Personal involvement in a scuba diving related emergency?
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OP
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Belzelbub
Contributor
I voted Lung Expansion injury and Other for the same incident, which is really the only one I've ever been involved with.
It happened during a checkout dive for a Deep certification. There were 4 students and 1 instructor during the course which took place in July of last year. Dive was to a maximum depth of 106' for a total duration of 29 minutes. Fairly normal profile. A few short stops at some platforms and objects of interest on the way down to a platform at 99ft. Spent about 10 minutes at 99' doing math, etc. with a brief drop down to 106' before beginning the ascent.
During the ascent, another student seemed to panic, and at about 80' she started to dart toward the surface. The instructor responded quickly, and was able to get her to calm down rather quickly. She indicated she was OK, and we continued up. We did surface marker deployment on a platform at 17' during a slightly extended safety stop. The diver who panicked did not want to participate in that activity, but still signed OK. When the rest of us were done, we ascended.
As soon as the panicked diver reached the surface, her regulator was out of her mouth, and she was gurgling on each breath and clearly in distress. Another instructor from the same dive shop had just arrived with an OW student. My instructor (shop owner) instructed her to get the oxygen from his truck. My instructor removed the diver's BC, and asked me to bring it up. Instructor got her out of the water, and both instructors did a good job of coordinating responsibilities. One diver was on the phone with 911, I was sent to the dive site office for a defibrilator (they only had a test unit), and remained by the road to flag down the paramedics.
Paramedics got there right as the O2 was pretty much exhausted. They did an assessment, and took her to the hospital. I had to give a statement for the dive shop.
I talked to both the instructors and the diver later. She was initially suspected of AGE due to the sudden onset of symptoms. AGE was later ruled out, and diver was suspected of DCS and pulmonary edema. She took two chamber rides, though the Dr later believed that DCS was negative. They did a full analysis of her dive gear, and could not find any leaks or other problems. We could only speculate that she managed to inhale some water while trying to look up the dive site wall, and panicked. She later continued her instruction and did complete the course.
The OW student who was getting ready to dive when our group surfaced was a bit scared initially, but the rest of us convinced him that this was not a normal occurrence. He completed his checkout dives and attained his certification.
It happened during a checkout dive for a Deep certification. There were 4 students and 1 instructor during the course which took place in July of last year. Dive was to a maximum depth of 106' for a total duration of 29 minutes. Fairly normal profile. A few short stops at some platforms and objects of interest on the way down to a platform at 99ft. Spent about 10 minutes at 99' doing math, etc. with a brief drop down to 106' before beginning the ascent.
During the ascent, another student seemed to panic, and at about 80' she started to dart toward the surface. The instructor responded quickly, and was able to get her to calm down rather quickly. She indicated she was OK, and we continued up. We did surface marker deployment on a platform at 17' during a slightly extended safety stop. The diver who panicked did not want to participate in that activity, but still signed OK. When the rest of us were done, we ascended.
As soon as the panicked diver reached the surface, her regulator was out of her mouth, and she was gurgling on each breath and clearly in distress. Another instructor from the same dive shop had just arrived with an OW student. My instructor (shop owner) instructed her to get the oxygen from his truck. My instructor removed the diver's BC, and asked me to bring it up. Instructor got her out of the water, and both instructors did a good job of coordinating responsibilities. One diver was on the phone with 911, I was sent to the dive site office for a defibrilator (they only had a test unit), and remained by the road to flag down the paramedics.
Paramedics got there right as the O2 was pretty much exhausted. They did an assessment, and took her to the hospital. I had to give a statement for the dive shop.
I talked to both the instructors and the diver later. She was initially suspected of AGE due to the sudden onset of symptoms. AGE was later ruled out, and diver was suspected of DCS and pulmonary edema. She took two chamber rides, though the Dr later believed that DCS was negative. They did a full analysis of her dive gear, and could not find any leaks or other problems. We could only speculate that she managed to inhale some water while trying to look up the dive site wall, and panicked. She later continued her instruction and did complete the course.
The OW student who was getting ready to dive when our group surfaced was a bit scared initially, but the rest of us convinced him that this was not a normal occurrence. He completed his checkout dives and attained his certification.
