I f*** up and I am ashamed

[SlugLife]

Was it a cave (no natural light), or a cavern (overhead environment)?

I appreciate you sharing this story, even if embarrassing, and I'm glad that you and your wife are safe. I regularly follow the "Dive Talk" youtube channel, run by a couple cave-divers, and know from that channel cave-diving is more dangerous to untrained divers than one would intuitively expect. Plenty of highly experienced DMs and Dive-Instructors have died in caves, lacking cave-diving training.

You appear to have the right attitude that you are responsible for your safety; afterall even if the DM was technically liable, a multi-million dollar lawsuit would do you no good if you were dead.

I will say what your DM did was extremely stupid, dangerous, and he should never act as a DM for anyone ever again. What he did is irredeemable.

Watching my wife dive into a cave (without training) would be hard to ignore. I wasn't there, but in hindsight, I'm thinking the right thing to do would have been to rush forward, grab her fin, and signal to turn around. That is until it became impractical or unsafe to do so, at which point you're better off hanging back because you could make yourself a person needing rescue. That could potentially get you killed, or both you and your wife killed, because now instead of rescuing one person, two people need rescue. In that case, your better off surfacing and getting help, because even if they did get lost, there might be time for someone adequately trained to rescue them.

 

[chillyinCanada]

Calling the dive "leader" a DM, is a practice that should probably stop. They are dive guides. Certainly, they may be able to help a diver in case of emergency and will too, but they aren't our divemaster, as defined by a certification.

They are guides that know the dive site better than we do. But ultimately, our diving and decision making in those regards are up to us.

 

[mc42]

Instead of continuing to beat yourself up, let’s touch on what others could have done. I’m not so sure you were a crap buddy.

You had a problem. The other two could have realized you were missing, or were separated, and could have turned to try to find you. But they didn’t know. They, more so the DM, completely lacked situational awareness for the clients he was responsible for.

Were the other two responsible for the bad visibility through bad finning technique? They may have been causing your problems while they had great visibility, being the first ones through. It might have looked like an easy swim-through, but could have turned into a serious situation. The DM again should have been checking to see where you were, and if visibility was an issue, moved the group members closer together to the point of touch contact if necessary.

How much air did you have left, given it was the end of the dive? Did the DM check your pressures before going through the cave to determine if it was prudent to go in at all? What if one of you had a problem (like you did) and needed to share air? Would you have had enough to get out safely?

Much of my dissatisfaction is directed at the DM. You and your wife rightfully followed him, putting a certain level of trust in him to take you on a dive commensurate with your skills and equipment. Even if something like a swim-through, overhead, wreck, or cavern fits in what is permitted within recreational limits (at least by PADI) it doesn’t make it a trivial thing, as you found.

Stay safe!

 

[Celt]

No matter how simple a dive seems beforehand, it must be planned. You entered the cavern or swim through without giving it a second thought. If you dive like that you’re always close to a slip up.

 

[ginti]

When I was an ambulance rescuer, the first rule was: take care of yourself. Indeed, if you have major issues, not only you would not be able to help others, but you would also need someone to rescue you! Safety first

In other words, do not feel ashamed if you self-rescued yourself. It was the right thing to do. Thinking otherwise is dangerous.

Well, I took many many courses and it taught me a lot of things

First, I would say that that I need to stay closer to my wife but it is difficult.

The way you describe it, you are not acting as a team. I recommend an intro to tec course, but you need to be sure >100% that the instructor is strongly team-oriented... if you are unsure, go for GUE fundies

But now, I think that she understands that she should not enter a cave without we don't have the proper training.

This isn't true only for caves. It is true for any diving activity (wrecks, deco, oxygen, etc.). Never exceed your training, never.

The other thing is the underweight vs overweight. I might need to take 2 kg more.

