Dumbest Thing You Have Done...

[Lynn CA]

Liveaboard diving the great barrier reef, several boats anchored at cod hole, dove off the Nimrod, and came up at the Mike Ball Spoilsport (looked the same underwater). Realized the mistake only when I didn't recognize anyone on board.

Borrowed my mom's Lexus (visiting her in Hawaii) to get to the boat, locked the car with the clicker & slipped it into my swimsuit bra, put on my wetsuit, and did two dives. Back at the Lexus, clicker is dead (they really don't like saltwater) so opened the door with the key & set off the alarms, which I have no idea how to turn off. Mom has to come in a taxi to get us, and to turn off car alarm with spare clicker. It was awhile before I got to borrow the Lexus again.

 

[616fun]

Ok,
Thought I'd share this one....

I went diving on a Sunday (everything went well) and brought my gear home, cleaned it in the normal fashion, and left it in the garage to dry before putting it away. Well, the only problem is that my wife normally parks her car in the garage...

I beat her home Monday night and was fixing dinner - she came in, changed clothes and we ate. I had somewhere I had to go that evening, so I went out in the garage and noticed her car was there. OH S**T!!!!

My BC was pushed against the wall and all the rest of the gear was under the car. Amazingly nothing was seriously damaged. She stradled my regs and computer. The BC was just pushed across the floor. Only thing that was damaged was a neoprene boot. It lost a few teeth on the zipper.

I laugh about it now - but I was ticked then. It wasn't that she ran over my stuff - but that she blamed me for it!!! Said it shouldn't have been there in the first place.
I asked her where else she'd like for me to put the soaking wet gear. I won't post her reply due to the family nature of this board :11:

 

[DavyJones]

So far the worst thing I've ever done is forget things. I'd wind up at the waters edge w/o a mask or a wieghtbelt or with my air off ect, ect, normal small dumb stuff. Right now my Wisdom computer has been missing in the house for a week. I had it in my hand and said to myself "I need to put this away" and that was the last memory I have of it. thank God for backup gear.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Well, I did a really dumb thing just this past Saturday ...

Was out diving on a boat with a few fellow ScubaBoarders. It was one of those boats where you have to get out of your rig and clip it off before boarding.

So on the first dive we ascended in a bit of current. While waiting my turn to board (and so I wouldn't have to hang on in the current any longer than necessary) I unclipped my waist strap, put a bit of air in the suit, unclipped the inflator hose, and removed the bungee from around my neck. Then, when it was my turn, I clipped the tether rope into my shoulder D-ring and spun out of the rig ... only to then realize I had neglected to release the crotch strap. The current quickly separated me from the rig, but the crotch strap was caught in the belt buckle and wrapped tightly around my left leg. Now, the current was taking me head-first away from my rig ... then I realized I had also neglected to take off my weight belt. I couldn't reach my reg (which was clipped off) and the force of the current was pulling my head down under the surface. Not a happy situation.

Fortunately, one of my dive buddies was right there and reached out a hand to pull me back upright. Once I grabbed ahold of the boat I was able to remove my weight belt and release the crotch strap. Had he not been right there, things could've gotten tense.

It was a good refresher though ... next dive, things went much more smoothly ... release the buckles, remove the weight belt, THEN take the rig off ... just like they teach ya in OW class ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[mstudley]

Well now we have covered almost everything other than the dumbest thing you have done that you should have known better than doing...

Here is my beginner oops.

During training my instructor kept harping about laying the tank and bcd down. If he caught it standing and you were more than 3 feet from it, you owed him a 6 pack. Luckily I never got caught.

Well a couple weeks ago I was getting ready to dive and to make putting the gear on easier I stood it up on the tailgate of my Tahoe. Then I realized my fins were still in my sotrage box on the ground 10 feet away. Since it is much harder to get to things on the ground in full gear I walked over and grabbed them.

Just as I picked them up I heard theloud his of air behind me. I immediately thought my reg was free flowing. I turned around and the whole rig was on the ground with a busted BCD inflator hose. So I was done diving for the day.

