(Another) Dive goes bad fast.

[Reno1979]

So after reading the story below, I will share my own dive story from yesterday.

ME - Newly certified. Very comfortable during all check out dives in quarry (Guppy Gulch mid-April) with water temps at or below 40 F. No other logged dives than check-outs.

My buddy - 12 or so dives, certified last year.

Gear - Me - Brand new Oceanic GT3/CDX5 and Swivel Octo on a necklace.
Gear - Buddy - Brand new Tusa reg of some sort.

Location: Bainbridge Quarry, PA.

Water temps at surface in the high 50's thermocline somewhere around 35 feet then water gets cold... low 40's.

We made the trip up to Bainbridge, really to test out all this new equipment I am taking to Aruba later this week for a trip that will includes some diving with my girlfriend. She had to work, so my buddy used her new reg, so we could test the stuff.

Our first mistake. Terrible dive planning. Between him having to drive back to the shop to get a different HP hose (the one on her reg didn't fit the combo inflater on his rented BC (WHY WOULD SOMEONE RENT A GUY A BC WITH A COMBO INFLATER?!)), his wife calling and yelling about bills (Sunday morning.. we are diving.. leave us alone.. sheesh), and our excitement to get in the water, we did a crap job at planning the dive. I thought I had made it clear that we needed to just go out towards the buoys, hang a left and double back when we got to 1200psi, but he doesn't remember that.

So we swam out a ways, and started our decent. We got down to about 25 feet and I was just getting comfortable, and letting water seep in my wetsuit, and checking out the bad viz, when he signaled for us to head right. I nodded and followed. His version of right also dropped us down to about 60 feet. No biggie, viz was WAY better down here, although it was instantly MUCH colder.

We could see about 25 feet now, and he headed straight towards a little bulldozer or tractor that was about 20 feet out in front of us. I stayed close behind him. I was starting to realize I was sinking, and added some air till I found myself nice and neutral.

My buddy was circling the bulldozer and I glanced down at my air. I had started with 3050. Now I had 2200. OH AND THE BUBBLES. Tons of bubbles. My reg was totally free flowing in my mouth. I was waving at my buddy who was about 10 feet below and about 12 feet away from me. He looked at me and I gave him the UP signal and went for my octo.

Did I mention the gloves I was wearing. 6mm... really thick fingers. I pulled the octo from my necklace, and lost it in the bubbles. Glanced at my air again and it was at 1400. My buddy was now giving me a two arms out "What's wrong?" look. In the moment I decided I need to swim up. He was down farther, my air was going and I thought to myself, well I have been down here all of 5 mins, no harm in swimming up. So I again signaled very strongly UP UP UP. I started to swim and it took some pretty hard kicks to get up, all the while still breathing from the free flowing reg... I just thought to myself, go slow, breath deep, no worries. Check my computer and it said 20 feet and my air was at 700psi. WAY TOO FAST. I dumped all the air I could, and fanned my arms out finally getting slowed down at 10 feet. Hung there for maybe 15 seconds, saw my air at 400 and swam up, inflated my jacket and waited.

My buddy came up about 30 seconds later. He was mad as hell and let me know it. Yelling that I came up too fast, and I should have slowed down, etc...

I got him to turn my air off, but it was all but gone...

He insisted I call DAN, even thought my nitrogen loading was nearly zero (one little dot on my computer). The doctor at DAN confirmed I was most likely just fine.

(sorry this is so freakin long)

So... My mistake... I really should have swam down to my buddy and shared air. There was definitely a disconnect between him and I. We never went over OOA events in the planning stages and we should have. (stupid)

I also should have gotten the darn octo in my mouth. I wasn't really having any problem getting air during the free flow, so I kinda just forgot it.

I should have dumped my air quicker so I could ascend slower. My cpu was flashing in the red for the ascension rate.... no kidding.

I felt my buddy did not do a very good job in leading the dive. The purpose was really to get comfortable with the new gear, and then have some fun. He went straight into have some fun.

SO... WHY THE FREE FLOW.

I think it was my fault.

My reg has an adjustable second stage which I tried adjusting right around the time we got near the bulldozer, to see if I could really tell the difference in how it would breath . The temp on my cpu said 41, so could it have frozen up? Or did I open it up to far, and cause it...

