near miss, lessons we all should not forget

[waterpirate]

Mods please do not move this.

I just returned from a dive trip where a brush with the reaper for another diver compelled me to post.

The lesson overall is that no one thing is the mistake, it is a snowball rolling downhill and it is a cascade of failures and events that cause fatalities.

The incident:

Older diver leading sedantary lifestyle, heart problems in the past. Used to be johnny bad a$$ when diving alot, not so much anymore.

1. physical conditioning

Conditions were rough on surface and we chose to make the dive int a 1/2 knot plus current.

2. New gear configuration

Diver was in a wetsuit with alliminum backplate and wing and no weight belt diving a steel 100. This whole setup was new to the diver, and IMHO suited for a no curent dive, but not the mid atlantic as the diver needed to "work" to get down, and did not know how to effectively dump that wing quickly on entry.

3. Frequency

Last dive was 2 weeks previous in great conditions further south and no current, before that it been over a year.

4. Task loaded

Diver went in with video cam not clipped off, could not bring himself to dith that rig +1,000.00 dollars I am sure.

Diver went into the current, got the tag line tangled around the cam and himself, struggled to clip off the cam, fought to dump air, flailed around to attempt to get to the down line from the tag line and nearly stroked out. Had it not been for the fast action of the crew he may not have lived to dive again. They hauled his a$$ back on the boat, striped his gear and administred first responder care. It is easy to see in hindsight how there were to many contributing factors to make that dive doable. So please to the community I ask: stay fit and conditioned, dive within your limits, ease into new gear not jump, and above all have the balls to tell someone that they may be in over their head. Dive safe, we only get to go around once.

Eric

 

[eelnoraa]

I will add that camera equipment is really not something a inexperience diver should take. If nothing else, it adds task load. They are usually not small, with arms sticking out. Even with clip off, thing will dangle and entangle. And since it costs lots of money, not likely any of them will ditch it.

 

[ScubaSteve1962]

. Used to be johnny bad a$$ when diving alot, not so much anymore.

I will add that camera equipment is really not something a inexperience diver should take. If nothing else, it adds task load. They are usually not small, with arms sticking out. Even with clip off, thing will dangle and entangle. And since it costs lots of money, not likely any of them will ditch it.

Would this be considered an inexperience diver, or a diver who just hadn't dove in a long time decided to buy some new gear, and forgot his training?? Had an easy dive and thought he was back where he left off??

 

[Scuba_Noob]

If you're going to add new equipment, difficult conditions, or new skills, add only one thing at a time until you become very comfortable with it to avoid task loading and emergencies. Don't do it all at once.

The diver had his basic dive skills/comfort (which he still needed to hone apparently), an expensive camera kit (equipment/skills), medium current, and a completely new equipment set. Lucky for him, the people around him were well-trained.

For me, I've always clipped my camera rig. I'll never have to make the decision between my rig and my life because I'll always make the choice of dropping the camera.

 

[Randy g]

Nice write up Eric and a good lesson to share with everyone. Folks seem to think the Mid Atl diving is like a nice Caribbean dive. When infact, this is no place to play around!! Rough conditions, bad vis and currents are here most of the time and unless you are ready to deal with them, it will hand you your ass in a tea kettle in about 2 seconds. Glad the ol bad ass lived to tell about it.

 

[waterpirate]

It's funny that now a full 3 days post event, I feel worse. I was first in the pool and last out, so I did not witness the event first hand. What I did witness was the ill put together rig, and a sullenness not common to the old bad a$$. I feel like I failed DM 101 by not stepping up to the plate and voiceing my concerns as a fellow diver, not the DM.
Eric

 

[mainedvr]

New gear adds so much to the dive as my wife and I are learning. We are by no means expert divers we have just over 50 dives, and recently changed our gear to bpw set ups. We are learning while we loved the streamline set up it is different in many ways. For instance dumping air from the wing for me was easy but my wife had her plate down lower than mine and because of this had lift here hose up higher than she needed to with her jacket bc. This is just one thing we found diving this new gear. We now have about 10 dives on the new gear and just did our first dive below 25' with it yesterday now that we feel more intune with it and I am glad we did wait.

Anyhow, I agree changing things slowly is the best route in my opinion and being use to the way each type of gear works is very important for a safe enjoyable dive.

Thanks for the post.

 

[cascas]

Would this be considered an inexperience diver, or a diver who just hadn't dove in a long time decided to buy some new gear, and forgot his training?? Had an easy dive and thought he was back where he left off??

Any diver diving new gear is in a way inexperienced until comfortable with the new gear.

 

[ScubaSteve1962]

Any diver diving new gear is in a way inexperienced until comfortable with the new gear.

Isn't part of the training for an experienced diver to try out new gear in situations like a pool or a shallow end of a lake ocean or quarry, to get properly weight among other things.

 

[maniago]

Drawing a parallel from another hobby of mine, perhaps you'all have seen this on the news recently

Airplane Crash In-Cockpit Footage: Stinson 108-3 - YouTube

Its a similar, often repeated issue. Old in the tooth person, disregarding his training (in this case, the fundamentals of lift) and putting a bunch of people in danger. This guy had many many 1000s of hours and years and years of flight experience. But failed at a novice level. Now, I'm not disrespecting old people, I am one. But the lesson is the same - you CAN NOT let your ego get the best of you. If you always consider yourself a student of the hobby (any hobby I'll wager), then you are more likely to maintain your training rituals and much less likely to make mistakes. Thanks for letting a noobe add and digress.

On a better note, OW certification dives in 9 days! Wahoo! I'm a kid again!