Lessons learned- embarrassing but true

[Diver0001]

So..... Got some new grey hairs.....

I was doing a trimix training dive yesterday with 4 divers. I am one of the students. I have 30 years of diving experience, more than 10 years of full-on technical experience but I never did Trimix because in our local area you need to bring a shovel if you want to get deeper than about 50m.

Diver 1 was the instructor. He's a Padi CD, TDI instructor trainer, re-breather guru and has more certifications than will fit in his wallet. He's also a personal friend and a very picky instructor, which is why I am following this course with him.

Diver 2 is a Padi tek-rec instructor candidate. He has 600-odd dives, is a highly experienced technical nitrox diver and is learning how to teach that course.

Diver 3 is a PADI/IANTD/TDI diver who is full cave certified and highly experienced. He has limited experience with non-overhead environments, which makes me think that he is probably dive circles around me.

Diver 4 is me. PADI instructor, IANTD technical, ice etc and highly experienced. I have zero (next to zero) experience in caves but a lot of experience in wrecks.

So.... I mean, the guy with 600-odd dives was the least experienced diver in the group. What the hell could go wrong, right?

But the dive was complete CF.

We got into the water fine, descended, made the buddy/bubble check and proceeded. Diver 3, however, is using a borrowed drysuit. His own suit is in for repairs and he thought, "meh'.

during the swim to 50m he fell a bit behind. He couldn't keep up with the two front divers. We stopped and waited for him a couple of times but didn't communicate with him. He was considering calling the dive but we didn't wait long enough for him to fully catch up with us, catch his breath and explain what his problem was. WE assumed (assumption being the mother of all ****-ups) that he was just taking his time.

so deeper we go. AT 40m diver-2 suddenly stops. The depth was exactly 40m and the time was exactly 20 min. I thought he had confused 50m with 40m. The instructor thought that he had confused 20 with 25 min (the planned bottom time). The other student thought that he was just joking with us .... but he stopped exactly at 40m/20min and signed something that was either "gas change" or "something wrong" (learning point #1)

He then turned and started swimming back along the line.... fast. I caught him up and stopped him. screaming (though my reg) to his ear "what's wrong" (sounding like donald duck). He signed "something wrong" I screamed in his ear "how can I help you". He signed. "Ok" "swim" "line" "ok"

I deduced that he wanted to swim back to the shallows along the line. I couldn't deduce what was wrong.

At this point myself and my buddy, who were both using tables, needed to make a decision. We had a been at depth for a bit too long.

We let diver 2 go back along the line but myself and diver 3 had to ascend. The instructor came with us.

We ascended to 18m. I did my gas change. My buddy was having a hell of a time controlling his dry suit. He did his gas change but ascended in the process from 18 to 15m.

I signed for him to come down. He signed "ok" and I turned to get our orientation on the compass.

Just then the instructor signed me with his light. I turned back. He signed "buddy" and "up". I mean W.T.F. I looked up and my buddy was just about on the surface.

Myself and the instructor both ascended slightly as a result but waited. My buddy (diver-3) became stressed because of his uncontrolled ascent and vented everything..............

He ... fell (this is the only way to describe it) back to depth. myself and instructor both dove on him and grabbed him. We caught him at about 15m and arrested his descent. Due to the way he fell I was completely unsure if he was conscious or not. We were both holding on to his manifold and swimming up.

He initially appeared to be unresponsive. The instructors' light had fallen off his hand and was laying in the manifold. I removed it. I saw the instructor (who was using a rebreather) playing with his computer (adjusting the set-point). We were all getting dragged deeper. At some point I saw my buddy sort of "wake up" and switch from 50% to back gas. I was already at 22m. I let him go. I hoped (was pretty sure) that he was conscious and I didn't want to get dragged any deeper with 50% in my mouth. He descended to the bottom and spent a couple of minutes re-gaining his orientation.

The rest of the dive involved getting back in control. However, due to this incident I had no idea at all about my deco status. I really missed the computer. I used everything I know to create a plan on the fly. interestingly my plan and the instructor's plan only differed by 1 min.

 

[PfcAJ]

Did you ever find out what was the catalyst for all this?

Sounds scary.

 

[decompression]

Holy crap......wtf started all this?


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[victorzamora]

I have a similar story. I was very interested to read this....I'd love to hear the answers to the questions posed above. I'm also curious to know what happened to the buddy that was "unconscious."

These are the experiences too many are too afraid to talk about but could teach us SO much.

 

[shoredivr]

Thank you for posting this. My guess would be assumptions, lack of communication and understanding of signals, and unfamiliar equipment. Just goes to show CFs can happen.

 

[Diver0001]

Team of divers all certified by different instructors/agencies and all bringing, as you mentioned, a lot of habits and personality traits to the table that weren't explicitly briefed. I guess you could say that this is one of the things that DIR tries to solve by standardizing behaviour as well as gear.

The main catalyst for the buoyancy problems diver #3 had was unfamiliarity with the suit he was using in conjunction with having to do a mid-water swim without visual references other than the other divers. He's a highly experienced diver but not highly experienced with this particular thing and that showed up too late.

