Sir, thank you very much for sharing this story, I haven’t had a major free flow issue yet, but after reading stories, like yours. I’m starting to dive with a pony bottle and rehears the steps with my dive buddies of what to do when **** hits the fan.
Free flow at 94' ffw
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A major part of the message here is how fast a low-pressure free-flow can drain your tank.
I had something similar happen once at the beginning of a cold dive in a quarry with two buddies. My primary free-flowed unstoppably at 70 ft, I shifted to my secondary and waved goodbye to my buddies. No safety stop, I surfaced, I had 200 psi left.
I had something similar happen once at the beginning of a cold dive in a quarry with two buddies. My primary free-flowed unstoppably at 70 ft, I shifted to my secondary and waved goodbye to my buddies. No safety stop, I surfaced, I had 200 psi left.
drk5036
Contributor
OP
0321tony
Registered
No judgment taken.
Unfortunately when it happened it was immediately after we had done an OK check so both divers were facing away from me, the water was so murky that even about 15 ft unless you were looking directly at me you wouldn't see the torch. So within seconds they were out of range to see me. When it happened my head and face were completely enveloped in bubbles from the alternate and while trying to find the issue due to using my hands the combination of bubbles and the light from the torch mounted to the back of my right hand had me blinded. I could have made a fast descent to catch up but figured with the circumstances my best course of action was to make an ascent. In better viz it would have been easy to bang on my tank to get their attention and ascended together. If I only had one air source I would have cought up and made sure I had a buddy to breathe off of if my air depleted itself.
I shared this incident hoping others can learn from it. Sure there were other things I could have done and each person could or would have handled this situation differently if it happened to them. The biggest take away I hope others can get from my incident are that keeping a calm head and not panicking led to a positive outcome. Practicing drills and knowing your gear and how to use it are important. Diving dry with a thick undergarment makes movement restricted and using insulated dry gloves makes dexterity difficult so being able to unplug hoses ect is more muscle memory than being able to do it by feel.
Within moments I was able to go through a progression of problem solving and eliminating possible issues. My biggest worry was that it was my drysuit valve had malfunctioned and I was worried about having an uncontrolled ascent so that was my first thing to eliminate. Once I found where the problem was my next worry was that if I didn't keep my breathing under control and take slow breaths that it could freeze up my first stage and then I'd have two regs free flowing and lose my air that much faster. My next issue was making a controlled ascent in black water with no visual references so I had to feep an eye on my computer, my air and dumping my bc as I came up. It's amazing how time slows down and your brain can think clearly in hyperspeed when it's needed. By regularly training and practicing drills for possible scenarios if you don't panic your brain knows what to do. Time slowed down and I remember clearly weighing my options and I took the steps that I felt were appropriate. It was a great learning experience and I am thankful for it. You can train and train but until an actual issue arises you don't know how you'll react. I'm a combat veteran and you can train and train but until that first bullet goes by your head you don't know how you'll react.
Stay calm weigh your options and make the best decision you can based on the circumstances, that's exactly what I did and I am able to share my story with the good people on this forum and you guys not read about another diver dying of over expansion injury.
There are a lot more experienced divers here than me and I welcome dialog on what others would have done so hopefully a new diver can read this thread and hopefully learn something from it should it ever happen to them.
One preventative solution to consider? Although I think the usual suggestion is to put it on the primary, and if that starts to FF you can shut it down and then move to the alternate. In your case you would have had to have it reversed, or one on each 2nd stage.
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Bob DBF
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I'm in an armchair, but I don't find anything wrong and it sounds like a course of action I would have taken. The unlimited backup gas waiting on the surface is much better than losing more gas to maybe find your buddies. Not using the pony, because you didn't need it yet, was a fine touch. And yes, the armchair agrees as well.
Bob
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