Things You Learned but Never Had to Use (or Had to Use)

[Trace Malinowski]

Dropping weights
Donating gas to someone with no gas — as in they cannot breathe

I was picking up an oxygen when I noticed that my regulator was drawing hard breaths and I was out of gas. Just then, my buddy signaled "Emergency!" and gave me the OOG signal. I donated the reg from my mouth. The look on his face was priceless when he realized I was also OOG. I signaled, "Up! Up! Up!" and "Switch!" We switched to O2 at almost 3 ATA as we high-tailed it to the shallows.

 

[Centrals]

The day after we did a CPR renewal for lifeguarding at our college pool, one of the girls in class had to perform CPR on a guy who had a cardiac arrest. Not in the pool, but somewhere she was.

My dad was a lifeguard too. I came into the kitchen one evening to find him choking (hardly making a sound) over the sink trying to use the counter to do the Heimlich maneuver on himself. I got behind him and started to do abdominal thrusts. It seemed to take forever, and I thought he was going to pass out, but the technique eventually worked.

I knew those techniques are practical/useful but have no wish to use it. You can practice the CPR but not Heimlich maneuver.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Out of air ascent, dropping weights, and lotus position.

Clearly, the lotus position is unnecessary when a diver from California never needed it.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Clearing a snorkel. I hate the damned things and have no use for them.

It's a blast!

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

The good old days. I think Resusci-Annie was the first girl I ever kissed in 6th grade. She had alcohol all over her mouth.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Breathing straight off of the tank nipple orifice.

No reg, just feathering the valve with the black hand valve, sipping the bubbles and not blowing your lungs or sinuses. Don’t swallow a popped o-ring.

Think about that.

it was done as a confidence builder and tester.

I teach this in solo and cave stage.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Things I've been taught and never used :

- ditching my weight belt (haven't been using one for 18 years btw),
- ditching my rig underwater and putting it back on,
- going up while exhaling,
- assisting an unconscious diver, (but conscious ones I did),
- buddy breathing,

- exiting from a cave without any light (hope it'll stay that way),
- being entangled in the life line, then cutting it and fixing it (see above),

I've had 4 lights fail in a team of two, but also never needed to exit without a light. For solo cave diving, I started to carry a glow stick or 4th light after that just in case.

 

[Wibble]

I was picking up an oxygen when I noticed that my regulator was drawing hard breaths and I was out of gas. Just then, my buddy signaled "Emergency!" and gave me the OOG signal. I donated the reg from my mouth. The look on his face was priceless when he realized I was also OOG. I signaled, "Up! Up! Up!" and "Switch!" We switched to O2 at almost 3 ATA as we high-tailed it to the shallows.

(Not having a go, want to learn...)

What on earth happened for you to be both out of gas and not know that? Was there some crazy incident you were both dealing with when you took your eye off the ball?

I could insert the obligatory "I hate 100% for deco, 80% is much better" comment, but I won't

 

[Ukmc]

I was picking up an oxygen when I noticed that my regulator was drawing hard breaths and I was out of gas. Just then, my buddy signaled "Emergency!" and gave me the OOG signal. I donated the reg from my mouth. The look on his face was priceless when he realized I was also OOG. I signaled, "Up! Up! Up!" and "Switch!" We switched to O2 at almost 3 ATA as we high-tailed it to the shallows.

Ok, both you and your buddy OOG at the same time? I would like to learn more about this dive. Was it a training exercise?

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Ok, both you and your buddy OOG at the same time? I would like to learn more about this dive. Was it a training exercise?

I don't remember why (maybe Mark does) but we staged our oxygen inside the Silver Comet at Dutch Springs instead of carrying it. On the way back from somewhere south of the island, we had the choice of going a more direct route home or going the long way around. We chose the long way. When we started picking up the O2 bottles, we both were on fumes.

I don't recall if we were training, or if we were having fun and just got cocky because it was Dutch Springs. Dutch was practically in Mark's backyard & it was my Pennsylvania office. We did a lot of diving as friends and as instructor & student at Dutch, the St. Lawrence River, and in caves.

All I remember about this one was that we left the bottles knowing it was considered a no-no, went for a swim that was long enough and deep enough to exhaust our back-gas, and the look on Mark's face when he inhaled from my long hose and acknowledged, "Oh! You're OOG too!" We ascended di di mau and switched gas on the move deeper than the MOD of the gas.

We just disrespected Dutch Springs was all. The quarry (I can say that now since Stu sold it) reminded us that it was still a bear capable of poking back.