Diver Rescue

[xjeslesx]

I'de call that a body recovery, and I don't teach that till Rescue.

Just giving up on an unconscious diver? I feel bad for your dive buddy.

 

[oldogre]

BSAC include "Basic" rescue in initial pool training.

 

[String]

BSAC include "Basic" rescue in initial pool training.

CBL of unconscious victim to the surface. OO4 or 5 has the same exercise repeated from 6m in open water.

As an agency they're doing everything else wrong currently but the rescue stuff is still a good thing.

 

[hg frogman]

If Open Water divers were sincerely supposed to be able to dive autonomously with their buddies after their certification, then (in my opinion) the OW certification should contain some rescue skills, notably bringing back an unconscious diver from 10 meters up to the surface at the right speed.

The OW course couldn't be done in 3 or even 4 days then .

People who make the laws in France seem to agree with me on this (though I doubt they care much about my opinion ). DCBC, as you are the OP I bet you will be pleased to know that the new French Code of Sport stipulates that, from July 2010 on, a diver (from whatever agency) must have this kind of rescue skills to be allowed to dive autonomously in France (within the context of a Dive Center, which is by far the mainstream ; out of this context, divers do what they want in France and can even get fills without any C-card).

 

[teejay58]

The most important aspect with my effective rescue interventions was having the confidence to 'act'... to take responsibility and get involved. This is closely followed by the capacity to keep a cool mind and avoid panic. Only then can you effectively problem solve and react effectively. The specific rescue techniques utilised were of much less importance than that.

I'm wondering... how do you train someone to stay cool in a difficult situation? How do you train someone to think while they are panicking? Is it possible? Or are there some people who are just never going to be able to function while in a panic?

This is another situation where I am aware that I can't think clearly when seriously stressed or panicked. I try. I slow down my breathing. I do what I can to minimize the effects of the stress, but I really don't think well. And I'm just not sure how I can fix that.

Took trapeze lessons a couple of years ago. The adrenaline flow was so huge that it seriously impaired my ability to hear, to move, etc. Much less to think coherently. The nausea was as close as I've ever come to upchucking without doing so. It also completely drained my blood sugar reserves so that for a 2 hour $75 session, I could only jump off that platform about 3 times before I was unable to climb the ladder again. LOL! Then it pissed me off that I could not control my fear any better than that. There was a net, I was roped up six ways from sunday with a safety belt on. It was safe, but my primal fear thing just was not listening to logic. I ended up taking beta blockers to put the squeeze on the adrenal gland so I could function. That experience taught me that I could act in spite of fear. But it didn't teach me how to think and reason in the face of panic.

When I was a brand new diver, I once experienced unexpected panic. But because I had a plan and followed it, there was a very good outcome. I got to feel panic and not be injured. We were diving off a pontoon boat. My mom was fishing on one side of the boat and we were diving off the other side. She got her hook caught in one of the anchor ropes. I came up pretty empty... well, pegged actually. She asked me to go get her hook. I reasoned that I'd be right on the anchor rope and could just haul myself up if I ran out of air. And in a worse case scenario, it was only about 25 feet of water; I'd just drop my gear and surface. So I went after her hook. Just after I freed it, I ran out of air. My eyes got big as saucers as the panic hit, then I followed my plan and hauled my ass up that rope. I consider that experience a very good one in that I know what panic feels like and what it does to me.

How do you train someone to think when they're panicked? How do you stay calm in a life and death situation when the adrenaline is surging thru your body?

 

[Peter Guy]

How do you train someone to think when they're panicked? How do you stay calm in a life and death situation when the adrenaline is surging thru your body?

a. You don't/can't train someone when they are panicked.

As far as I know (and understand), the idea of stress based training is to instill reactions to situations so that the onset of panic is delayed as much as possible.

b. Staying calm? Training and probably genetics (or at least long term personality traits) are needed to stay focused on what you can do and ignore what you can't thus delaying the onset of panic. This reminds me of the report of radio calls from test pilots at Edwards Air Force Base -- as they are screaming towards the ground, saying "I've tried 'x' -- I've tried 'y' -- what more can I do?"

 

[Crush]

I'm wondering... how do you train someone to stay cool in a difficult situation? How do you train someone to think while they are panicking? Is it possible? Or are there some people who are just never going to be able to function while in a panic?

I don't want this to be taken out of context, but part of the reason for training is to save the diver from the burden of thinking - you simply do what is correct, rather than think about it and second-guess yourself. Stopping problems when they are small breaks the panic cycle before stress blows-up into full panic.

I don't know how one would train someone to think while panicking. I would hope that training would prevent the panic from happening, or at least delay its onset.

I believe that most people cannot function rationally when in a state of panic. However, some can calm themselves down after they became panicked, revert to their training, and extricate themselves from a bad situation.

 

[hg frogman]

1) What we know we're not (or less) afraid of. Training aims also at experiencing the situations that can be critical, so we know them and how to react (eg rescuing an unconscious diver).

2) Some sports (eg rock-climbing) increase self-control. In many cases, I believe avoiding panic consists in getting distanciated from oneself, while staying active. One can stay active because one knows from experience what to do (point 1 above).