Luckily the shop I rented the gear from didn't charge me to replace the hose. I felt like such a doofus. I knew better than that.

I'm embarassed to say that I've done the exact same thing... except I ended up with a broken first stage (landed right on it)

 

[ofthewall]

I 've got one for you,
I am a Dive Master and am always harping on the students about leaving the tank standing just like syruss32 said.

Last Febuary my buddy and I were quarry diving in PA and the ground was frozen hard as a rock. I setup my gear on a picnic table and had it standing up on the end of the table as I was putting it on. I realized that I had forgotten my weight belt b/c I rarely use one, so I left my gear standing up and walked to the other end of the table. As I lifted the belt of the table it moved the table enough to cause my gear to fall off. It flipped completely over and landed on the first stage. The leverage of the tank hitting the hard ground forced the valve to bend forward and the yoke screw to slide up. the air was on and had 3000 psi, the first stage blew off. Holy Crap I thought!

I normaly dive DIN but this time I had my regular gear in the shop for service and was diving a 80cf with a k valve so I had to use my yoke adapter.

The only damage was the bent valve which I replaced with a DIN. The reg was a ScubaPro mk25, I had it checked out and besides a scratch or two it survived with no problems.

I was mostly mad at myself b/c did not follow my first rule!

 

[redrover]

I like your signature line Belushi. I think having a remora stuck to me would make for a very short dive time. LOL
Oh offthewall, what a good one I can just see it. How big can your eyes get?
I’ve done stupid things but not broke anything yet (knock on wood – is there an icon for that?) I have seen some surprising things. An ex-boyfriend is a DM and guided and instructed kayak diving. The first time we went snorkeling he forgot most of his gear and kept telling me shark stories as I geared up to go hang out with the Spinners. The first time we put kayaks in the water was my first ocean shore launch and I was a bit nervous but he hulied putting in and had not strapped every thing on so we had to scurry around finding it in the surf. He hulied again on the way and exiting in OW. It really pi**ed him off I didn’t. At least I think that’s why he didn’t talk to me much. Our first dive together he spazzed somehow giant striding off a shore platform and cut his lip. He didn’t talk much after that either.

 

[david.tolan]

Not something I did, rather trainee instructor, passing me his OCTO for an out of air drill, kept turning it upside down, and wondering why I kept going back to my own reg.

Haven't done anything "silly" yet, but I have messed up bad and got away with it.

On a cold water dive to 30M. We were supposed to stop at 10M on the way down to orientate. I just went straight down, finning against negative bouayancy. (What's that BCD thing for again?)

By 30M I was agitated, nervous and felt I was having difficulty getting enough air. (Cold Dark Water Nitrogen Narcosis with a heavy hit of paranoia). I decided to go back up, and signalled one of the assistant instructors. I forgot to vent the drysuit, and made a reasonably bouyant ascent. It didn't feel fast, but the assistant instructor who came up with me said it was. Luckily I got away with it. Mostly down to not having been at the bottom long enough to build up much nitrogen.

You learn from these things, next time you do better.

Dave.

You start out with lots of luck and no experience, hopefully you end up with lots of experience before your luck runs out.

 

[dive_lover88]

I'm guilty of putting my leg thru my leg thru the armhole of my wetsuit and asked my buddy if my wetsuit shrank during the surface interval...once i even managed to get my legs thru the armholes and found out that i was wearing it the wrong way...pretty dumb of me...hahaha

 

[cra2]

Forgetting things sux. lol.

On my second check-out dive, I was sooOOooo comfy being in the ocean, I was using my snorkel and looking around underneath us as the group huddled up around the instructor. Once everyone was ready, we all gave the OK to descend. I must've been 25' down before I realized I still had my snorkel in my mouth! Seawater tastes nasty.

In Costa Rica, I came back to the tiny boat after a dive and the boat assistant told us to hand our gear up first and then he'd help us climb up over the outboard motor.
Well.. I promptly whipped off my non-weight-integrated BC and handed it up, ...then wondered why I was having so much trouble keeping my head above the waves. lol. Can you guess why?