Wijbrandus
Contributor
Here's the story. I actually have reservations about posting this, for a few reasons. First, my friends are infrequent readers of this board, and I really don't want them to feel like I've aired out their dirty laundry here on the off chance they read this. Second, I'm feeling very conflicted now and guilty about how this turned out, and I'm not sure how to handle these feelings. Please, be nice in any response for these reasons. 
Here's the background. I certified last summer with diver A and his wife, diver B. My wife certified just a few months ago. Since that time, diver A and I have also completed our AOW (this April). I have done a few dives in addition to my training, and actually feel very comfortable in the water. Diver A and B haven't done any dives outside of the training dives. My wife hasn't either.
Yesterday, the four of us went to the local lake to do an easy shore dive. My wife only went to observe. She didn't feel comfortable in diving cold water with heavy neoprene until she's done a few Carib dives. So now, we are down to three. I'd hoped to talk her into it, but now I'm glad I didn't press the issue. Outside temp was 89F, and the water was 68F at the surface with a visibility of about five feet.
The dive site is at an elevation of 5280 ft, with a Cessna sitting on the bottom at 30', and a max depth of 60'. There is a marker at the plane. The plan was simple, since we were unfamiliar with the site. Swim out to the bouy, descend to the plane, spend 20 minutes max on the bottom, ascend, and swim back to the beach. This meant a surface swim of about 60 yards.
As we suit up, we have a string of the usual newbie problems. Fighting the heavy neoprene, putting a tank on backwards (facing the wrong way), etc., but with good buddy checks the three of us get it all together. We do a weighting check also. After adjusting weights, we decide we are ready.
On the swim out, this is where problems strike. First, the vis is crap, so you have no landmarks when you are snorkeling out and staring into a brown fog. We slowly spread out over the distance. Not far, but not within hands reach either. I drift of course a bit. Diver B falls behind a few yards, while her husband diver A reaches the marker. I pop my head up to see I'm off to the left, and I hear Diver B a few yards away say, "I'm done, I'm going back, I'm not doing this dive."
I say, "OK, you're done, we're all done, we'll go back and review and replan." She suddenly starts crying and saying she can't breathe, and flailing in the water. She's trying to kick her head up out of the water farther, and in all honesty I think she's going into panic mode. I've already started swimming her way, and she keeps saying the weight belt is cutting her in half. I tell her, "get bouyant, put air in your bc. Relax. You can't sink with air in there". As she fills the bc, it looks to me like she's getting worse. I say "Dump your weights, this trip is over, let's get safe and dry." She can't find her weight release, and I'm like oh crap. I swim the last two yards in a rush of adrenaline.
I get to her side, I see tears in her mask, and I repeat, can you dump your weights? She can only flail trying to throw her head out of the water. I look down, and dump her weight belt for her. And then Diver A, who left the marker to come to us, says, "Help, I've got a problem now too." I'm like how can this get any worse? Diver A is about ten yards away now. I've got his wife barely under control, and I can't help him from here. He's complaining about the same thing and starting to freak out too. I shout over, "dump your weights". He does, and lays on his back to catch his breath.
I tow Diver B back to the beach, encouraging Diver A all the way. Diver B is crying when we get out of the water. Diver A looks like he's been told his best dog died. The whole time I'm trying to remain calm on the outside and keep them from freaking out worse, while I'm almost panicked on the inside.
On the beach, we talk about what happened...
Diver B said she just could not breathe in her getup. Apparently, and this is only my impression, her gear was too small. She's a big busty lady. So that created a diaphram squeeze. Then, she's got the heavy weight belt. She said she was swimming out on the reg, and thought why not use the snorkel? When she swapped over to that, she got water in the mouth, couldn't clear it and couldn't catch her breathe on the surface. When she aborted, her confidence dropped and she started to freak.
Diver A had similar problems, but was handling it. He complained of bad back gas. He said he was getting a carbon monoxide headache that was killing him, and he could not catch his breath. After the fact, I think what hit him was shallow breathing on the surface swim. Regardless, with all the heavy weight, and then his wife's problems, he started to panic as well.