So what could he have done?
1) he assumed that he would be able to handle the mid-water swim without having done many free floating/swimming ascents like this. I don't think he had any doubts but he could have put the experience issue on the table during the briefing. This might have been a bit of over-confidence.

2) the drysuit was not his. He could have done a dive or 2 in it ahead of time to get dialed in. This was suggested but he chose not to. During the first phase of the dive he knew he was going to have to fight with the suit for the whole dive but chose not to call the dive. He should have.

3) when he made the unplanned ascent through his ceiling he got stressed out and over-compensated. I think if he had kept his head a little better he could have re-decended under control. His deco obligation was not extreme. He was really embarrassed by it, of course, and tried to act too *quickly* when it would have been better to act *effectively* and stay in control. That's the ABC rule again. He had gas, so "B" is the next step. Buoyancy control. Get back in control, get back to diving.

TBH the problem that diver #2 had concerned me more. He indicated that he had a problem and was calling the dive but chose to swim back to the shallows along the bottom. This wasn't the plan but he insisted on it. I understood later why but because the other divers weren't using computers, we didn't have the flexibility to change the plan that much and go with him and he really refused to do the swim mid-water, so we had a problem. As it was we ascended above him and were able due to the good visibility, to keep an eye on him during most of the ascent but this was a highly risky thing to do. Having something like ratio-deco in your bag of tricks might have helped but we didn't. This risk could have been eliminated if we were all using computers and/or all versed with RD.

R..

---------- Post added December 18th, 2014 at 07:39 PM ----------

So... tekkies..... here's a question.

I've been talking to friends about this. I'm not the instructor, although I have an opinion about it.

Thinking seems to be split with respect to diver #3

- give him the benefit of the doubt and a chance to correct it
- wash out and recycle to the next course

what do you think?

R..

 

[LiteHedded]

sounds like a complete failure of this team from the instructor on down to me. I wont go through it piece by piece but i'm sure you can see a lot of things went wrong here your instructor could have stopped before they snowballed.

why on earth is the instructor on a rebreather? seems to me that one needs to pay attention to a rebreather, but in a trimix class the instructor needs to be paying attention to you guys. he's dicking with his breather while you're attempting to rescue a possibly unconscious teammate who is about to exceed the MOD of his deco gas?

this class needs to dial it back to recreational depths and work on midwater skills before progressing to the 50m dives like this one with live ammo in your deco bottles. 30m diving with a deco bottle with a lean mix in it with ascent and descent drills would do a world of good for this class.

 

[Diver0001]

I would be inclined to agree on some points.

Of course I'm not the instructor and don't feel responsible for his decisions or choices of gear. What I do believe is that at this level of training, students should be responsible for their own choices.

as for the team's mid-water skills... it's the instructor's call. Personally I have in opinion about it

 

[GrimSleeper]

why on earth is the instructor on a rebreather? seems to me that one needs to pay attention to a rebreather, but in a trimix class the instructor needs to be paying attention to you guys. he's dicking with his breather while you're attempting to rescue a possibly unconscious teammate who is about to exceed the MOD of his deco gas?

this class needs to dial it back to recreational depths and work on midwater skills before progressing to the 50m dives like this one with live ammo in your deco bottles. 30m diving with a deco bottle with a lean mix in it with ascent and descent drills would do a world of good for this class.

I'm not reading that the instructor was using a rebreather, just that he's a 'rebreather guru'. If he was using a CCR, that strikes me as exactly the wrong choice for a course dive where the instructor might expect to have to deal quickly with unexpected depth changes - exactly the kind of thing a 'breather is particularly bad for.

Out of interest, how well did the instructor know the other students? If I'd never seen someone in the water before, I'd want to see them run through the basics on the kind of dive LiteHedded is talking about before doing 50m staged deco dives, especially if key pieces of their kit are borrowed or new. Did the high professed experience of the students push the instructor into going too fast?

As for how the course should proceed, a lot of the elements that led to the cluster come down to everyone having a conversation and getting a sense of what to expect from their fellow divers. But I'd have serious doubts about continuing a TMX course with a diver who can't hold depth in mid water. A three-metre whoops moment, sure, it can happen if you're task-loaded and not paying attention (although not paying attention during a course dive does rather call the student's attitude into question…). Bouncing the surface from 18m? You're not ready for Tec45/Deco Procedures level dives, never mind trimix.

EDIT: Just re-read OP. Instructor WAS on rebreather. Which, in my opinion, is a poor choice for a student-level decompression dive, for the reason I gave above. In turn, that choice suggests just a little bit of arrogance about at least two of the people in this dive.

 

[PfcAJ]

So... tekkies..... here's a question.

I've been talking to friends about this. I'm not the instructor, although I have an opinion about it.

Thinking seems to be split with respect to diver #3

- give him the benefit of the doubt and a chance to correct it
- wash out and recycle to the next course

what do you think?

R..

I would leave the course and link up with better divers and instructors.

The amount of crazy on that dive is too damn high!