Pushing the Limits

[wetb4igetinthewater]

The problem is this is Dunning-Kruger territory. How do we know how far is too far? We don't really know how we will actually handle an emergency until we actually have to deal with it

To be on the conservative side, one can take "small" steps (very vague I know). Team based diving with practicing emergency skills prior helps.

I don't think anyone can give a definitive description of how far is too far.

We always assume risk on every dive.

 

[Diverlady13]

I think most people know their own limits, but aren't always honest with themselves as to how far they can push those limits while remaining safe...or at least able to help themselves if there is a problem. I'm a relatively new diver, but also have participated in other risky activities. I think we need to be really honest with our self-evaluations before participating in dives (or other activities) that can kill or incapacitate us. If one isn't willing to be honest with themself, then that makes it really difficult to accept our limits and know how far past them we can go, whether those are training limits, physical limits, whatever. I am a risk taker by nature, but as I've gotten older I feel like I'm smarter about risk. I try to evaluate things that I know will exceed my own limits and figure out if that dive/activity will help me improve my own skills or whether I just need to sit it out (or modify).

I also do think that we need to continually assess when we do dive past our limits. Some people tend to get so committed to the plan that they fail to reassess even when things start to go wrong. Maybe moreso with newer divers, but I feel like lots of incidents happen when someone feels like diving is somehow a competition of who can go deeper, longer, darker, etc.

Also, thanks for posting this. I haven't had a chance to watch either video yet, but I'll do that later today. Surprising to hear there are a lot of inaccuracies in John Allen's (aka MrBallen) video. I suppose he counted on news and other internet sources for his data. He's typically pretty accurate, but I do find that he "dumbs down" his diving videos a bit, I suppose to keep it simpler for non-diving viewers. Sometimes it leads to inaccuracies in his videos. (I have found myself thinking "that's not quite right", but I guess the greater audience wouldn't notice). For anyone unfamiliar with him, John Allen is a former Navy Seal and typically is pretty accurate when we talks about diving. Cave Divers React has covered a few of MrBallen's videos and I enjoy watching both. I find the Cave Diver's React videos to be so educational.

 

[letterboy]

Real hard to do unless you’re super honest with yourself and/or you have surrounded yourself with level headed guys who can keep you in check.

Big jumps in depth, distance, and duration require careful evaluation.

I think the honesty is hard for many people.

Its not about skills or ability but it is about skills and ability....

I have the ability to do a 200 ft dive,but do I also have the skills?

This should be an honest evaluation every Diver makes, whether it's a 30 ft reef drift or a 300 ft tech dive.

 

[boulderjohn]

I think we need to be really honest with our self-evaluations before participating in dives (or other activities) that can kill or incapacitate us. If one isn't willing to be honest with themself, then that makes it really difficult to accept our limits and know how far past them we can go, whether those are training limits, physical limits, whatever.

I think pretty much everyone believes they are being honest with themselves, even the ones that aren't.

It's like going to FaceBook and seeing someone you think is stunningly irrational posting the familiar "You can't fix stupid" meme, knowing he or she is talking about you.

 

[kelemvor]

I think we need to be really honest with our self-evaluations before participating in dives (or other activities) that can kill or incapacitate us.

Except that most divers don't think of diving as something dangerous. In fact if you go into almost any dive shop you'll probably be told or see materials telling you how extremely safe diving is.

 

[tursiops]

So, perhaps one way of knowing you are going to far is recognizing when more experienced people give you subtle hints that they think you are going beyond your limitations but don't want to be impolite enough to spell it out clearly.

Yes, and the opposite is true too.
Years ago I was sitting, geared up, waiting to splash on the USS Monitor, at about 225 ft. I'd been to 200, and was in the middle of my Adv Trimix training.
I guess I looked nervous.
Joel Silverstein, trip leader, asked, "You ready to splash?" "I've only been to 200."
He smiled, nodded, said, "If you can do 200, you can do 230."
It was a great dive.

 

[AfterDark]

Except that most divers don't think of diving as something dangerous. In fact if you go into almost any dive shop you'll probably be told or see materials telling you how extremely safe diving is.

I think they mean being lead around by a DM is "safe" diving, not digging rocks out of a cave entrance type diving. The X factor as another pointed out is the unexpected, one can never fully account for everything that can be a hazard or weakness on any dive the more extreme the bigger the X factor.

Witness veteran, experienced divers of many quals being recovered from where they met their match.

 

[drrich2]

So here is the question--how can we tell if we are safely pushing our limits and when we are exceeding them unsafely?

My question was not intended to be as much how do you know during a dive that you have exceeded your limits but more along the lines of how do you know before a dive that you would be exceeding your limits if you were to go ahead and do it.

So, is that a rhetorical question that you're going to answer? I've often scratched my head and thought it was an interesting problem. Everyone chants the mantra "dive within your limits" among others. But that means it's not possible to improve. Of course, like other areas of life diving has a "what's taught and what's actually done aren't always the same thing"

You just summarized why I am struggling to write the article.

I'm not a tech. diver and I'm not commenting on the event that led to the original post, rather the issue more broadly from the perspective of a mediocre intermediate rec. diver. How can I know before a dive I'll be exceeding my limits unsafely (rather than pushing within a reasonable safety buffer) if I do the dive, knowing I need to push it a bit from time-to-time to improve and grow as a diver...but not too much?

1.) What you're taught. In an OW course, one is likely taught don't dive solo or in over-head environments, and don't start out doing max. depths > 60 feet (note: that last is often violated, but on guide-led dives in benign conditions). Don't exceed the MOD on that nitrox mix.
-----Formal standard recommendations.

