Watch this video of the Blue Hole of Dahab before it is deleted

[PfcAJ]

Word on the street is @PfcAJ will take you down B tunnel on air for $50 and a handy J.

The Art of the Deal.

 

[almostDIR]

I have a mate who runs a dive centre out there. He gets these mad Russians with 5-6 dives coming in all the time asking to be taken to 100+ meters.

that would surely be the Adrenaline Rush they are looking for!

that would be OxTox Roulette! what a nice game to play on vacation!

 

[Miyaru]

It seems like a lot of criticism is directed toward the man who is presumably the student. I think 98% of any negative comments should be directed toward the professional dive instructor (presumably) who allowed this to take place. He felt compelled to provide physical touch and assistance at the surface before the dive and continued throughout.

Are we blaming the student who is seeking technical training or the person delivering it? Exactly how the gear is configured would be way down on my list of concerns with this video.

This is not a course. Too many things are wrong here:

• single divecomputer. No backup visible. No wetnotes or slate visible with a plan (no pockets either).
• inflating the wing while holding the deflator up. Typical for novice divers.
• constantly giving 'ok' signal, also when not asked for.
• buoyancy not under control, out of trim and descending uncontrollably.
• 1:56 the other diver signals a gasswitch. It takes until 3:17 before the diver with the red wing switches to backgas, not following *any* gas switch procedure. The filming diver tugs the stage hose.
• 4:00 for a whole minute, the diver descends uncontrolled, fiddling the inflator, giving 'ok' signals, breaking coral while finning upwards.

And that's just a quick list. No way that this diver holds any technical certification.

I have a mate who runs a dive centre out there. He gets these mad Russians with 5-6 dives coming in all the time asking to be taken to 100+ meters.

And I agree that this looks a lot like some wannabe who just paid for a 100m trip. The diver that took him down, obviously didn't risk the whole trip down

 

[king_of_battle]

bold move taking a leonardo as your only dive computer that deep. But for real where do you get blue jetfin knockoffs?

 

[In2theabyss]

Wow...That was painful to watch for sure!

 

[txgoose]

That's the most telling part.

Panicked and or stress divers will often give you an automatic ok to your "are you ok?" question underwater when you see they're having an issue. It one of the quick ways to tell that they're being overwhelmed by the situation.

Someone who's under control with give you the problem response.

So a good lesson for people of things to look out for and be aware of and then be prepared to make an intervention

Honest question, not a debate point. He was overwhelmed I think, but he never seemed even close to panicked. He appeared fine with his situation. Or was there something that you picked up on? A different “tell” of sorts? Granted, I think he was out of control, I’m just not sure that he thought he was out of control. Seemed like he thought he actually wa okay.

Anyway, just curious of your thoughts in case I can glean something from it.

 

[Danseur]

The whole time I watched this I kept saying, "Ok, alright now, where's the thumb? Come on, come on, let's see the thumb. Ok, NOW we're going to see the thumb. No?! No thumb there yet, STILL?! C'MON! Oh ****, still no thumb... oh no... still sinking out of control... no thumb (!!??!!)... oh, no no no no no..."

Wrong or bad gas? Having a medical? Student and guide/instructor alike... what fresh Hell is this!? The other diver drifting further away... is he being supervised? Is he in a supervisory capacity? How many bodies will need to be recovered?

I thought it was going to be a snuff film. I literally held my breath with my shoulders by my ears and teeth clenched during that gas switch.

T.O. should probably make some kind of statement before this gets out further... If anything worse happens in his career, this tape will be seen in the courtroom and on a Dateline TV special. Everything is on video in this day...

 

[dmaziuk]

bold move taking a leonardo as your only dive computer that deep.

The manual says it's rated to 120 m. In gauge mode. It's perfectly fine, whatareyoutalkingabout.

 

[johndiver999]

Honest question, not a debate point. He was overwhelmed I think, but he never seemed even close to panicked. He appeared fine with his situation. Or was there something that you picked up on? A different “tell” of sorts? Granted, I think he was out of control, I’m just not sure that he thought he was out of control. Seemed like he thought he actually wa okay.

Anyway, just curious of your thoughts in case I can glean something from it.

Just because someone is so far out of their skills envelope that they don’t recognize it, does not mean they are in control. If the tech instructor must provide hands on assistance with the gear, I would think the dive should be terminated right away.

Also, people can suffer from significant narcosis and not exhibit overt signs of fear or panic or even being out of control, but they might be quite incapacitated and the consequences of this only become clear when a challenge arises. That guy was fully occupied by breathing and playing with the inflator- it looked like he could not have handled any minor problem or challenge. His situational awareness was clearly pretty poor.

 

[txgoose]

I didn’t say he was in control. Actually the exact opposite. I was curious about Diving Dubai’s thoughts about other ways of identifying stressed divers. They were completely lost. I just didn’t see stress. The inflator hose was about the only thing I saw that indicated the diver might not be completely happy.