One more near-miss

[victor]

If you had done what everybody has advised you would have been on the boat with 500 psi left.
What would have happened to buddy no 2?
He went OOA on a deco dive somewhere below 18ft.

If you had not been there he would have had to rocket all the way to the surface, almost certainly he would have been bent, possibly drowned, possible embolism from holding his breath. :shakehead

That man owes you a lot, possibly his life.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I'll bite on this one, i'm going to get crushed however. I can really feel the TECH overtones on the replies to this thread, all I can say is did the Duane, on air, without a "survival pack", no reel, no jet pack, no "ACME save a diver kit", no rocket powered superduper SEAL fins, simply my recreational rig, carried a safety suasage, dove using an aluminium 80, got back to the boat with 700 psi, seen most of the wreck, hung at the ascent line like a flag, and got back on the boat. Simple. I often get from my friends that diving is soooo extreme, sometimes I think we make it too hard on ourselves as divers, You mean to tell me you have actually thought about mailing tanks to the keys in order to do a dive on a wreck? seems like nonsense to me, if I really felt as though I needed a bigger tank I just might not get off the boat. I have 200ish logged dives, well 234 to be exact and have been under 100 fsw lot of times and never once thought, man I should be breathing nitrox. and to feel putout by diving a wreck with other divers diving air.....let my crushing begin

I'm not going to crush you but...if there are "tech" overtones in this thread, I think that's a good thing. You know why? "Tech" or technical (maybe even technique) implies that little details like adequate breathing gas and decompression planning have been considered. I don't use any of the stuff in your list

"survival pack", no reel, no jet pack, no "ACME save a diver kit", no rocket powered superduper SEAL fins

other than a spool and a lift bag for marking my location on the surface should I need to. You might consider those items when diving in OW an the possibility of surfacing away from the boat exists.

It's been stated in this thread that incidents like this are fairly common on the wreck. It's because divers are commonly pushing the limits of their equipment and their skills when diving it. It sounds like a big fire drill to me.

I'd rather do the wreck with a little more "tech" oriented charter where no one was pushing any limits. It's nice warm water and only 100 ft or so of depth right? Do a nice long dive on the wreck, a nice liesurely deco in that nice warm florida water and hit the surface with enough gas left for another dive on the way in.

 

[kidsdream]

As most of the others have said, the real key is the gas management - for any dive, an certainly on the Duane w/current.

I think the comments about the steel tanks seem like a bit of a "crutch", not that you might have some weighting/balance issues;but that you did not take additional care knowing that you were having some difficulties.

Being a Keys part time keys resident I have quite a few dives on the Duane with Alu 80's as well as larger steel tanks (I normally use my Steel 95 for this dive w/a 13 Cu ft pony). I do vary my tank selection based on my intended profile, conditions and what my buddies are diving. The Duane can certainly be done on 80's if you dive the right profile.

Lastly, using a dive operation that presents you with the flexibiity and opportunity is also quite helpful. Divers City and Conch Republic both offer larger tanks (nitrox mixed to order). Additionally if the current is strong a better plan would have been to go down at one end of the ship, drift the wreck and come up at the other end. Even if the mooring is being utilized, you can do your SS at 15' and then drift away and up for a live boat pick-up.

Thanks again for sharing

 

[DandyDon]

I understand, your right, I wouldn't think it would be a good idea to mix an air diver with a nitrox diver. I only assumed(first problem) that you would be paired with a diver breathing the same gas. As for the boat full of air divers, again I see your point, I rarely have been on a boat with anyone diving nitrox. I always thought that boat captains always grouped divers accordingly, you know nitrox with nitrox, air with air. with different breathing gases that allows for completly different profiles with people back at the boat at diiferent times....I can see why you might be miffed....Sorry

Oh no apologies needed at all, but nice of ya'. Yeah, traveling & boarding alone like I often do, I get a lot of different boat-pick buds, and I've done some of the Keys wrecks with Air buds who ran out of Ndl before either of us were close to out of Gas. Sending the Air bud up alone, and me coming up alone later would certainly not be a good idea. As illustrated in the original post here, buds need to stay close and take care of each other.