2.) What experience shows you through humbling experiences (e.g.: jumping in without my fins, or my air's not on, leaving the dive boat without my fins, getting a bit freaked on a Bonaire shore dive when underweighted and holding onto a rock to stay down). Or just getting knocked down by a wave and rolled around like a 265-lbs. toy by surge. Experience may be the only way to get a sense of how prone to narcosis you may be.
-----Real world feedback reminding me yet again I'm not as good as I'm prone to think I am, and easily set back with gear malfunctions, difficult conditions or task loading.

3.) Time on Scuba Board reading posts by others with a better understanding of the issues. Some 'Accidents and Incidents' threads, some threads discussing narcosis or debating what 'undeserved DCS hit' means, etc...

4.) The Rescue Diver course is a good one for teaching people to pro-actively trouble-shoot. I think that's a more lasting benefit for many of us than teaching different techniques for hauling incapacitated divers out of the water (which I don't remember). Or the tech. diver saying (IIRC) '2 is 1 and 1 is none' regarding gear redundancy. Contingency planning.

5.) Time with good mentors if that's an option.

All that said, there are a couple of problems that bear conscious consideration.

1.) Unlike working out a little too hard and ending up with sore muscles, getting a little too close to a bonfire and getting your hair singed and spending too much time in the sun without sunscreen and getting burned...sometimes when things go south on a dive, one may be 'in too deep' (yep, had to go there) - instead of a feedback gradient warning you, it's like a house of cards - when the crap hits, the situation collapses and it's too late. We may see what the Rescue Diver course warns of...panic sets in and narrows thinking, instead of the potentially lifesaving mantra to 'Stop...Think...Act.'

2.) Diving is inherently task loaded, with less additional bandwidth available for problem-solving than on land. At 80-feet deep in dive gear, I've got less peripheral vision, lack directional hearing, increased work of breathing, must maintain buoyancy, be mindful not to hit the reef and mindful of depth and gas pressure, and where the guide/group are (unless solo), dive time and eventual exit plan (e.g.: when the guide'll lead me to the boat, or when to turn the dive on a shore dive), and look around for subjects of interest, big or small - and be ready to take snapshots. For a one-track minded guy like me who doesn't multi-task well, that's a lot of mental balls to juggle.

So a problem that looks pretty straight forward at my computer desk can absorb my focus so I lose buoyancy control and sink.

I guess the lesson is, a dive may be harder than it looks. Is the dive plan sufficiently within your capabilities that it shouldn't be too difficult/challenging, so if it's moderately harder than anticipated, you should still have the capability to complete or abort if safely? That's why in the SDI Solo Diver course it's taught don't do 'pinnacle dives' (exceeding your prior limits) on solo dives. Save those for when you have more resources (e.g.: a buddy or instructor).

 

[rick00001967]

This thread may not be well placed. Moderators should feel free to move it.

The diving death of Shane Thompson was covered in this thread in 2016. Recently, someone named Ballen made a video describing that fatality, but that video was wildly inaccurate. Another video was then made in which people interviewed Shane's buddy on that dive, Mike Young, and Mike corrected the inaccuracies. I could have posted that video at the end of the old thread, but I think it is too important to stick it at the end of a 5-year old thread where people will probably not watch it. So here it is:


I am quite sure Mike's version is accurate. I was on the dive team there, and I was standing to his right when he told the story right after the dive. What he says in this video matches my recollection of that telling, except for a part he did not know then and was only discovered after Shane's GoPro was reviewed.

I think it is important for a couple of reasons, one of which is obvious--correcting misinformation.

More importantly, I have been haunted since that day by my desire to write an article on what I believe was the most valuable lesson to be learned from that accident. I have tried to write it, but cannot make it work. Shane was an extremely experienced and skilled diver. As Mike said in the video, they were the only two divers on the team who were able to go where they were. His abilities were far beyond mine, likely far beyond what mine will ever be.

But he was diving beyond his ability.

All divers, from the newly certified OW diver to the most certified cave diver, continue to grow as divers by pushing our limits a little at a time. We have to do this, or we will be forever beginners. But we can't go too far, because diving beyond our limits can be fatal. So here is the question--how can we tell if we are safely pushing our limits and when we are exceeding them unsafely?

that was gut wrenching to listen to

 

[CuzzA]

I appreciated hearing the facts from the guy on the dive. Amazing how far off that story was from the other guy on YouTube.

Like Mike said, dive the plan. Shane deviated. He was backmount in what sounds like a nightmare of a space. Perhaps Mike didn't emphasize enough the reasons why Shane wasn't supposed to go past the 165 restriction. I find it bizarre that Shane did that if that was the agreed upon plan.

As for the topic question:
How can we tell if we are safely pushing our limits and when we are exceeding them unsafely?

I think this incident is pretty self explanatory. Had it been the plan, Mike likely would have insisted he was sidemount, perhaps adding other steps to safely get both of them to the end of the line and back out. I don't think he pushed the limits rather wittingly broke them.

To me, safely, and I use that word loosely with expedition dives, means planning to push your dive to the next level. Be it depth or penetration. Exceeding them unsafe would be not pre planning to do what you're about to do.

I'll add another point that Simon Mitchel discussed in one of his rebreather videos. He noted the dives that are now able to be executed with rebreathers and how they lend themselves to pushing the limits. He even joked with a picture of himself about no way would he be caught dead inside some really deep wreck without a CCR. The ability to dive without large quantities of traditional scuba tanks opens up a new world underwater, and in some places, like this cave, even with the technology, no one should be there. There's simply places on this Earth, despite the ability to get there, that humans should not go.

Mike seemed to sense this on that project and had his reel not been there I wonder if they even would have attempted to go past the 165 restriction again.