OP
- Messages
- 19,768
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Interesting. The only time I have seen "Severe, debilitating nitrogen narcosis" was during training dives in US Navy First Class Diving School when they ran us to 285'/87M on air, dry in a chamber and in heavy gear in a wet pot. Slurred speech, poor math skills, tunnel vision, etcetera was obvious. However nobody did anything crazy or couldn't control their dive gear, which was all manual. Most of us could still tie a bowline in 3-finger canvas dry gloves, but it took about 3x longer than at 60'/18.
I have seen and experienced a lot of compromised dexterity, confirmed by CCTV and/or audio communications, but never to the point that divers were unable to safely function. We did a lot of surface supplied and Scuba deep air to 220'/67M. I was an inside tender on a treatment table 6a (165'/50M) that extended into over 6 hours and saturation decompression. The non-diving physician that was in there with me appeared to be able to diagnose symptoms -- until he discovered he couldn't get out when the patient recovered. We found out later he was a shrink who was on duty in the ER and was sent because he was the least-essential. He had mild claustrophobia but it didn't kick in until the patient recovered consciousness.
Granted, the vast majority of my deep air exposure was with well trained and experienced commercial and military divers. My narcosis "early indicator" has always been an odd numbness around my mouth, even in cold water. I have trained myself to start very deep slow breathing and to reduce exertion as soon as that happens.
I have seen and experienced a lot of compromised dexterity, confirmed by CCTV and/or audio communications, but never to the point that divers were unable to safely function. We did a lot of surface supplied and Scuba deep air to 220'/67M. I was an inside tender on a treatment table 6a (165'/50M) that extended into over 6 hours and saturation decompression. The non-diving physician that was in there with me appeared to be able to diagnose symptoms -- until he discovered he couldn't get out when the patient recovered. We found out later he was a shrink who was on duty in the ER and was sent because he was the least-essential. He had mild claustrophobia but it didn't kick in until the patient recovered consciousness.
Granted, the vast majority of my deep air exposure was with well trained and experienced commercial and military divers. My narcosis "early indicator" has always been an odd numbness around my mouth, even in cold water. I have trained myself to start very deep slow breathing and to reduce exertion as soon as that happens.
I once had a conversation with a very well known figure in the dive industry whose name I will not repeat because I do not have authority to repeat what he told me. He was with Sheck Exley on a number of deep air dives in the 400 foot range. He said Exley sometimes passed out briefly during dives from the effect of narcosis. He would then wake up and continue diving. His theory is that the unusual nature of Exley's death, with him tied off on the descent line, could be because he realized he was about to pass out and tied himself off so he could resume the dive when he awoke.
A number of years ago a dive shop owner in Cozumel died from DCS after a deep bounce dive on air. The story we got on ScubaBoard (after much discussion) was that when her group reached 300 feet (with AL 80s), she was so badly narced that she kept swimming deeper. She was eventually turned around at 400 feet by her DM, who will never walk again. (They had to go straight to the surface, with no deco stops.) When I was later in Cozumel, one of the DMs there said that she had not swum deeper; she had actually passed out at 300 feet and simply sunk until her DM caught her.
Was it narcosis? We all think of a seizure as the danger of oxygen toxicity, but I sometimes wonder if passing out might be a danger as well.
A number of years ago a dive shop owner in Cozumel died from DCS after a deep bounce dive on air. The story we got on ScubaBoard (after much discussion) was that when her group reached 300 feet (with AL 80s), she was so badly narced that she kept swimming deeper. She was eventually turned around at 400 feet by her DM, who will never walk again. (They had to go straight to the surface, with no deco stops.) When I was later in Cozumel, one of the DMs there said that she had not swum deeper; she had actually passed out at 300 feet and simply sunk until her DM caught her.
Was it narcosis? We all think of a seizure as the danger of oxygen toxicity, but I sometimes wonder if passing out might be a danger as well.
Belzelbub
Contributor
Yeah, I think that is definitely a possibility.
divinh
Contributor
On my first ever open water dive, one of the other students had trouble with his mask flooding and sucked through a tank in 15 min. (He was a big guy.) He didn't come back for the remaining dives, so I don't know if he ever completed.
Oxygen tox was the reason the Navy limited us to 285' on air, or a 2.0 PPO2 which was the limit in those days. Carbon Dioxide was probably a bigger contributing factor, which exacerbates narcosis (or worse). Even narc'ed, you can notice the gas density of air below 200' in a chamber where there are fewer distractions than in the water. A lot of divers describe it "like breathing whipped cream", which is obviously an exaggeration but gives you a sense of their perceptions.
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