Dumb Things I've Done

[claymore]

I got a new GoPro (Hero 3 Black) this spring went diving with it most of the summer in my dry suit with zip seals and dry glove rings. I had put a handle on the GoPro and and a big foam loop handle. The loop handle slide over the dry glove rings with a nice tight fit.
Went to Cozumel and went diving in a 3mil shorty. First dive clipped dive light to BC, put GoPro loop on wrist and went diving. Part way though the dive I reached down to grab my light and that is when the GoPro must have just slid off my wrist because without the big rings on the dry suit to hold the loop on it slid of without any real resistance. Bye Bye GoPro.

Lesson learned CLIP the Camera to a lanyard.

 

[raftingtigger]

Paddled out for 10 minutes in a small inflatable with my son. Got out there and found I had left 10# of needed weight on shore (after trying to descend). Fortunately I had an extra 10# mushroom anchor hanging on the anchor line. So I pulled down the anchor line and clipped it to my weight belt. Worked just fine until my son swam under me as I turned and I clipped him (very slightly) on the mask with the anchor. We both still have a good laugh over that one.

Many more, but for now they will be left unsaid .

 

[nimoh]

On various dives, I have forgotten my bottom timer, argon regulator, oxygen bottle and drysuit, but in all 3 instances I was able to borrow the item from someone I was diving with and do the dive

While shooting video of a recovery, I realized just in time that by trying to get a good angle, I had positioned myself directly above the lift bag

Once when first learning how to dive, I was unable to descend and informed everyone that I thought I needed more weight. Then someone pointed out that I was pressing the wrong button on my inflator hose

 

[mmcdanie]

My Top 3
1) Drove to boat to realize that I did not have the keys to the boat. Had wife drive them to us...early in the morning....she was not happy, and I will never hear the end of it.
2) Forgot to pack wetsuit, no diving that day, upset buddy.
3) Forgot to zip wetsuit zipper, another reason to have a good buddy.

 

[FinnMom]

When we sank a small boat as an underwater diving attraction I was on shore taking photos and video. A beginner class from another club came to dive the brand-new wreck, possibly their very 1st open-water dive.
I've got a few photos of 2 different students putting their wetsuits on back-to-front

 

[buddhasummer]

After a 40 minute boat ride out to dive site realized I'd forgotten my wetsuit.

I have a routine of turning my air I when I set up, one of my "buddies" checked my air, without my seeing, and actually turned it off. I began to descend and realized my air was off. I changed my routine.

---------- Post added December 2nd, 2013 at 09:41 PM ----------

After just telling some newer first time night divers not to turn their lights off until back on land, I got caught in a dive flag rope and in the process of untangling myself the light lanyard came loose and fell off my wrist. I never saw the light again, I had turned it off.

---------- Post added December 2nd, 2013 at 09:42 PM ----------

In my hurry to get in the water jumped off boat sans fins.

 

[Dr. Lecter]

Tried to stand up after donning a rig that was still bungeed into the tank holder.

Have had my backup SMB become a butt d-ring tail more times than I can count.

Managed to sit on a rail just right, such that my shiny new Halcyon Pathfinder reel unclipped itself from the d-ring and did a free descent to the bottom 130' away.

Failed to consider bottom current direction while deploying a SMB from 220' or so, resulting in a varation on pissing into the wind but with a stream of #36 line. Thankfully only a tiny squirt of gas is necessary at that depth to get a fully inflated bag at the surface, so I had the time necessary to untangle myself before either having to cut the line or become a Polaris missile.

Failed to consider the surf report for later on when doing an 'at dusk' shore dive with a planned exit involving transiting a cut in a rocky breakwater. That error cost me a hole in my Fusion Bullet skin.

Forgot to turn on a backup light before unclipping it from the harness, while in a silty engine room with serious gaps in the deck plating... promptly dropped a light for the first time ever.

 

[TSandM]

Oh, I forgot to mention the day I tried to launch the boat without the plug in it. I went to park the trailer and came back and had a guy yell, "Hey, your boat is sinking!" He was right -- so I asked my buddy, who was already halfway into his dry suit, to stand at the back of the boat as the Dutch Boy while we tried to figure out where my husband had put the plug. Unable to find it, I went and got the truck and came back, and got the trailer under it before it sank too far to load. We pulled it up to the parking lot and sat on the transom while one of my friends hiked to West Marine to buy a new one.

Turns out my husband thought the ash tray of the truck was a good place for the plug.

The boat now has three, and one is zip-tied to the steering.

 

[GrimSleeper]

Oh, so many. Either everyone else is bashful, or I'm just really stupid...

This is just a random selection from the hall of infamy.


Descended with snorkel in. And not just once or twice...

Giant stride without fins, having observed all the OW students doing their buddy checks.

Entry with air off, ditto.

Got halfway to dive site, after lecture to students on importance of checking they have all their kit because of the length of the boat trip, before realising that I have. Not. One. Solitary. Item. Of my own kit on the boat.

Arrived at dive site for a deco dive and remembered that backplate and harness are still on single-tank rig at shop.

Wondered why I was having such trouble holding a safety stop. When I surfaced, wife (who was DM-ing on boat that day) suggested the dive might have been easier if I'd taken my weight pockets. (One of many reasons I use a bp/w when single tank diving nowadays...)

Tied self up in fishing net trying to free a cuttlefish.

Later tied self up again in same net as part of team removing it from reef.

Had a valve jam open when I was doing a shutdown drill. Such was my determination to complete the drill, I sheared the knob clean off. Dive over.

Forgotten to reset computers for different mixes untold times.

Forgotten to tell computers I have completed gas switches several times. Don't do technical dives with computers any more.

Allowed wife to follow me into bottom level of the Fujikawa Maru's engine room after her primary light failed, without her deploying backup. Well, it'll be fine, I'm carrying a 50W HID and we're just going round this corner to the engineer's station. Turns out light doesn't travel round corners...

'Shark calling' in spots where my back isn't against rock or reef. The ocean is three-dimensional, and the bit behind you is still there even if you can't see it. Stopped doing that after an 8-foot Silvertip came over my shoulder and knocked my mask off at 50m... I don't know what haunts me more: recovering my mask and seeing what had just hit me, or the sound of the wife's laughter while I was scrabbling after my mask.

Arrived at dive site and found I'd brought empty tanks.

Tossed mask into small boat before getting back on board. Except I actually tossed mask OVER small boat and into sea on other side. Gone.

Back-rolled into three feet of water (boat had drifted slightly while I was briefing OW students and driver hadn't noticed). Landed on tank, fortunately.

And talking of boats, swept up to the jetty in one of our 23-foot skiffs, brought her alongside perfectly, was stood chatting to customers about the dive they'd had when I realised I was close to knee-deep in water. I'd taken the bung out to empty the bilge during the trip back...

There's probably more.

 

[TMHeimer]

Over the 8 years I, of course, also have forgotton to turn on air--maybe 4 times, fortunately all were shore diving. Though did once (before I was a DM) share air with a DM buddy (who was leading me on a dive in Panama) who jumped in and descended with a near empty tank. In my first couple of years I forgot my fins AND didn't really notice until I was way away from the car and actually in water--at the time I actually wondered what the dive would be like without fins-- a lot of bottom walking? Lifeguards luckily had a spare pair. Dumbest thing (basically as a newbie) was watching my 10 lb. weight fall into 20 fsw probably due to improper securing. BUT, I then tried to go down and get it and took me a minute to figure why that would not work....