I'm sure some of you have the DIR 2004 DVD's. If you watch the 18 minutes of the Wakulla dive, you'll see even the best of the best making mistakes.
During the open circuit portions you will see a lot of poor trim and propulsion issues. These issues are more highly excusable when trying to manipulate the amount of scooters and stage bottles during the later rebreather footage due to the massive equipment load, but with basic equipment, the WKPP divers certainly can do better. Or, have the demands placed on divers begun to move away from "acceptable" to "must be perfect" on today's entry level technical diver going through DIR training? The trim and propulsion issues are not destroying visibility, nor are they compromising team integrity. Are they a problem? No. But, how many of you would not be allowed to "pass" a course if displaying the same skills? One of my students took my Tek Prep course and then took JJ's DIR-F days later and told me that the skills I demonstrated were better than JJ's. That surprised me. But, then I never took a course with JJ. I learned from Andrew, who as we know, is amazing. So, if I looked better than JJ to one student whose occupation deals with studying athletes, and if I can't pass Bob's DIR-F after taking Andrew's Tech 1, what level are our skills being challenged to meet as DIR students before we actually can go diving? Have I seen JJ dive. Yes, several times, and he always had his scooter and looked great. The point of this is that when you are assessing your own mistakes place them in context of where they occur in a dive and how critical the mistake is and not just always against the template of perfection.
Returning to the 2004 DVD's, you'll see George make a significant impact with the ceiling at the end of an old tunnel approaching the 14,000 foot mark. This impact is made while scootering with the brunt of the hit being taken by the cylinder mounted to the right side of the rebreather and the manifold of that bottle going into the rebreather. The impact visibly swings the unit and large pieces of cave rain down and continue to rain on Jarrod as he follows continuing to film. George doesn't pause to check the status of the knob on that cylinder nor examine the manifold and Jarrod doesn't get his attention to insist that they check for damage. Such a mistake can be critical. I have impacted ceilings in caves and wrecks and grew sloppy about checking
every time. Last month, I managed to strip my left knob off my manifold in a U-boat. I didn't check the knob because the impact with the celing was relatively gentle. Upon surfacing, an R/V Garloo crew member asked, "Where's your handwheel?" as I climbed the ladder. I hadn't known it was missing throughout decompression and no one pointed it out to me underwater. George's failure to check his knob and my failure to check my knob could have turned into critical situations.
Less critical, but quite unfortunate, cave damage is done by stage bottles impacting the ceiling in two other places. The most obvious at the 16,000 foot mark where the cave is syphoning. You can see the ceiling raining down and the white color of freshly exposed limestone.
Not critical at all, not really mistakes either, but you'll see rubber fin straps rather than springs on the fins, Jarrod wearing gloves which is not recommended for cave diving (but, he
is going in for several hours) and decompressing on the knees. As DIR divers it becomes important to ask yourself why you, others in your group and divers that you see are doing things.
As a cave instructor, I'd look at these issues as:
Fins = springs would be ideal, but the heel straps are either cut or folded under removing possible entanglement points (acceptable).
Gloves = possibly diver needs them for comfort during long exposures? Comfort is more critical than reduced dexterity and the ability to feel the line if a lights out or silt out situation occurs.
Decompressing on knees = divers are tired from lengthy exposure. Deco on knees helps them rest and maintain proper depth while possibly experiencing fatigue.
Again, the point of this post is to call to attention ways of assessing your own mistakes, and those of others, by placing them in context of where they occur in a dive and how critical the mistake is, as well as to say that even the best of the best error. Keep that in mind as you quest for perfection.
TSandM:
Bob and I were actually talking about this topic last night after our dive. Really, the point is that people are only human, and no matter how well trained they are, they're occasionally going to make mistakes. The mistakes will be less frequent, hopefully less severe (although there's NO guarantee of that), and the person involved should have better tools to salvage the situation, but no amount of training and practice will ever change the fact that a human being is a complex system vulnerable to error...
...And this gets back to the original question of this thread, from which we have strayed far afield. Ideals are just that, but people live in a messy real world and often have to reconcile what they'd like to do (or be able to do) with what they can actually pull off. We're all trying to get by, above and under the water, the best we can.