You need a proper weight check. If I were you, I would dedicate an entire dive to this aspect. Ensure that you can:
- go down from the surface at the beginning of the dive, head up, without kicking
- swim up from depth with one buoyancy compensator broken
- hold a 3m safety stop (3m, not 5!) with almost empty tanks (40bar)

I would start the dive with 2 kg more than usual, and during the safety stop I would first remove 1kg to see what happens, and if still stable, I would also remove the second kg

One thing surprised me. I was swallowing a lot of sea water trying to get out of this situation and I still don't understand why.

There are several things that could explain this phenomenon, but I wouldn't bother to understand it if I were you. It's definitely not your main concern now: team diving and weights are.

 

[Dody]

So you scared the crap out of yourself and survived. You are making progress toward being a real diver.

Going into dark places that you can not see and without a light is unwise but that might have been a sort of spur of the moment decision.

But why did you knowingly dive with improper ballast?

Having too little to completely stop your ascent at any depth is critical. What if a boat does not see you and is in gear and you float up into the props? Isn't this something you thought about before and considered?

Is the reason you carry too little lead some sort of pride or competitive attitude or a mind set that good divers need less lead? I am really curious why you chose to dive like that?

I recently got some new gear including a new wetsuit that is much more buoyant than the one I rented from the dive shop. I initially needed 8 kg to go down with the new wetsuit and it was very uncomfortable. However, I realized that I could hold my safety stop with 4 so I stuck with 4. I thought about boat issues and did not find an answer. Stupid and foolish.

 

[Dody]

The best way to protect your wife, in this instance, would have been to stop her from entering the cave. I know you were 10 metres away, but could you not have used something metallic to bang on your tank and draw her attention? Do you dive with a small dive knife?

I dive with a big knife on the inside of my right calf and a small knife on the side of my bcd. I did not think about banging on my tank. I was never trained to do cave diving. In fact, I hate it. I don’t like not having a direct way to the surface.

 

[Dody]

Why?

Because I was wrongfully led to believe that it is always better to be underweighted than overweighted. Now, I know better.

 

[chillyinCanada]

With regard, to you swallowing water or feeling water in your mouth on inhales, during this incident, I find it more likely that as you were struggling, your 2nd stage was being pulled to the side and/or your increased breathing rate due to the anxiety, was causing your lips to not be pursed upon the reg. Yes, being upside down can make a reg breathe wet too, but for some reason, I just don't think that was what was causing this.

You were very stressed, you were struggling, your struggles, made everything more frightening and more difficult to control.

Dody, please stop referring to yourself as stupid etc. You've had an experience that you survived and now you need to learn from this. AND that means non-critical self evaluation.

 

[Dody]

Yeah, what the others said about weights. Surface swimming in full gear is much harder than the same swim at 2-3m. Sometimes you may need to do a pop-up to get your bearings and can find yourself trapped at the surface unable to rejoin your dive buddy or burning a lot of air to get down to them.

I didn’t really understand your description of the dive. In one part you said you couldn’t see you dive computer because of the visibility and then you were ten meters from your wife and could see her entering the cave. It sounds like the guide was taking you through a swim through of some type. Could you give us a clearer description of the dive. Where was it? Is it a cold water dive? Do you know the name of the sight? Depth and visibility?

I was 10 meters behind my wife before entering the cave. She was maybe 2 meters behind the DM. I saw the cave but I could not believe my eyes when the DM went for it. Out of the cave, the vis was not very good. Blurry but it was possible to see shapes at 10 meters. When I entered the cave, I realized that I could not see sh… The DM told me later than in those caves, you can only see if you face the sunlight not if you look at the back of the cave. The dive was in Cape Verde in a place called Cidade Veilha in the open sea. Both my wife and I are considered good divers. We have experienced strong currents, deep dives, poor vis, diving with sharks without a hint of panic. The DM was acting more like a guide than a DM and we told him that we wanted to see things. But he forgot that I had always told him that I did not want to do cave and wreck penetration.