I think it was more putting your trust in someone who had greater experience. The takeaway is that you should always be at least familiar with, if not actively participating in your dive plan ... this helps minimize the potential for surprises once the dive begins.
The "trust-me" dive. There is a story in the book "Diver Down".
That would cause me to start thinking about the wisdom of going on the dive with these fellows. Exceeding NDL isn't a big whoop ... not honoring your deco obligation can be ... joking around about it definitely would make me question whether or not they're taking the risks of the dive too lightly ... in which case I don't want to be in the water with them.
From what I know, it appears that the group members carried no more gas than aluminum 80s. I don't think they were prepared nor equipped to for decompression.
How did he arrive at that number? Given the dive profile, that's not adequate gas reserves ... depending on your consumption rate, it's barely adequate to get yourself to the surface, much less have anything in reserve for a potential buddy failure.
I don't know exactly how he arrived at that number, but yes, it wasn't adequate
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Dives such as this one point to the value of at least being able to conceptualize how to evaluate your gas needs prior to the dive, rather than watching your gauge and aborting at a certain point ... it keeps you from sliding down the slippery slope of what Lynne referred to as the "incident pit". Please consider reading this article ... NWGratefulDiver.com
Agreed.
Not knowing what signals were used, I should ask ... are you sure he understood what you were trying to tell him? Did the two of you review signals prior to the dive to assure you would be able to understand each other? You should have.
I tapped two fingers of one hand into the palm of another hand (meaning gauges, may not be universal). My buddy actually looked at my pressure gauge. It's still a possibility that he didn't get what I had in mind; message sent does not equal message received
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A better plan would've been to tap him, point to yourself, thumb up, and begin your ascent ... in other words, communicate your intent to surface first, then begin your ascent.
That's what I should have done :confused4:
It sounds like you didn't make a direct ascent ... but rather angled (swimming in that direction) toward shore. Is that correct? If so, did you consider that with a low air reserve this may not have been a prudent thing to do? Priority one is reaching the surface before you run out of air ... preferably with adequate reserves to inflate your BCD and hopefully a bit more to breathe in case you run into problems getting back to shore.
Yes, I did a rather angled ascent. Another mistake
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No ... if you had a ceiling it's because you exceeded NDL ... not because of your ascent rate. And in any case, once you're getting that low on gas you should be heading to the surface. Prioritize your risks ... DCS is fixable ... drowning, much less so.
I am 99.999% certain that I didn't exceed my NDL, the Suunto Zoop makes the safety stop mandatory (hence the ceiling) if the ascent rate exceeds a certain limit. The manual confirms this. To be more sure, I would need to pull out the dive data from the computer.
... and probably a few other reasons ... like a stress-induced change in breathing pattern and dealing with circumstances you're not familiar with.
I should always remember to breathe normally.
You stayed down too long ... 100 psi is well outside the margin of error for an analog pressure gauge. What would you have done if you went to breathe and suddenly couldn't? When was the last time you practiced a CESA and manual inflate of your BCD? If it's been a while, consider practicing this skill.
I will be practicing the CESAs and manual inflates.
Using the last bit of your precious air supply ... next time consider exhaling into it instead.
Great info, new skill.
... another skill that needs practicing ... doing something like this for the first time shouldn't be happening at the time you need it ... your brain's already too overloaded dealing with other issues. I'd recommend practicing this skill on a safe, shallow dive till you're completely comfortable with it.
I really want to practice these tasks in pool first.
Actually it's simple if you breathe into the bag ... transferring air from your lungs to your bag doesn't change your buoyancy at all.
Yeah.
Once again, just flip over on your back ... turning your tank into a keel and getting the weight of it underneath you ... and kick. You'll be amazed how far you can go that way ...
I did swim back mainly on my back, but I still felt a lot of drag
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... that's probably the biggest flag you missed right there. Learn to cultivate conversations with that "little voice" inside your head that says something's not right ... and if it seems to be not right, accept that it isn't right and don't go. The best accident prevention is recognizing when something's not right and, if you can't fix it before the dive, deciding not to do the dive.
No problem ever got better by submerging it in water.
Definitely!
Seems to me there were a lot of lessons coming out of this one dive. Glad to see that you're taking them to heart ... not everyone does.
I really try my best
Thanks for your post!