So why don't you dive nitrox and enjoy 50% more bottom time limits at depth, anyway? The cert can be had for as little as $100/ 3 hours of class. Seems like a small deal to anyone who wants to do any deeper recreational diving, especially the square profiles like wrecks. Then you can be a nitrox snob like me. :lol2:

 

[Vayu]

have been under 100 fsw lot of times and never once thought, man I should be breathing nitrox

How about a helium based mixture? Nitrox 32 is at the sweet spot between 0' and 100'.

 

[Spratman]

Glad you brought this up, Mike. I was thinking the same thing.

While there is no requisite for what type of training you should have, there comes a point where some tech training is required. In the rec courses, 500psi was bottom line. If it indeed, ended up as a deco situation, you're a lucky guy!

Also, the use of reels, bags and such requires more practice and training, especially on fast current, deep wreck situations. Not to mention wreck penetration?! :11:

I did my NAUI Intro to Tech class last year. I had done ocean dives prior to that, but wasn't going to hit the deep, dark Atlantic without being prepared for worst case scenarios. Two things of primary focus were buddy diving and gas management, such as diving thirds.

Glad everything came out okay for ya. "Technical" classes teach and hone very useful skills, and the classes are great for everyone that wants to be a good diver.

I'm not going to crush you but...if there are "tech" overtones in this thread, I think that's a good thing. You know why? "Tech" or technical (maybe even technique) implies that little details like adequate breathing gas and decompression planning have been considered. I don't use any of the stuff in your list other than a spool and a lift bag for marking my location on the surface should I need to. You might consider those items when diving in OW an the possibility of surfacing away from the boat exists.

It's been stated in this thread that incidents like this are fairly common on the wreck. It's because divers are commonly pushing the limits of their equipment and their skills when diving it. It sounds like a big fire drill to me.

I'd rather do the wreck with a little more "tech" oriented charter where no one was pushing any limits. It's nice warm water and only 100 ft or so of depth right? Do a nice long dive on the wreck, a nice liesurely deco in that nice warm florida water and hit the surface with enough gas left for another dive on the way in.

 

[aHeavyD]

Glad you made it back ok, You might want to think about a pony bottle.
It's this exact same reason why I have one when I wreck dive. I love diving the Spiegel and Duane and the dive boats use 80's. I just know when I get close to 750 I want to be at the line. Those currents can kick butt on those two wrecks and since I was in the currents once and had a hard time getting to the line I invested in a 19 pony since. I have no problems traveling with it and the best part it's a total reduntant system.

 

[Vayu]

I don't think a pony bottle is a reasonable answer to what in essence is poor gas management and poor situational awareness between buddy groups. Part of diving is paying attention to what resources are available and using those resources to complete a dive safely. In this case it appears that several individuals either ditched the team outright or did not understand their resources in regards to gas requirements and decompression obligations. I am personally extremely pleased that the dive came out ok and give kudos to the poster for sharing this with everyone. However as I see it the problem with this dive was not lack of a pony or any other equipment. It was lack of proper planning and a marked absence of dedicated buddies. If the poster was not on this dive the other divers would have had serious trouble.

 

[cummings66]

Tough crowd. But I deserve it. I learned nothing from the experience you say? I regret that my post suggested anything of the sort. I've

Complacency, cockiness, laziness, whatever the motivation or driving force is behind the behavior, is what can turn a routine dive into an fatal incident and then people instead of insulting you, say nice things about you. Like you said, what matters is to be able to learn from the mistakes. Peace.

You misread what I meant, what your post is/was is a statement of what you did and the result. You didn't mention how you changed your diving or what you learned from the mistakes made that day, that's what I was getting at. In other words, you listed the problems A,B,C and not your solutions to them.

I'm sure you do things differently, and based on your posting I expected to see what you are doing different now vs then. I'm not being hard on you or anything like that, I'm just curious as to what exactly you have changed based on what happened that day.

For example I can say I did this and that which resulted in this happening, now I do X and this will no longer happen. In my case I'll wear my mask on the forehead or take it off, no more around the neck and I'll keep the wing inflated on a shore dive exit. That's kind of what I was expecting you to say but you never did.

In other words, you left us hanging with the following opening.

I'm posting as it's still fresh with no other goal than sharing the experience and hopefully someone reads this and learns. I know I did.

 

[aHeavyD]

Vayu,

yes you are correct about the issues