Her Air Stopped on 140 Foot Dive

[jamiep3]

Had similar situation in Coz last year. Set my gear up, tank on, checked breathing, and then laid it down while I double checked my camera. When we arrived on site, one of the crew members held my tank/bc up for me to don. At about 60', noticed my reg was breathing very hard. Check of guage showed big drop with every breath. Stopped my decent, controlled my breathing, reached back and found my valve almost closed. Can only assume the guy who held the tank up thought he was openning it for me.

Needless to say, predive the last thing I do now is look at my guage and take three deep breaths.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Needless to say, predive the last thing I do now is look at my guage and take three deep breaths.

I've seen several references to this procedure in this thread. It usually won't help at the surface. If a valve is only on a little the reg will often breath just fine with no visable changes in the pressure gauge when a breath is taken.

You usually won't see the needle dip during a breath untill you get to some depth and a breath is a much larger volume. That's why we use only two positions of the valve...all the way on and all the way off. Even if the reg is pressurized and then turned off you'll only get a breath or two so you'll find out before you get very deep. If it's on a little you me get pretty deep before having any kind of problem or even see the pressure gauge dip.

At the surface you need to manually verify that the valve is all the way on.

You really need to be able to reach your valve whether they teach in OW class or not.

You need to not let people mess with your gear.

 

[DandyDon]

I've seen several references to this procedure in this thread. It usually won't help at the surface. If a valve is only on a little the reg will often breath just fine with no visable changes in the pressure gauge when a breath is taken.

You usually won't see the needle dip during a breath untill you get to some depth and a breath is a much larger volume. That's why we use only two positions of the valve...all the way on and all the way off. Even if the reg is pressurized and then turned off you'll only get a breath or two so you'll find out before you get very deep. If it's on a little you me get pretty deep before having any kind of problem or even see the pressure gauge dip.

At the surface you need to manually verify that the valve is all the way on.

You really need to be able to reach your valve whether they teach in OW class or not.

You need to not let people mess with your gear.

Thanks, Mike! I was wondering why I'd forgotten the "test breath and watch SPG" think; because it's worthless.

All the way - so i'll be all the way open, or all the way closed and you'll know it. Better idea...

I've only been diving a little more than 3 years, with just ove 200 dives, and I'm amazed at the severe problems I've seen - and personally survived. But any problem in this sport can be "severe."

 

[Iruka]

Wreck, I know that often properly trained & competent divers don't want or need assistance from a DM, and I try to determine what level of help/guidance is appropriate for each diver. When I am about to do my entry, if there happens to be boat crew there, they will more often than not check my valve right before I hit the water. I KNOW my air's on, so I don't need them to check it for me, but I'm sure they've caught many people trying to enter without their air on....so I just let them do it, it only slows me down a couple seconds. I haven't had any of THEM close my air on me, but I'm sure it happens. With divers' abilities ranging from completely helpless to completely self-sufficient (and far more of the former than the latter!) we sometimes "guess wrong" but it's not meant to offend anyone. Usually watching someone put their gear together gives me a pretty good idea of how much diving they've done. Often here in Guam (where most divers are Japanese) we have cultural things as well to keep in mind. For example, when I have a pair of 90lb/40kg girls on a beach dive, I'll often carry the 3 sets of gear (wearing mine & throwing their BCDs with tanks over each shoulder) and walk for 3~5 minutes. They GREATLY appreciate that. With American women, on the other hand, I think they would consider that to be an patronizing for me to carry their gear....so I need to be more conscious of offering help of that nature.
(Normally I don't write this much, but diving's shut down for a couple of days due to a tropical storm going through)

 

[Bretagne]

Iruka, if you proposed to carry my tank, I would thank you and appreciate it, but I would refuse. I prefer a DM with a back in good health state

 

[ShakaZulu]

If my buddy does that to me, I'll just politely take his primary out of his mouth..........now let's see if he does that again.

 

[cobaltbabe]

Says something for not being lazy and learning to assemble and check your own gear and be able to manipulate your own valves at depth.

Complacency kills and no one is to blame but her. Not even the new kid.

Every diver is responsible for their own equipment first and formost. And I am sorry but if she made an ascent from 80 feet with no stop, what the heck was she thinking going back down again? Not smart.

Complacency does kill and she is very lucky. Maybe now she will be more careful before entering the water.

 

[Mako Mark]

The half turn back question has been discussed in the instructor 2 instructor forum recently, my recolection of that thread was that there is no reason to do so.

On is on

and

Off is off.

this would have prevented this incident from happening deeper than about a foot under water.

.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Sounds like a story I read in one of our local dive magazines a couple years ago. Same location ... Blue Hole, Belize.

Guy was on his 5th dive after OW certification. So they take them on a planned dive to 150 fsw. He got "fascinated" and didn't realize he was at 170 till the DM came and got him. Then, in his "fascination" he realized he was down to 700 psi. Ended up getting escorted back up to 20 fsw breathing off the DM's backup reg ... then placed on a hang tank to decompress (yes, he was in deco).

He ended the story by telling everyone what a GREAT dive it was ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[downunderjenn]

First, it's amazing what people call a great dive. I think this is in part just cultural, as peoplel like to remember experiences as being fun and worthwhile, thusly, the memory translates a dive as great while erasing the bad bits.

Secondly, with regard to this diver that bolted until she realized she had air. Why did she not know how much air was in her tank, what her usual air consumption rate is, when she turns dives, and how much air she was consuming during this dive? As far as I know, a tank does not break so as to prevent air from coming out. The valve may be turned off, a burst disc could blow, an o-ring can go bad, and the valve can fall off. I've never seen a tank get a leak, beyond o-ring, burst disc, regulator attachment.

I don't know much about valves freezing (but this won't happen in the tropics), and I'd think a reg would freeze before the tank valve. Anyway, just curious as to why she didn't make buddy contact and discover the only solution was a tank valve issue with it being off. I would like to know more about freezing valves and defective valves.