3) In my opinion, about 10% of the people I had as would-be OW students were not really able to dive, albeit being physically fit, because of diverse "phobias" or whatever. That made them too prone to panic. Better for them to find another sport (or a better instructor ). Diving is not for absolutely everyone.

 

[Kingpatzer]

I don't want this to be taken out of context, but part of the reason for training is to save the diver from the burden of thinking - you simply do what is correct, rather than think about it and second-guess yourself. Stopping problems when they are small breaks the panic cycle before stress blows-up into full panic.

That's correct. Training is not about instilling an ability to reason under pressure. Some people can do that better than others. One of the purposes of many of the high speed military training programs is to specifically weed out those who's threshold for thinking under pressure is too low. These are folks who have shown themselves to be exceptional soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen to get into the program. It's not their training that is lacking; rather, it's their ability to hold up under immense stress that washes them out.

I don't know how one would train someone to think while panicking. I would hope that training would prevent the panic from happening, or at least delay its onset.

Also correct. No one can think or act reasonably while experiencing panic. That's what panic is -- instinctive responses where the upper brain has simply disengaged and handed over the flight controls to the more rudimentary parts of our neurosystem .

I believe that most people cannot function rationally when in a state of panic. However, some can calm themselves down after they became panicked, revert to their training, and extricate themselves from a bad situation.

Training allows people to have things to do when facing a problem. Panic happens when your mind can't come up with a solution to your problem fast enough, and your brain goes "i don't know what do to -- hit the flight or fight reflexes!" So training helps you identify a problem quicker, and then adhere to an established set of responses to that problem. By having done the pretend games over and over again in preparing for a real emergency, the neural connections in your brain have already been made. Those ideas are pre-created for you to use. That means you don't have to reason out a response. you don't need to get creative. Instead, you can simply do what you already know to do.

I play jazz guitar. I spend hours and hours and hours practicing various riffs, scales, and the like. When I'm playing with the band and a chord change comes up, I don't have to stop and think "gosh, what will sound good here? What is it I should do now?" Instead I trust my fingers to 'know' what to do. I make a few decisions, but I don't think about what I'm doing, I don't need to. I've already thought about it thousands of times.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I'm wondering... how do you train someone to stay cool in a difficult situation? How do you train someone to think while they are panicking? Is it possible? Or are there some people who are just never going to be able to function while in a panic?

This is another situation where I am aware that I can't think clearly when seriously stressed or panicked. I try. I slow down my breathing. I do what I can to minimize the effects of the stress, but I really don't think well. And I'm just not sure how I can fix that.

Took trapeze lessons a couple of years ago. The adrenaline flow was so huge that it seriously impaired my ability to hear, to move, etc. Much less to think coherently. The nausea was as close as I've ever come to upchucking without doing so. It also completely drained my blood sugar reserves so that for a 2 hour $75 session, I could only jump off that platform about 3 times before I was unable to climb the ladder again. LOL! Then it pissed me off that I could not control my fear any better than that. There was a net, I was roped up six ways from sunday with a safety belt on. It was safe, but my primal fear thing just was not listening to logic. I ended up taking beta blockers to put the squeeze on the adrenal gland so I could function. That experience taught me that I could act in spite of fear. But it didn't teach me how to think and reason in the face of panic.

When I was a brand new diver, I once experienced unexpected panic. But because I had a plan and followed it, there was a very good outcome. I got to feel panic and not be injured. We were diving off a pontoon boat. My mom was fishing on one side of the boat and we were diving off the other side. She got her hook caught in one of the anchor ropes. I came up pretty empty... well, pegged actually. She asked me to go get her hook. I reasoned that I'd be right on the anchor rope and could just haul myself up if I ran out of air. And in a worse case scenario, it was only about 25 feet of water; I'd just drop my gear and surface. So I went after her hook. Just after I freed it, I ran out of air. My eyes got big as saucers as the panic hit, then I followed my plan and hauled my ass up that rope. I consider that experience a very good one in that I know what panic feels like and what it does to me.

How do you train someone to think when they're panicked? How do you stay calm in a life and death situation when the adrenaline is surging thru your body?

Ask yourself this ... what causes people to panic? Usually, it's putting themselves in a situation they don't know how to get themselves out of.

So the answer to your question isn't that you train them how to deal with panic, but that you train them how to deal with the problems that would otherwise induce panic.

In reality it's a two-pronged approach. In a well-run Rescue class, you'll spend about as much time learning how to avoid accidents as you'll spend learning how to deal with them. In other words, by learning to recognize the factors that lead to an accident, you're better equipped to take steps to avoid a situation that would cause you to panic in the first place.

But, since accidents do happen ... learning how to deal with them will help you gain the self-confidence needed to focus on what you need to do, which will reduce the likelihood of panic.

Of course, a lot of it is dependent on your personality. There are people out there who are just naturally calm, and will deal with any emergency situation by just compartmentalizing their emotions and taking care of business. And there are others who ... no matter what training they have ... turn every little thing that goes wrong into a crisis. You cannot really "train" those folks to respond differently ... it's who they are. In some cases, the best thing you can do for those folks is convince them that diving's probably not a good idea for them, because of their personality.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)