DIR and SPG

[Kendall Raine]

We had this drill roughly similar to the above during my latest Wreck Class: a 3-man team laying line suddenly "losing all their masks" (including backup masks:11: ); after re-grouping on the line for egress, one of my teammates presumably was "declared OOG" and promptly ripped my Primary out of my mouth. I positioned him in the middle, put my other teammate in the lead per protocol, and we made our way out using touch contact. . .

The method I used in desperation to estimate elapsed time (I'm gonna really get flamed for this one! ): Play the Final Jeopardy Tune in your head --it's about 30 seconds long-- and try to keep a running tally. . .

You won't get flamed by me. What works in the real world works. It's a good idea. Let others argue about the right way to part hair or the "correct" tune to hum. I have no musical talent and so instead use breathing cycles. I know how many breaths I take a minute and count that way. Helps me think about measured breathing and measured breathing helps me think. I used to have a Seal reservist who worked for me. He told me they used kick cycles for measuring distances when swimming in harbors at night where they couldn't even use a backlit watch. The point is you have a tested method that works even in zero viz.

 

[limeyx]

There are always exceptions though... E.g. If they think you've gone far enough for the upcoming scenario and want to save some gas for the next dive. My primary failed on the way in once and I gave Chris LM some grief about it, told him that was cheatin'

I also found that when failures occurred was in direct proportion to how brain-dead we were being -- get two kicks behind you team -- suddenly you are OOA. Stay with the team, and magically you are unmolested.

I could definitely imagine there are things you could do in cave to get "failures" on the way in

 

[nadwidny]

I also found that when failures occurred was in direct proportion to how brain-dead we were being -- get two kicks behind you team -- suddenly you are OOA. Stay with the team, and magically you are unmolested.

I noticed that as well with Cave 1 so I was determined to not let that happen next time. Unfortunately with Cave 2 they changed the rules.

 

[CompuDude]

For some odd reason I'm now a LOT less eager to get into cave diving...

 

[limeyx]

For some odd reason I'm now a LOT less eager to get into cave diving...

it gets even more "interesting" when one buddy has a valve failure, but you put them in the wrong team position, or forget to make sure the entire team knows about the failure.

you can find yourself "suddenly OOA" and going for gas to a person that cannot provide any.

But it's all (supposed to be about learning. The point of the failures in the classes is to push you beyond what you could reasonably expect to have happen so that when real failures do happen, you can not only cope with the initial failure, but know how to prevent a simple failure escalating into something more serious.

My cave class starts monday (ulp)