Well, we get it all back together, and diver A starts talking about taking my weight belt and going back down after those belts they dumped. I'm like, "Are you nuts? There's no vis out there, you just freaked and aborted a dive, and you are telling me your very first dive outside of training is going to be a solo dive?" I also say "It's lead. It's not so expensive as to risk your life for it. I can't see them charging you more than a buck a pound. (what do I know?). My wife doesn't see a problem with him going in, but Diver B doesn't like the idea either. Probably because I'm arguing against it. End result we abandon the belts.
We go to their house, hose off the gear, and return it to the LDS. The shop charges them $1.70 a pound, with an end ticket of $113 bucks. I'm shocked. They are shocked. We are all pissed, but they pay it and we go our separate ways.
On the way home, my wife tells me she doesn't think they were that bad off. Now, I'm second-guessing myself and wondering if my call cost them another $113 on top of a miserable day of diving that we took a vacation day to go do. On top of that, we were all planning to go to Roatan this October, and I had to back out this week due to financial constraints, and I don't know if they are ready for it. I don't even know how to broach the issue with them because I feel it will be like I'm trying to talk them out of going because I bailed.
I've already decided after this experience, I'm never diving a threesome again. Too much can go wrong. I was really scared, not for myself but for my friends, and I really felt that dropping the belts was called for, but the end result was the money and my wife saying it didn't look that bad from shore. Now I'm feeling like I overreacted and I should have taken things a bit slower and handled it differently.
Rescue diver has been on my list of to do things, but I haven't had the ability to schedule it, and probably won't until this winter. I do have previous rescue experience, but in water is a whole different ballgame. I think that previous experience is what lead me to say bag the weights, we are aborting hard.
Some of the things I learned: call the dive if it feels uncomfortable, don't wait for a small problem to become a big problem, don't dive in threes, and be certain your gear fits you. I'll never do a threesome ever again, even though I didn't have a problem. There was no one left to rescue me at this point if I did.
Any advice? What could I have done differently? I'm feeling guilty that I may have overreacted and cost them this money. Deep down, I think I did right, but now I'm not sure.
Here's the background. I certified last summer with diver A and his wife, diver B. My wife certified just a few months ago. Since that time, diver A and I have also completed our AOW (this April). I have done a few dives in addition to my training, and actually feel very comfortable in the water. Diver A and B haven't done any dives outside of the training dives. My wife hasn't either.
Yesterday, the four of us went to the local lake to do an easy shore dive. My wife only went to observe. She didn't feel comfortable in diving cold water with heavy neoprene until she's done a few Carib dives. So now, we are down to three. I'd hoped to talk her into it, but now I'm glad I didn't press the issue. Outside temp was 89F, and the water was 68F at the surface with a visibility of about five feet.
The dive site is at an elevation of 5280 ft, with a Cessna sitting on the bottom at 30', and a max depth of 60'. There is a marker at the plane. The plan was simple, since we were unfamiliar with the site. Swim out to the bouy, descend to the plane, spend 20 minutes max on the bottom, ascend, and swim back to the beach. This meant a surface swim of about 60 yards.
As we suit up, we have a string of the usual newbie problems. Fighting the heavy neoprene, putting a tank on backwards (facing the wrong way), etc., but with good buddy checks the three of us get it all together. We do a weighting check also. After adjusting weights, we decide we are ready.
On the swim out, this is where problems strike. First, the vis is crap, so you have no landmarks when you are snorkeling out and staring into a brown fog. We slowly spread out over the distance. Not far, but not within hands reach either. I drift of course a bit. Diver B falls behind a few yards, while her husband diver A reaches the marker. I pop my head up to see I'm off to the left, and I hear Diver B a few yards away say, "I'm done, I'm going back, I'm not doing this dive."
