I know next to nothing about extreme deep diving and these conditions (HPNS, arthralgia) that keep coming up (there is plenty of good stuff to see in the top 130' of ocean!). I think one question I am curious about is what people with extreme deep experience know about his probable condition. I was talking to my wife, and said I hope at least he passed out before he realized something was seriously wrong. Because it would be horrifying to have one of these extreme deep conditions that caused paralysis while in that total dark and cold, while his brain was fully aware to realize the extent of his mistake as he continued to fall and went through the remainder of his air. He made a terrible mistake, but I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy.
I wrote some posts back something. I will react to you, even this has nothing to do with this accident, but you ask about things, so why not answer? My max depth is absolutely not as deep as doc deep has been and came back alive, but I don’t have plans to do that.
Arthralgia I have never experienced.
But first a thing that happens if END is high and you are narced ( I don’t know what the END of the gases was that doc deep used, but this example makes it for you maybe understandable if you don’t have any experience with technical diving): I never experienced being narced when I was a sportsdiver. Yes I have dived outside the 40m limit as a sportsdiver, up to 55m on air. I never experienced being narced. BUT: I thought I was not narced. Since I use trimix I know I was narced as a sportsdiver too. Now I recognize the minor beginnings of being narced: in my body most times tunnelvision. The problem with being narced is that if you don’t know what you can or have to feel you don’t feel it.
Fast descents make me really more sensitive for being narced, but it disappears a little bit if you stay at that depth. Being narced is possible with trimixes and high END’s
About hpns, I wrote I mentioned it 1 time, but not as strong as some others I know that have dived deeper have felt it. It was on a fast descent to 130m. I did not feel it again on dives to same depth.
1 time I almost had a CO2 hit on ccr.
Helium makes the gas less dense, so it breaths lighter. But even with a 6/72 the EADD (equivalent air density depth) on 130m on oc is around 43m. So if you go deeper you will for sure feel that breathing costs more energy. And CO2 is a contributing factor for getting narced, and faster breathing (on oc every breathe you throw your gas away), etc. This means that you have to know that there is a change that your RMV/SAC will not be the same at depth. I use on oc 12-14L per minute, 16L per minute in cold waters. But I have had that there was no reason I had 20L/min on 1 dive to 110m. Yes the water was cold, but I was relaxed and no currents and so on. So even if my normal gasconsumption of gas is lower, I always calculate my gas needed with 20L/minute. Deco too. I have never been deeper than 112m on oc, but you must know from yourself how much you will need and what differences you have in gasconsumption. On ccr bailout I calculate with more than 20L/minute. Getting cold makes you use more gas too.
Grouppressure is a special thing too: 1 time I listened to the group and my buddy and we get lost in a wreck and I had to decide to share air with my buddy or to kick him away and tried to safe only myself ( I decided to share air with him, and we surfaced healthy, his tank empty, mines 15 bars left, when we searched for the exit I counted how many minutes my life would be if we couldn’t find the exit. I thought what will I do if my buddy runs out of air because he uses more than I, etc).. Since then I always take at least a small spool with me on even the most simple wreckdive. Another example of groupthinking was a solodive I made on an 18L tank in my sportsdiver career to almost 50m: 49,7m (my brain said go back at that moment). When I told people about this dive, nobody told me how stupid it was to do this on a single tank in 4 degrees water (ok I had a drysuit and dual outlet on valve, but could not do a valvedrill) without any knowledge of deco, narcosis, etc. The reaction I got from other divers: wow, that was nice, but why did you not touched the 50m exactly? I can say to others I have never done stupid things, but this examples I use to warn people not to do the same.
If it is normal in a group to do deep air dives, then you think it is normal. I dived in this period with people who wanted to do deep airdives as sportsdiver. Some of them went to 73m on a single tank and they still say that trimix is a useless gas. :shocked2: So better not to listen to them. On the other hand, grouppressure that tell you that technical diving is useless because all interesting can be find in 20m depth is maybe some kind of safe grouppressure, but if your dreams are to explore deep wrecks or caves, then go for that. But try to find the right people. Technical diving is really nice, and it is not only deep, deeper, deepest.
