Real-life Equipment Failures

[Tropicalwolf]

Can't you just hit them tanks with a wire brush and some krylon?

Quite a few years back in Sebastian, Florida. I remember hearing about a tank that exploded blowing out the side of the building and killing the fill attendant. I never heard the reason for the failure or what kind of tank it was.

"Ron Scherrer, a 72-year-old owner of the Dive Center in Sebastian, FL, died last November when a scuba tank he was filling ruptured and blew out part of his shop. The explosion split the tank wide open and shattered a concrete cooling tub. Fragments of concrete caused massive chest and head trauma, which killed Scherrer instantly.

Bill High, president of Professional Scuba Inspectors, reports that the tank was an older 72-cubic-foot steel model. It evidently had not been hydrostatically tested since 1991, yet somehow passed a visual inspection in 1999. Based on High’s preliminary investigation of photos from the scene, it appears that the tank’s interior was badly pitted from corrosion. The case is under investigation by local police and the shop’s insurance carrier." - Undercurrent.org

 

[TSandM]

By far and away the most frequent equipment failures I've had have been HID lights. The ballasts don't seem to last all that long, and I've damaged one cord, apparently.

Dry suit inlet and dump valves seem to get a lot of wear and tear, too, judging from how often I have to take them apart and service them.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Had an interesting failure the other day while I was out with a student. We were surface swimming out away from shore when I noticed some bubbles escaping from my BCD inflator hose. Lifting the hose up to investigate, the inflator mechanism came completely off the hose, causing my wing to lose all of its air. Tightening up the dump valve on my drysuit, I inflated it and told my student to turn around and head back to shore. Figuring to use this as a teaching moment, I asked her what she'd do if this happened to her and she wasn't wearing a drysuit. What else could she do to return to shore safely?

What would you do?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[captain]

Had an interesting failure the other day while I was out with a student. We were surface swimming out away from shore when I noticed some bubbles escaping from my BCD inflator hose. Lifting the hose up to investigate, the inflator mechanism came completely off the hose, causing my wing to lose all of its air. Tightening up the dump valve on my drysuit, I inflated it and told my student to turn around and head back to shore. Figuring to use this as a teaching moment, I asked her what she'd do if this happened to her and she wasn't wearing a drysuit. What else could she do to return to shore safely?

What would you do?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Oraly inflate the BC through the end of the hose and pinch it shut or slip the hose back on the inflator and hold it in place.

 

[elmer fudd]

The easiest path would probably be to just orally inflate the BC and swim with the leaking portion of the hose submerged as deep as possible to avoid letting the air back out.

Assuming you don't have a drysuit of course. If you have a drysuit, then you can just do as you did and use it for flotation.

The way I see it though, if you're properly weighted in a wetsuit you should have a couple of pounds of negative buoyancy on the surface at most and that should only be at the start of the dive. Come the end of the dive you should be slightly positive on the surface. This should allow you to tread water even with no additional buoyancy at all. BC fails? Unless there's heavy chop you've got no problem.

I've done a few dives now without drysuit or a BC and it's very enlightening. You get your weight perfect for the depth you intend on diving and then you just rely on breathing or picking up a rock or two to balance you out as you vary depth or use up air. First off, it's surprising just how little weight you actually need. I thought I had my weighting pretty fine tuned last year when I was wearing 19 lbs. with an HP119 and a 7mm J-suit, but now I've done dives with as little as 11 lbs. and an LP72 and I find I can hover in shallow water with only 15 lbs. and a 72.

Once you get your weighting figured out like that, you find you're always buoyant on the surface.

 

[iztok]

Well I just somehow got my can light flooded

Since it was only used for routing the long hose during that dive I didn't even know until much later that somehow one clip opened and caused a leak. Now it doesn't strike on (LED light). I charged the battery but no go. Will have to get it fixed.

 

[Shcubasteve]

Good replies everyone. I’m sure we all know that proper maintenance is the key to avoiding gear malfunctions. Here is another good example relating to that topic-

Customer brings in a BC and says he had no buoyancy on the bottom and had to ditch his weights to get to the surface- he seemed freaked... Here is what I found in his BC... ROCK SALT! It would appear that the salt was holding his sholder dump open. There was MUCH MORE where that came from... Moral of the story- RINSE your BC out after diving in saltwater

 

[scubafanatic]

Good replies everyone. I’m sure we all know that proper maintenance is the key to avoiding gear malfunctions. Here is another good example relating to that topic-

Customer brings in a BC and says he had no buoyancy on the bottom and had to ditch his weights to get to the surface- he seemed freaked... Here is what I found in his BC... ROCK SALT! It would appear that the salt was holding his sholder dump open. There was MUCH MORE where that came from... Moral of the story- RINSE your BC out after diving in saltwater

Pretty spooky to see there are people out there who neglect their life support gear so badly......probably don't even want to imagine what the inside of their reg looks like...Darwin award in progress.

 

[Rhone Man]

What would you do?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Ditch my weight belt.

 

[Shcubasteve]

Had an, the inflator mechanism came completely off the hose, causing my wing to lose all of its air. ... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I wonder what model wing you were using.? There was a recall for the problem you describe on the Apex WTX series wings. Click Here