Cozumel incident but lesson learned

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gt2003

Contributor
Messages
345
Reaction score
41
Location
Oklahoma
# of dives
25 - 49
First off, I suck a LOT of air. I swim, take pics etc so I just do.

My wife and I are in Cozumel back in November. It's her first trip and first experience at ocean diving and my first in over 10 years. We did a pre-dive at a local lake to work on buoyancy and re-familiarize ourselves with diving. Some friends of ours who have been diving quite a while recommend a dive master they use. We contacted him and went out on a medium sized boat with quite a few other folks but he was basically "our" divemaster. He goes over the dive plan, we settle on nothing over 80 feet, come up with 700 lbs of air etc. and we set out on our dive. He mentions they've seen black tips so we go with the group over to that area. We're cruising around and sea some eagle rays and behold, black tips. But, he keeps going deeper. We follow thinking A) he's the divemaster and B) he's here to look out for us. I see we are at 87 feet or so and figure we are doing ok. I then check a few minutes later...116 feet! Needless to say I'm a little irritated.

We continue the dive and my air gets to 1000. I tell him. Then, I'm at 700, I tell him. 500, I tell him. 200, I tell him and literally put the gauge in front of his face. We finally do our safety stop, I'm staying right beside him and by the end of it I'm breathing off his Octo. No biggie, I'm comfortable, life is good. Suddenly he drops a weight, looks at me, points to the surface then takes off to get the weight. I'm a little confused as his regulator is pretty much pulled from my mouth. I swim down, catch up with him, get one more breath as he points up again. I see my wife above me, know she has air so I frantically swim up to her as I am continually breathing out. I take one more breath off her regulator then shot to the surface.

TAKE AWAYS:

1. The divemaster is a guide. Don't rely on them 100%. If he hadn't been there I would have done my safety stop then ascended to the surface with around 4-500 lbs of air. However, I allowed the mindset that "he'll take care of me" to overrule my common sense. DON'T BE ME>>>Lesson Learned.

Your THOUGHTS:

1. Why did he take us so deep?
2. Why did he ignore my air issue when he was fully aware of the situation? Why didn't he simply ascend with both my wife and I then head back down for the weight? It was probably only 30 feet deep.

I confronted him after the dive and his response "We had a great dive, you saw lots of neat stuff. Do this next dive with me and I will take good care of you." Uhm, HELL NO, you kinda freaked me out (which doesn't happen often) and you thoroughly scared my wife who honestly hasn't seen me truly scared since we've been together.

Any thoughts are appreciated. I think I've learned my lesson from the dive but willing to hear others input on things I should have/could have done differently. I've been to Coz a few times and have always had excellent experiences until now. We dove with Dive Paradise the next day and had 2 great dives so the trip wasn't a total loss.
 
If we agreed on 80 feet. I’d expect no deeper than 80, unless it was my own fault, like not paying attention. I’d expect my dm to motion me to go higher.

700 psi, I’d expect to ascend. 500 psi absolutely ascend. Staying down until 200 is absolutely dangerous. Not forgiveable

He was a very bad dm. Sorry that happened to you. I would’ve probably did the same as you, thinking he would look out for me. But on the surface, after some thinking, I would also conclude he was downright irresponsible.
 
Hi @gt2003,

I agree with @Dogbowl, you paid for the DM, you discussed the dive, he really should have done what was discussed. That aside, you should have taken control your own dive and communicated that to the DM. If you thought you were too deep you could have signaled ascend and level off, and then done that. If you thought it was time to ascend, you should have signaled that and then started your ascent. Unless your DM was going to abandon you, he would have followed both of your and your wife's moves. When it comes down to it, you are responsible for yourself.

Were you diving air or nitrox? If the latter, you may have exceeded the MOD for your mix if it was 32% or more, just something to be aware of. If you are concerned about your gas consumption, you can do two things, follow your RMV and work on things to reduce it, and/or dive with a larger cylinder. Several operators in Cozumel have 100 cf AL cylinders and others have 100 and 120 cf steel cylinders. For drift diving in Cozumel, you really should have at least a SMB, if not a DSMB, and know how to use it in case you need to ascend before your group or get separated.
 
