan?

 

[Cave Diver]

It would be fairly simple for the instructors or DM's to instead teach people how to lower their gas consumption in a variety of ways to extend their dive safely and proper gas management skills.

Not likely to happen in vacation destinations.

Their bread is buttered by getting people in the water for a little while, then getting them back on the boat and taking the next group out. If everyone started improving consumption they'd be closer to NDL's (esp DM's making multiple dives a day) and extending the diving day because everything took longer. Longer dives, longer SI's because of the longer dives and all of a sudden you've added 2-3 hours onto the day and no additional $$.

Which is one reason why I avoid this type of diving whenever possible.

 

[Mike]

Just because this is a common practice hange to figure out why there was a reg exchange, but it seems that the freeflow didn't start until the exchange, the exchange seemed to be initiated by the DM, adoes not make it acceptable to everyone. Divers are trained that they should adhere to the rules they were taught in o/w, and continuing a dive by airsharing when LOA and especially OOA are certainly not any of the rules taught and should not be advocated by professionals. It would be fairly simple for the instructors or DM's to instead teach people how to lower their gas consumption in a variety of ways to extend their dive safely and proper gas management skills. So if sharing air when OOA is planned to double the dive time, does that qualify as planning the dive and diving the plan?

The vast majority of dive ops don't dive 'by the book'. I've seen every iteration of every 'rule' or 'guideline' or 'best practice' there is. Dive in enough places and you'll see every variation of anything you can think of. What dive ops should do and what is going on have nothing to do with each other and wishful thinking on a forum won't effect the reality that's out there. Every dive op has a different take on anything you can think of. Who hasn't experienced a dive op not even asking to see your C-card? Who hasn't seen a dive op have different DM to diver ratios, depth limits, different low air PSI numbers to call the dive, different ideas on safety stop depths and times, different ideas on who sets ups the gear, different ideas on tank types, weight set ups... air sharing... etc... etc... etc...

It is what it is.

As a certified diver it's your personal responsibility to be personally responsible for your safety. You don't have to accept anything a DM wants to do, you can call your dive at any time during the dive.