Kind of a bad first dive, huh? All in all, I learned that I have a lot of practice to do. I think it shook my buddy up way more than it did me. I never felt out of control (even if I was when ascending) since I had air to breath, and new the science was on my side as we had only been down a few minutes. Had it happened after we had been down 30 mins at 60 feet, would I have gone and shared air. That is the real lesson to learn I suppose.

 

[1_T_Submariner]

Thanks for sharing your experience, I'm glad you did not get hurt or worse.

Sounds like the dive plan dissolved when it hit the water.

I don't know about your reg. Was this the first dive? If not it is possible that it froze with the water being cold and you possibly breathing really hard. If it was the first dive there is a chance it wasn't assmebled correctly?

I would have got to my buddy and got his octo then had him shut down your tank (or shut it down yourself) then ascend into warmer water and open it back up to see if it was frozen.

I think you learned from your experience.

If you can't get to alternate air your only choice is to go up you can recover from being bent you can't recover from being dead.

Edit:
Your buddy shouldn't be mad at you he should have seen yolur reg free flowing and swam closer to you to help.

 

[diverrobs]

I can appreciate your situation given mine yesterday. Glad to see you are alright. Give the rate that you were losing air and the fact that your buddy was lower and away. In my short experience you did nothing wrong (other than maybe go up a little too fast). Better to hit the surface with air then not get to your buddy in time to share air. I learned from my experience yesterday that anything farther than a few feet (litterally 3') is too far to be separated from your buddy in cold water. We were lucky we were 3' appart and looking at each other. I might have made the same decision as you in your situation.

 

[stairman]

I must have read something wrong.It said you were diving in a wetsuit in 41 degree water.It sounds like yall are diving cold waters with regs that might not be for that purpose.Diving in bad vis with your lack of training,or lack of many logged dives seems dangerous to me.I know people do it everyday and it was a learning experience for sure,but the cost might not have been worth it.In cave diving we drill for all the [what ifs]we can think of.As I mentioned in the other post,having an h-valve with redundant 1st stage would be money well spent.I only dive double tanks,mainly cave,with two regs and valve shutdown drills are performed on every dive.In the cold water where freeflows are common it should be a priority.Trying to ascend in blue water in a million bubbles is hard.You should have got on your buddys backup and tuned off your tank.With the bubbles gone ascending together is much easier.

 

[Reno1979]

Thanks for the replies. Stairman, Not sure what you think you read wrong... I don't believe diving wet up here in these conditions is all that uncommon. In a 7mm Farmer John, my body was not cold. My face was. The reg I am using I bought partially because Oceanic touts the first stage as suitable for most conditions including ice diving. Could it be the second stage is not? I am not sure. I would be surprised if it was frozen, as we were not under the thermocline more than 2-3 minutes, where the water dropped from nearly 60 F to 43 F. I could be wrong. Thanks!

 

[stairman]

WOW!Maybe Im a big sissy but the coldest water Ive dove was 68 degrees.I too wear a 7 mil and dont get cold but I thought all you cold water guys dove dry suits.Theres no way you cant be shivering.

 

[beester]

First of all thanks for posting. It's a good thing to try to evaluate your experience.

Next to the obvious things that went wrong during your coldwater dive there are some points that will help avoid freeflows.

Abiatic cooling (cooling happening when you lower pressure) happens mostly at the 1st stage. It's this big sudden change in pressure (from high to intermediate) which could cause freeflows. The 1st stage that is cooled by this change in pressure is 'warmed' up again by the surrounding water (yes it can only be 40°F but that's still warmer then the 1st stage). So this is the principle, here are my pointers:

• Use a regulator that is winterproof. Brand is not important. Generally speaking membrane regulators (specifically sealed membrane regulators) proof to be better cold water regulators then piston regulators.
• Make sure that your tank is filled at a good filling station that uses appropriate filters. The air in your tank needs to be clean and dry. Make also sure that at no time water can get in your tank since this can be sucked into your 1st stage where it can instantly cristalize.
• Make sure the contact with your 1st stage(s) with water is as good as possible. Remove hose protectors during winter dives.
• Never test your equipment above water during cold water diving. No breathing of your 2nd stage above water, no inflating the bcd above water! Since above water your 1st stage does not benefit from the warming effect of surrounding water it will freeze. Only test your regulator when your 1st stage is below water, manually inflate your bcd!
• Avoid airflow peaks. Spread out your airflow. Don't connect main 2nd stage, octo, bcd inflator and drysuit inflator on one 1st stage. This will cause peak airflow to be very high (when you are simultainly breathing, inflating your jacket for example). Best practice is to use 2 separate systems (2 1st stages and 2nd stages) and to spread inflator hoses between them. For example main 1st stage = main 2nd stage + drysuit inflator, backup 1st stage = backup 2nd stage + bcd inflator
• Use doubles of a single with H or Y double valves
• Practice freeflow incidents (obviously not the freeflow incident itselve but how to react).