Thanks @scubadada , great advice. I simply placed too much confidence in him. I will be more proactive next dive and take control if needed. Unfortunately I felt shoving the gauge in his face at 200PSI was adequate to convey my message. However, I 100% agree that I'm responsible for myself. I now have a SMB and will use it if this situation arises again. 100's or 120's aren't out of the question either!
 
As a DM, I consider your DM's actions malpractice. He did a lot wrong. If just one other thing had gone wrong in your scenario, you could have gotten bent or drowned. When I lead a dive, I consider myself responsible, even-though as @scubadada points out, you are ultimately responsible for yourself. This was certainly a learning experience for you, though on the edge.
 
Every diver has to learn to say no - to instructors, DMs, buddies, everyone. If it goes outside your training, the dive plan, or if you simply just aren't feeling it, you have both the right and the obligation to say no.
 
Thank you for posting this. It takes courage to post about our mistakes online. The idea that a dive master or an instructor or a buddy or a more experienced friend will keep us safe is something that each diver needs to reject in their mind. We all must learn to be responsible for ourselves for our own safety and the safety of those around us. I have as recently as today seen divers that became distraught underwater when they didn't have a dive master hold their hand, literally.

My wife wanted to let me learn for both of us and just count on me to guide us both. I wouldn't let that happen because as soon as I have an issue, I will need her to be self sufficient. Each diver must know that they are responsible for their plan, their execution, their equipment and their safety. I am fairly new so I remember wanting my DM to watch out for me on my first trip to Coz.

It is great that you learned this lesson early. What are your wife's thoughts on the matter?

Thank you for bringing this issue up for discussion.
 
Who was the dive master/company?
 
Who was the dive master/company?
A response to that question will change this thread from how it was intended and where it is located to something altogether different. Even an argument about whether that information should be disclosed will detract from the valuable lessons that can be learned from this thread and the forum in which it was posted. There is a forum on Scubaboard for threads that are intended to warn of or discredit dive ops suppliers, instructors or businesses. It is located in the thumbs down forum and if the OP wishes to disclose that info, I would suggest he start a new thread there. This forum has a purpose and it is to learn from our mistakes in a safe environment.
 
When I was still a very new diver on a trip to Fiji, on the second dive of a 2-tank dive, the DM told us that the skipper would be leading the second dive. (I later figured out that he was teaching the guy to be a DM.) We started the dive with a very short surface interval. There was not much to see where we were diving, and he kept taking us deeper. (I later figured out that he had missed the intended site--it should have been huge and shallow.) My Suunto computer did not like that, and I was very quickly on the verge of violating my NDL. I showed the DM--he didn't seem to care.As I got closer to NDL, I signalled that I was going up. I was followed by the other divers in our group. Since there was nothing to see at the depth that my computer got happier in terms of NDL, I surfaced and got on the boat. I explained the situation to the real DM. When the skipper/second string DM got on the boat much later, the two had a very unpleasant chat in Fijian.

One time in Cozumel, the DM got in the water to check the current. He determined the direction and signalled the rest of the group to get in. As we descended, I looked at the particles going by and thought we were going the wrong direction. We reached the reef and started swimming along, working hard as we swam against the mild current. "Why are we going the wrong way?" I wondered. Eventually another group appeared, swimming with the current. Apparently afraid of the embarrassment of passing another group while going the wrong way, the DM turned us around. We soon reached the edge of e reef where we had started, and we spent the rest of the dive drifting over sand. I don't know what the DM was thinking as we drifted, but I was thinking I should have raised a fuss as soon as I saw a problem on descent. We could have gotten back on the boat, motored to the other end of that reef, and done the dive correctly.

No, DMs are not gods. The one in this case was absolutely incompetent. If you hire someone to do a specific job, he should do that job according to specifications. It is a liberating feeling for a newer diver to realize when he or she has the ability to recognize that incompetence and take positive action to correct it.
 

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