It isn't easy seeing green...

[Fuzzmutton]

I've got one for you guys that I can't find any info. on, nor have I heard anyone talking about it.

I've been puzzled for awhile about an incident that happened almost a year ago. I went to So. Cal. and was diving La Jolla Shores, at a depth of around 65 ft. my vision started "turning green". I was in murky, low viz conditions and I was seaching the bottom for anything interesting when I noticed the silt was starting to glow neon green. I promptly motioned to my husband that I was losing my mind, but since we had not discussed that particular hand signal ahead of time he was rightfully confused It started to creep me out, everything was glowing green, so much so that I could hardly see. I then signaled that I wanted to go up a little, 65 ft. is shallow for nitrogen narcosis of that sort, I think, but I wanted to make sure. We went up to somewhere in the 40'-45' range and it went away.

I had the experience of my vision turning green once before...when I was being put out for surgery with gas, as they gassed me it was like a green fog rolling in over my sight.

Can anyone help me make sense of this? Has anyone else had this problem?


Thanks,
Fuzz

 

[Hank49]

That's pretty odd. I don't know if there's similarities to sodium pentathol, which I think they still use to knock you out for surgery, and monoxides as far as their affect on you. But since you saw it as you were blacking out for surgery, I'd seriously look into it before diving again.

 

[Fuzzmutton]

Thanks, I was kinda worried that there might be a connection between the two incidents, and if that meant that for some strange reason I was on the verge of a black-out. I had tentatively put it down as narcosis, being that it went away when I went I went up a little but I had had a "stress incident" entering the water (I posted about it) where I almost drowned in the surf zone and my husband would not accept that I wanted to call the dive. I had a long surface swim to calm myself and relax and I thought I had gotten a good grip by the time we descended. I was wondering if maybe I was not breathing fully in and out, due to residual stress that I was unaware of, and had a build up of carbon dioxide? This was well into my dive, almost at the end in fact.


Fuzz

 

[Hank49]

I'm no doctor so all I can give is my experiences here.....I've been pretty narced on very deep air dives and never seen green. I have seen red at 170 feet after coming up from 240 feet (don't try this at home)....which I've been advised may have been the first signs of oxygen toxicity.

 

[Fuzzmutton]

Hmmm....

Info. that I googled sez carbon dioxide build up can cause vision "distortions". Nothing about seeing colors though.

My hubby, didn't think it could be narcosis either, given the depth we were at but he was not much interested in finding out what it could have been if not that.

Fuzz

 

[DandyDon]

Did your hubby see any color in the "murky, low viz"...?

Would 65 feet be deep enough for red to look green, anyone? Could this site possibly have a red tint to the murk that appeared green at depth?

 

[Fuzzmutton]

Hi DandyDon!

The hubby wanted to know what my weird hand gestures meant on that dive (how do you signal "Mad Cow" underwater? Ha ha) so I asked him if he saw the neon green everywhere and he said he saw nothing out of the ordinary.

Fuzz

 

[dpbishop]

There are persistent rumors of an underwater nuclear test off the coast of San Diego circa 1955. Maybe you should have your hubby run a Geiger counter over you?

 

[dpbishop]

The water quality report indicates a minor red tide currently. Perhaps the bioluminescense appears green due to the red/green shift at depth. Ask DR. Bill.

 

[DandyDon]

The water quality report indicates a minor red tide currently. Perhaps the bioluminescense appears green due to the red/green shift at depth. Ask DR. Bill.

That would support my green at depth theory, or maybe. I don't know how much different people see different things differently?