 

[lowviz]

He was down farther, my air was going and I thought to myself, well I have been down here all of 5 mins, no harm in swimming up. So I again signaled very strongly UP UP UP. I started to swim and it took some pretty hard kicks to get up, all the while still breathing from the free flowing reg... I just thought to myself, go slow, breath deep, no worries. Check my computer and it said 20 feet and my air was at 700psi. WAY TOO FAST. I dumped all the air I could, and fanned my arms out finally getting slowed down at 10 feet. Hung there for maybe 15 seconds, saw my air at 400 and swam up, inflated my jacket and waited.

It is my opinion that you did rather well. This post helps feed my suspicions that this sort of thing happens much more frequently to new divers than is ever reported. Cold water presents a lot of issues, stay in Bainbridge's lagoon for cold water checks. You can minimize but never eliminate the risk of free-flows. Your buddy was way too far from you. On the bright side, you now have a good appreciation of just how deep 60' can be at times.

 

[Reno1979]

First of all thanks for posting. It's a good thing to try to evaluate your experience.

Next to the obvious things that went wrong during your coldwater dive there are some points that will help avoid freeflows.

Abiatic cooling (cooling happening when you lower pressure) happens mostly at the 1st stage. It's this big sudden change in pressure (from high to intermediate) which could cause freeflows. The 1st stage that is cooled by this change in temp is 'warmed' up again by the surrounding water (yes it can only be 40°F but that's still warmer then the 1st stage). So this is the principle, here are my pointers:

• Use a regulator that is winterproof. Brand is not important. Generally speaking membrane regulators (specifically sealed membrane regulators) proof to be better cold water regulators then piston regulators.
• Make sure that your tank is filled at a good filling station that uses appropriate filters. The air in your tank needs to be clean and dry. Make also sure that at no time water can get in your tank since this can be sucked into your 1st stage where it can instantly cristalize.
• Make sure the contact with your 1st stage(s) with water is as good as possible. Remove hose protectors during winter dives.
• Never test your equipment above water during cold water diving. No breathing of your 2nd stage above water, no inflating the bcd above water! Since above water your 1st stage does not benefit from the warming effect of surrounding water it will freeze. Only test your regulator when your 1st stage is below water, manually inflate your bcd!
• Avoid airflow peaks. Spread out your airflow. Don't connect main 2nd stage, octo, bcd inflator and drysuit inflator on one 1st stage. This will cause peak airflow to be very high (when you are simultainly breathing, inflating your jacket for example). Best practice is to use 2 separate systems (2 1st stages and 2nd stages) and to spread inflator hoses between them. For example main 1st stage = main 2nd stage + drysuit inflator, backup 1st stage = backup 2nd stage + bcd inflator
• Use doubles of a single with H or Y double valves
• Practice freeflow incidents (obviously not the freeflow incident itselve but how to react).

Great info... I definitely breathed on my regs before we got in the water, also filled my BC up before we were submerged with the inflater.

 

[TSandM]

Did I mention the gloves I was wearing. 6mm... really thick fingers. I pulled the octo from my necklace, and lost it in the bubbles.

I don't really understand this. If you have your backup on a necklace, all it takes to get it in your mouth is gently to tip it with the tips of your fingers. In fact, if the necklace is short, you can sometimes even pick the reg up with your mouth, without using your hands at all.

But anyway, I think you picked up on a lot of lessons from this dive: Changing your technique with your regulator, making a much clearer dive plan, agreeing on emergency procedures, communicating much more clearly underwater, and maintaining your buoyancy when heavily task loaded are all goals. The planning and communication are something you can change right away; the buoyancy will take some practice, doing ascents first unstressed, and then while doing various things (like sharing air, or spooling up the line to an SMB, or taking your mask off and putting it back on again). The last time you want your buoyancy control to desert you is when you are trying to deal with a problem, but it takes practice to maintain it when your focus is on something else.

Glad everybody came out okay, and you got a great learning opportunity.