Mattleycrue76
Contributor
I was doing a wreck dive in the NorthEast and a young lady was doing her first dive in this area. She was nervous and it showed. I usually dive solo as do most, because the visibility is usually quite poor and it makes diving with a buddy problematic.
I offered to dive with her and she readily accepted. I explained that I would set my reel and she would follow me, always maintaining contact with the reel at all times.
We dropped down the anchor line, I deployed my reel, and we began the dive. The current was strong and the visibility was less than 10 feet in murk. A few minutes later I turned around and she was GONE. By the time I got to the surface they were doing a "rescue"- she had let go of the line for reasons unknown and was swept off the wreck by the brisk current and she made a free ascent and ended up away from the dive boat. The DM was swimming out to her with a life ring, and pulled her in.
She joined me once again on the second dive. I told her again to NOT let go of the line! We agreed that if she wanted to end the dive early she was to follow the reel line back to the anchor and ascend, I was more than happy to have her dive with me but I was not going to end my dive early. This is what she did...and when I got back to the boat...yup another rescue in progress. This busy dive boat uses two lines to the wreck...white is the "down" line and "yellow" is the upline. They're tied in to each other on the wreck and selecting the correct one is easier than making a left or a right turn at a fork in the road.
She forgot which one to use...and she started up the downline, and when she saw other divers coming down..she...let go. And she was swept off the line and made a free ascent and surfaced away from the boat.
So to sum it up:
1) You think that diving in low viz makes good buddy skills impractical
2) You buddied up with a new obviously nervous diver in challenging conditions and didn't bother to look at her for a few minutes - at which point YOU had lost contact with her
3) You then buddied up with her again and let her go back to the upline alone even though she was clearly struggling and had required a rescue under similar conditions on the previous dive
4) And you seem to think that SHE's doing the dumbest things here?
Are you Serious?