I say, "OK, you're done, we're all done, we'll go back and review and replan." She suddenly starts crying and saying she can't breathe, and flailing in the water. She's trying to kick her head up out of the water farther, and in all honesty I think she's going into panic mode. I've already started swimming her way, and she keeps saying the weight belt is cutting her in half. I tell her, "get bouyant, put air in your bc. Relax. You can't sink with air in there". As she fills the bc, it looks to me like she's getting worse. I say "Dump your weights, this trip is over, let's get safe and dry." She can't find her weight release, and I'm like oh crap. I swim the last two yards in a rush of adrenaline.
I get to her side, I see tears in her mask, and I repeat, can you dump your weights? She can only flail trying to throw her head out of the water. I look down, and dump her weight belt for her. And then Diver A, who left the marker to come to us, says, "Help, I've got a problem now too." I'm like how can this get any worse? Diver A is about ten yards away now. I've got his wife barely under control, and I can't help him from here. He's complaining about the same thing and starting to freak out too. I shout over, "dump your weights". He does, and lays on his back to catch his breath.
I tow Diver B back to the beach, encouraging Diver A all the way. Diver B is crying when we get out of the water. Diver A looks like he's been told his best dog died. The whole time I'm trying to remain calm on the outside and keep them from freaking out worse, while I'm almost panicked on the inside.
On the beach, we talk about what happened...
Diver B said she just could not breathe in her getup. Apparently, and this is only my impression, her gear was too small. She's a big busty lady. So that created a diaphram squeeze. Then, she's got the heavy weight belt. She said she was swimming out on the reg, and thought why not use the snorkel? When she swapped over to that, she got water in the mouth, couldn't clear it and couldn't catch her breathe on the surface. When she aborted, her confidence dropped and she started to freak.
Diver A had similar problems, but was handling it. He complained of bad back gas. He said he was getting a carbon monoxide headache that was killing him, and he could not catch his breath. After the fact, I think what hit him was shallow breathing on the surface swim. Regardless, with all the heavy weight, and then his wife's problems, he started to panic as well.
Well, we get it all back together, and diver A starts talking about taking my weight belt and going back down after those belts they dumped. I'm like, "Are you nuts? There's no vis out there, you just freaked and aborted a dive, and you are telling me your very first dive outside of training is going to be a solo dive?" I also say "It's lead. It's not so expensive as to risk your life for it. I can't see them charging you more than a buck a pound. (what do I know?). My wife doesn't see a problem with him going in, but Diver B doesn't like the idea either. Probably because I'm arguing against it. End result we abandon the belts.
We go to their house, hose off the gear, and return it to the LDS. The shop charges them $1.70 a pound, with an end ticket of $113 bucks. I'm shocked. They are shocked. We are all pissed, but they pay it and we go our separate ways.
On the way home, my wife tells me she doesn't think they were that bad off. Now, I'm second-guessing myself and wondering if my call cost them another $113 on top of a miserable day of diving that we took a vacation day to go do. On top of that, we were all planning to go to Roatan this October, and I had to back out this week due to financial constraints, and I don't know if they are ready for it. I don't even know how to broach the issue with them because I feel it will be like I'm trying to talk them out of going because I bailed.
I've already decided after this experience, I'm never diving a threesome again. Too much can go wrong. I was really scared, not for myself but for my friends, and I really felt that dropping the belts was called for, but the end result was the money and my wife saying it didn't look that bad from shore. Now I'm feeling like I overreacted and I should have taken things a bit slower and handled it differently.
Rescue diver has been on my list of to do things, but I haven't had the ability to schedule it, and probably won't until this winter. I do have previous rescue experience, but in water is a whole different ballgame. I think that previous experience is what lead me to say bag the weights, we are aborting hard.
Some of the things I learned: call the dive if it feels uncomfortable, don't wait for a small problem to become a big problem, don't dive in threes, and be certain your gear fits you. I'll never do a threesome ever again, even though I didn't have a problem. There was no one left to rescue me at this point if I did.
Any advice? What could I have done differently? I'm feeling guilty that I may have overreacted and cost them this money. Deep down, I think I did right, but now I'm not sure.
