Bent in Belize--Blue Hole Incident

[kaerius]

Absolutely. Can you imagine the number of divers getting narc'd on these dives, many probably for the first time.

That's one of several reasons why dives like this also give us "diver missing at blue hole" and "diver dead at blue hole" headlines with a fair amount of regularity(not just belize, egypt has another famous blue hole death trap).

Btw I had a dive buddy get a very serious narc hit recently on a 30 meter(100 feet) high current dive. She was unable to focus her eyes and read the dive computer, and very weak, she acted as if under sedation, I had to keep physical contact with her and control her ascent, and her arm remained limp as I took her in a roman handshake. If something like this happens on one of these deep no buddy trust me dives, chances are high that we'd read about that in the fatality section.

PS: On my last dive trip I forgot my computer in my cabin(liveaboard) for the morning dive one time. That day I didn't do a morning dive.

 

[Inked Medic]

I dove the Blue Hole a week and a half ago. My dive buddy/better half had a computer malfunction and she ended up diving with a manual SPG. After the dive I mentioned that it was a deco dive for me (I hit 157 feet and she maxed at 130 feet). She looked at me and said "I never thought about the deco aspect of this" and was lucky enough not to get bent. We all rely on computers too much; it's too bad PADI isn't teaching the manual tables any longer (I don't consider the eRDPML reliable). I never go anywhere without my trusty tables including nitrox tables.

I hope you invested in some DAN insurance. I'm glad you survived to tell your ordeal; thanks for providing the details.

 

[Edward3c]

I dove the Blue Hole a week and a half ago. My dive buddy/better half had a computer malfunction and she ended up diving with a manual SPG. After the dive I mentioned that it was a deco dive for me (I hit 157 feet and she maxed at 130 feet). She looked at me and said "I never thought about the deco aspect of this" and was lucky enough not to get bent. We all rely on computers too much; it's too bad PADI isn't teaching the manual tables any longer (I don't consider the eRDPML reliable). I never go anywhere without my trusty tables including nitrox tables.

I hope you invested in some DAN insurance. I'm glad you survived to tell your ordeal; thanks for providing the details.

Therein lies the real lesson: Plan the dive, including any decompression requirements before entering the water - not forgetting the gas requirements and reserve.

As an aside was your buddy carrying a backup timer.

 

[peterbj7]

As a PADI Staff Instructor I greatly regret PADI's decision to drop tables from their courses. I taught a nitrox course recently and found it impossible to get over the fundamental concepts without referring to the tables. The trouble was that my student had never been exposed to the air tables. The course was IMO almost valueless. There is now virtually no scope for "understanding" in the course, just memorising, and I firmly believe that what is simply remembered will just as easily be forgotten.

 

[kaerius]

As a PADI Staff Instructor I greatly regret PADI's decision to drop tables from their courses. I taught a nitrox course recently and found it impossible to get over the fundamental concepts without referring to the tables. The trouble was that my student had never been exposed to the air tables. The course was IMO almost valueless. There is now virtually no scope for "understanding" in the course, just memorising, and I firmly believe that what is simply remembered will just as easily be forgotten.

Doesn't help that many instructors don't understand it either. I sat down with a fellow instructor and student while they were going over some quiz/theory for nitrox course. Student asked what the -10 in the calculations was for, and the instructor didn't know, so I stepped in and informed them...(pressure vs depth conversion). I don't have the nitrox teaching cert(though I have the student cert and well over 20 nitrox dives, I did more than that just on my last dive trip). I need to grab that for my next teaching trip.

 

[peterbj7]

Another complication in the American sector is that many/most Americans have no understanding of the metric system, so the simple relationship of bar to metres (of sea water) is lost on them. I remember one 14-year old OW student who had no understanding of that relationship or of any basic metric measures such as the metre and the kilogram, nor of the 24-hour clock and much else besides. The theory in my OW course ended up taking well over a day, as there was so much basic non-diving stuff to teach first. It's quite depressing when I realise just how ill educated many American kids are, and that's before we get onto things like creationism. At school in England I was fully accustomed to the imperial system as used in America, as well as the metric MKS and CGS systems. I used them interchangeably, employing each according to its relevance to the matter in hand. People who are taught only one - the imperial system is now generally not taught in British schools - suffer at a disadvantage when dealing with people outside their own narrow culture.

 

[finnks]

Another complication in the American sector is that many/most Americans have no understanding of the metric system, so the simple relationship of bar to metres (of sea water) is lost on them. I remember one 14-year old OW student who had no understanding of that relationship or of any basic metric measures such as the metre and the kilogram, nor of the 24-hour clock and much else besides. The theory in my OW course ended up taking well over a day, as there was so much basic non-diving stuff to teach first. It's quite depressing when I realise just how ill educated many American kids are, and that's before we get onto things like creationism. At school in England I was fully accustomed to the imperial system as used in America, as well as the metric MKS and CGS systems. I used them interchangeably, employing each according to its relevance to the matter in hand. People who are taught only one - the imperial system is now generally not taught in British schools - suffer at a disadvantage when dealing with people outside their own narrow culture.

To some extent I agree - but the education issues go considerably deeper than units. Converting units in the systems discussed is just a linear process. However many kids have difficulty grasping simple multiplication or division. When someone cannot understand that a meter is ~40"~3.33' it is inconceivable that they will be able to grasp the volume-buoyancy or depth-pressure relationships.

Don't feel that you need to learn in both sets of units (though it is probably somewhat beneficial). IF logic and simple math are learned, unit conversions can easily be learned and applied. Unfortunately most Americans learn only rudimentary math and logic - feel qualified to say this having had University students who literally had difficulty multiplying by two! Always amazed when in Europe and store clerks do the arithmetic in their heads where Americans push buttons with pictures of which items they are charging for and have no idea whether the total makes sense!

FWIW as an American I was not introduced to the metric system in school until fourth or fifth grade (fuzzy memory that far back). At the time my contemporaries and I expected the US to go metric as factors of ten and thousand are so much easier to remember than 12, 3, 1760, 16, 2000 etc. Among the best features on metric are that m,k,M,u (mu) etc all have standard meanings regardless of whether applied to length, weight, pressure or electric charge.

 

[peterbj7]

And of course the imperial system, which originated in the British Empire, is different when applied in the USA. All to do with the British government yet again shafting the brave colonists...

 

[themagni]

And of course the imperial system, which originated in the British Empire, is different when applied in the USA. All to do with the British government yet again shafting the brave colonists...

Try ordering parts from the US and the EU and installing them in Canada. I have to work with British Imperial, SI, and American standard parts interchangably. Nevertheless, we can agree that 152ft = 46m = too many.

I dove the Blue Hole a week and a half ago. My dive buddy/better half had a computer malfunction and she ended up diving with a manual SPG. After the dive I mentioned that it was a deco dive for me (I hit 157 feet and she maxed at 130 feet). I'm glad you survived to tell your ordeal; thanks for providing the details.

I am also glad I survived. As the expression goes, I've never enjoyed making a saving throw this much.

Work is intermittently blocking scubaboard. I'm not really sure what's going on there.

 

[Stoo]

I wil confess to having skipped about 90% of the posts, but i don't imagine it matters as it's #1 that matters. There isn't a single thing in that dive execution of the lead up to it that's at all out of the ordinary for a tropical dive trip.

However, the (dare I say it!) stupidity of picking up a series of random computers to complete a days' diving is, to me, astonishing. As the OP is an educated man, and an experienced diver, I think that the blame doesn't have far to go.

Let's chalk it us to perhaps too "relaxed" an attitude, and be grateful it was a minor hit. This could have easily ended up VERY badly...