Dumbest Thing You Have Done...

[bisonduquebec]

Ok.... my turn to admit dummiest mistakes.

I will pass on the usual tuba breathing underwater, forgotten weights, air turned off, etc.

I read the whole thread and have not seen the 2 following mistakes, so here we go.

My wife and I just switched to backplate / wing / integrated weights setup to be more comfortable with our dry suits. So we went to the local quarry and spend the first 2 hours fitting our rig. We adjust, go in the water, back out, readjust until everything is perfect.

Finally, I put my equipment on to do the real dive. I slowly walk down the slope and suddenly, in about 4 feet of water, I am being pushed from the back, face first in the water, reg not in mouth. First reaction, lets get back up, but someone is keeping me from getting straight. I stop think and put my reg in my mouth. Ok now I can breath and figure out what I am going to do to that *** ******* playing trick on me. So I start moving around and don’t feel any resistance but my own.

And I got the flash. My wing is fully inflated (I mean full) and it literally pushed me faced down. I deflate the wing, get straight again and try to look normal. Well, not really. There are about 20 others divers laughing at me. There goes my pride….

I also often forget to attach the crotch strap. Usually not a problem but when I did put my rig on a floating deck, I turn over on my knees to get up, extend my legs, and feel the whole rig moving towards my head and pushing me over the deck in the oily marina cold water. I don’t now how I did it, but I was able to stop movement and was able to fell on the deck. No harm done. Did I mention I was not wearing my dry suit and all this was only to be able to get the rig on the boat?

 

[grouchyturtle]

Here's my latest.
KISS training last weekend:

Removed the BOV from mouth to do an out of dil drill, but forgot to close it. Went back on the loop, heard gurgle gurgle gurgle. Freaked out, bailed out, started to ascend, and fought off my instructor as he tried to close it.

In the end I finished th drill, very slowly and badly, rolled to get the water into the trap and completed the dive. There was just a LITTLE water when I dumped my scrubber that night!

 

[TxHockeyGuy]

Fortunately I don't haven't had any major oops yet. Worse I've done is try to use my snorkel as a regulator, that really doesn't work. The funniest thing I've done was on my OW cert dives I was diving with the fin inserts still in, you know the ones that prevent the pocket from deforming. Instructor asked how I couldn't have noticed them, it had to be uncomfortable with those in there. Well I play hockey and for anyone who has skated they know that skates are not the most comfortable things to have on their feet, so compared to the skates even with the inserts the fins felt great!

 

[diveAK]

Two dumbest things I have done are...

1) Didnt bring a weight belt back home to Alaska with me, so I dove in a lake using a pouch full of socket wrenches, which wasent enough so i had to find three big rocks to hold onto the entire two dives I made...

2) Finished cave training and didnt switch my regulators back to a single tank set-up, so when it came time to dive trying to find a wreck in Lake Erie I put my regulator on my tanks and went diving with one regulator and a bc inflator (no backup or depth/pressure gauge), and I had also forgot to bring my watch and computer along...in water with viz less tha a foot...

 

[reefseal]

Cinch strap of BC for tank. Sat down real hard after dive and rrrrrrrrrip! No second dive. I carry a spare now. Dropped rental tank on tank where tank landed on tank valve climbing up rocks. (glad a rental!)

 

[bolantej]

the night before OW certification I noticed my new compass was not inserted correctly into my new computer console and the lubber line was crooked. I read the manual, and it said to use a flathead screwdriver to "pry" it out of the console. Of course, I had no flat head screw driver, so I figured that my handy pocket knife would be sufficient. Well, I managed to get it out of the console, but no doubt with a little lubrication help from the oil now pouring out of my compass into the back of my console and onto my hands. I will never do that again. Good thing my friend loaned me his so I could finish my navigation drills.

P.S.
I recently purchased a new compass with a wrist mount.

 

[DavidScubadiver]

My first dive after open water certification was a night dive, not a twilight or dusk dive, but dark of night, in Jamaica. My newly minted buddy and I decended, decided to abort, and finned our way to the surface...she kept trying to clear her ears and I signaled not to do that since we were ascending. Then.... we hit bottom. Apparently, using "descending divers with lights" as a reference point is not helpful for determining direction. While we were moving "up" relative to them, that only meant we were DESCENDING slower than they were (hence the buildup of pressure!).

Check those guages, don't dive beyond your training. Ironically, when we did surface (we shot up pretty fast from 30 feet), my dive computer was alarming like mad, I thought I had dcs (because I was all tingly and my dive computer said I should be dead, or so I thought), until about 10 pm that night when I looked at my dive computer, pressed a button and the thing squirted me in the eye, the button fell out and a little spring dropped to the floor.

 

[miketsp]

Well this happened to my buddy.
We were diving a wreck in a very strong current and it was all we could do to hold on to the shot line which was at a really shallow angle.
Anyway we dumped our BCs and hauled down the line hand over hand - really hard work pulling into the current.
Anyway we got the the bottom at nearly 30m and the current eased off as we got into the shelter of the wreck. I let go of the line and my buddy was just about to do the same when I realised that he was at a strange angle. Then it hit me. I sprinted for his hand and managed to grab it in one hand and the line in the other and got him back onto the line.
He was light by about 8kg missing both front integrated weight pockets.
The current had been so strong that the effort of hauling on the line masked the missing weight.
It would have been an ever accelerating fast trip to the surface.
When we looked back on the pre-dive checks we realised it happened due to a series of small events that interrupted our normal routine.
Murphy really is out to get you!
Anyway, I now do a final weight check every time I need to use a line to descend - before letting go of the line.

 

[Cacia]

every few months or so, I will be talking too much and put my eclipse on upside down.

And once I was trying to take all my gear off at once and almost fell off the back of the boat. Weights should come off before peeling the hood! That would be a very humiliating way to die...they find your body on the bottom and you are stuck in your hood with one elbow and all lassoed up in the long hose and weights. Please just say you never found my body.

 

[prodive69]

he he....

Know that feeling....once I forgot my bs bottoms, so I put my wetsuit on in the head.
After the dive, I forgot and pulled my wetsuit down. Pointer: people don't scream, you only draw attention to yourself...what a loser.

I was just minding my time, reading through all the post and got to this one. As I read the post I found myself chuckling........then comes the "pointer" and whooosh the burning sensation of Pepsi coming out my nose......the truth really is better than fiction! (the way you told it I could picture myself there on the boat) too funny