She thought it was all a big joke ... apparently her and her friends do stuff like that to each other. The difference is, they know to expect it and look for it. I didn't ... nor do I see such an action as in any way funny ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
I agree with your reaction there. 100% I'd be pissed. But it wouldn't have anything to do with valves.
I work at the same company as someone - not willingly and I'm counting the days/working to shorten the time until he gets fired - that was driving down the street in front of our offices and saw a group of our coworkers (not me, I watched from my car) standing outside talking. He decided it would be funny to swerve his car towards the group as though to hit them. Nobody was hurt but I was livid. When I confronted him over it of course it was all a joke and he though I was just being an a-hole.... no, he was for taking an action that could easily have resulted in a Bad Day for a lot of people, for his own momentary amusement.
That's what I would've been pissed about in your scenario, the attitude.
But here's what it comes down to for me, and forgive the analogy but it's what I know....
In aviation there are good reasons why airplane fuel tanks should be kept full. At least in theory an empty tank can have dew form inside. The water accumulates in the tank and if not removed can cause an engine failure in flight. Possible outcome: death for all aboard and perhaps people on the ground too. Bad in a way divers rarely need to worry about.
Touching aircraft that don't belong to you is fairly common. E.g. in a common hangar you might need to push another plane around to get yours out. You might move another plane if you saw stained rings under it too...that can indicate a fuel leak (the rings are dye left behind after the gasoline evaporates) so moving the plane a few feet to see if new rings form could possibly prevent a hangar fire. This isn't something anyone is cavalier about but it happens. If your plane and mine are parked in the same hangar, I assume you will end up touching mine and I'll end up dealing with yours somehow too.
In touching/moving a plane it is entirely possible that an attentive person would notice that the fuel tanks were nearly empty (many planes have a simple clear sight glass tube attached to the fuel tank so you can easily see level) but nobody I know would ever "correct" that without explicit instructions from the plane owner or a pilot preparing to fly that plane. Why? Many planes are not capable of flying both full cargo/passenger load and full fuel in all phases of flight. In some cases (e.g. Some acro planes) it may not be able to carry a normal pilot and a full tank of fuel and do some maneuvers. At full weight the plane may be limited to +4g, at some lower weight +6g, and if the pilot flies a 6g maneuver with extra weight his wings could collapse...again, death for all aboard and more on the ground is possible. It's like a rural gate...you leave it in whatever position you found it in even if you think you know better. All of that said, if someone did...it really wouldn't be a safety issue.
Likewise, if I call the right number and ask for someone to come out and fuel my plane (which I don't actually have by the way), they will happily push it out of the hangar, fuel it, and put it back in the hangar for me without my presence or real knowledge of what they did. They could be incompetent and totally mess up, or they could be great.
If an in-flight incident were to occur from any fueling (requested or not), it would be 100%, without apportionment or limitation, the pilot's fault. OK, maybe not if a fuel sample revealed a refinery issue or something, but normal conditions. It doesn't matter how the fuel got there, who touched the plane, what they did, why they shouldn't have, or anything else. The pilot is responsible for pre-flight checks and planning, responsible for the safety of that flight from before she is walking towards the plane until she is done tying down after the flight. It was her responsibility to recognize the unsafe condition and correct it, e.g. by burning off or draining off the extra fuel before engaging in high g maneuvers, or realizing that the fuel caps were not re-installed, or that the 100ll you requested was put in another plane and you got jet A instead.
I know it's a hard-ass position but I don't see how a diver is really any different. Yes, the potential consequences of failure are lower, but not to the diver. The fact that someone touches your gear, turns off valves, etc. is totally irrelevant to the safety of your dive. You are responsible for ensuring your gear works, and is in the correct configuration for your planned dive, before you need it. If that doesn't happen, you messed up. It isn't the DM or the captain or another diver that caused a problem, it's you for failing to do your checks . From the time you decide to enter the water, until you are back on the boat, it's up to you to exercise your judgment and utilize your training to make the dive safe. That means verifying that your air is turned on, your BC is attached to you somehow, your mask isn't full of leaches, your fins aren't made of papier mache, etc.
The only caveats I can think of at the moment are sabotage and changes made after you have started your dive (which means after you have done your pre-dive checks). In other words, things a reasonable person would consider malicious interference rather than, well, normal.
So going back to the original scenario of a husband and wife buddy team with many dives completed, the husband not wanting his wife to touch his gear before a dive doesn't make much sense to me. Why? Because he is still responsible for checking himself whether she touches anything or not, so it doesn't add any workload. On the other hand, assuming they more or less like each other, touching may have benefits. It is possible that a quick check by the wife...or a quick turn of the valve she is today conditioned to avoid touching, could have prevented or ended this incident.
Of course I don't know either person. Maybe she (the OP, hi OP
) is a practical joker who shouldn't be trusted around valves...I don't get that impression from the post but what do I know? Expecting sabotage from your wife just sounds paranoid to me. Paranoid in a bad way I mean. If your marriage is solid enough to go diving together anyway.
I understand that personal boundaries are personal and I can respect that on a human level, but those boundaries are more about psychology than safety.
