PADI Rescue Diver class near miss (and lessons learned)

[wreckchick]

Buddy breathing is an optional skill for PADI OW and listed as choice 4 of 5 options in the "what to do if low on air/out of air" in the PADI OW course materials.

I could believe that the instructor had them do this skill not so much to practice as to test task-loading and basic awareness in the students much like the equipment exchange in divemaster isn't really a useful water skill, it's a mental skill. If that's the case then there probably should have been supervision.

R

 

[Petedives]

Pete, I was very critical of you earlier in this thread and I'm hesitant to hammer you again but I need you to really understand something before you go on to DM or whatever... I didn't insinuate anything about your OW skills, you told me and everyone else reading this thread that losing your reg caused a panic situation for you. That is clear evidence that you DON'T have a handle on your OW skills. Being in 80F water won't solve basic issues like that.

R

I think you're taking your bench analysis a little too far.

1) I don't have a problem with losing my reg, I had a problem with my buddy
ripping his out of my mouth for no apparent reason.

2) I did plenty of reg knocked out of my mouth drills, including simulated
panicked diver rescues with reg/mask recoveries. What freaked me
out was my buddy forcibly pulling his reg away when I was at bottom
lung (no air). The fact is, is that I recovered from my momentary
panic in far less than a 'one-onethousand', and dealt with my issue.
After I had my air source firmly back in my mouth, I went back down
with the group, and completed the rest of the drills for that dive. When
I got back on board the boat, right after I got out of my BC, we had a
surface rescue drill about 100' from the boat of one of the instructors,
and had the instructor's heart started with our trainer AED in 3:59. We
all functioned appropriately as a team, and smoothly.


3) A momentary sense of 'panic' when a situation occurs is quite a normal
reaction for most people. You can claim YOU don't freak out a tad when
YOU'RE in a sticky situation all you want, but I'll believe it when I see it.

4) That quite informative book I just read described a couple of situations
when *highly* trained, experienced, and undoubtedly competant, even
by YOUR estimation divers panicked and either got the bends and ended
up crippled, or died.

5) In my OW class, buddy breathing was not taught, because it's now optional,
some instructors choose to not teach it. That's not because there's anything
particularly wrong with the protocol, but because of the human factor, people
dying because a buddy won't give it back. In that case, who's panicking, the
OOA buddy, or the air donor who freaks and lets his buddy die?

6) I could sit there and do somersaults underwater, lose a weight out of my
shoulderblade BC pockets, calmly retrieve the weight, take off my BC,
put it back in, and get back into my gear. I'm *not* the panicky type of
diver. What would you do in that case? 'Rescue' me because you saw
me 'rejecting gear'? That almost happened to me during the same class,
where my instructor was far more freaked out than I was. Thanks, but
'NO THANKS'.

Peter

 

[wreckchick]

We start rising, with him holding a death grip on the left side of my BC
as per BB protocol. Both of our ascent alarms start going off. Instead
of calmly dumping air out of one of our BC's, since we were rising and
the situation was only getting worse, he decided to rip the regulator out
of my mouth (at bottom lung), flip head over heels, and kick for the bottom.

Needless to say, I was a little unprepared. It was more than a tiny bit
nerve racking to try and keep enough presence of mind to find my regulator,
purge it, and gasp a beautiful deep breath off my own air source, clamping
my jaw shut too keep my lungs from filling up with water.

This was the last of 5 days of Rescue Diver training. After we've been
taught and drilled on 50 different ways to deal with a non-personal diver
emergency. It wasn't training that failed, it was attitude.

Just to recap, you had a death grip on each other and even in the presence of ascent alarms you did nothing to either your own or your buddy's bcd to vent any air.

You had a minor freak-out because you didn't have a reg in your mouth.

The attitude that failed was that you thought the situation was under control when clearly it wasn't.

1) I don't have a problem with losing my reg, I had a problem with my buddy
ripping his out of my mouth for no apparent reason.

If you were holding onto him with the "death grip" there's no way this could have happened.

2) I did plenty of reg knocked out of my mouth drills, including simulated
panicked diver rescues with reg/mask recoveries. What freaked me
out was my buddy forcibly pulling his reg away when I was at bottom
lung (no air). The fact is, is that I recovered from my momentary
panic in far less than a 'one-onethousand', and dealt with my issue.
After I had my air source firmly back in my mouth, I went back down
with the group, and completed the rest of the drills for that dive.

So, you were fine doing "drills" but when the actual SHTF you were kinda freaked.

3) A momentary sense of 'panic' when a situation occurs is quite a normal
reaction for most people. You can claim YOU don't freak out a tad when
YOU'RE in a sticky situation all you want, but I'll believe it when I see it.

It really depends on the definition of 'sticky situation'. What you described wouldn't phase me a bit, I don't consider it an emergency. I'm not saying I've never had a heartrate increase underwater, don't get me wrong. This just wouldn't do it.

4) That quite informative book I just read described a couple of situations
when *highly* trained, experienced, and undoubtedly competant, even
by YOUR estimation divers panicked and either got the bends and ended
up crippled, or died.

Panic is something that we all have to train to prevent and be aware that the possibility can exist for even the most experienced diver. The key is to manage the stress, prevent a full-blown freak out and continue to think through the situation. I'm not immune and neither are you. I just try to keep a head on and when the cascade starts, pull up and pull out before little things become big things.

5) In my OW class, buddy breathing was not taught, because it's now optional,
some instructors choose to not teach it. That's not because there's anything
particularly wrong with the protocol, but because of the human factor, people
dying because a buddy won't give it back. In that case, who's panicking, the
OOA buddy, or the air donor who freaks and lets his buddy die?

I teach it not as a rescue technique but as a confidence building tool. IRL if anyone ever gets to buddy breathing on the "what to do?" scale, so much has already gone wrong that the parties involved should take up crochet.

6) I could sit there and do somersaults underwater, lose a weight out of my
shoulderblade BC pockets, calmly retrieve the weight, take off my BC,
put it back in, and get back into my gear. I'm *not* the panicky type of
diver. What would you do in that case? 'Rescue' me because you saw
me 'rejecting gear'? That almost happened to me during the same class,
where my instructor was far more freaked out than I was. Thanks, but
'NO THANKS'.

I'd watch to see what your point was in taking off your gear. I think a better short term solution is to pick up the weight and stuff it in a pocket until you're on the surface and replace it in the proper pocket then. The only time I've ever seen anyone degear underwater for a good reason is to replace a tank that's slipped. In that case the motive is obvious.

R

 

[NIK CANCUN]

take a breath guys!!!!!!

 

[Petedives]

Yeah, I don't have anything further to add to Racheal's self-important
judgement of my OW skills or level of panic. Her training is obviously
far superior to anything I've received.

*rolleyes*

Peter

 

[ChrisA]

Was your rescue class through PADI? I recently completed my RD course through PADI and though I felt like the instructor did a good job of pushing the students, we certainly weren't put through the drills you described?

Is this question directed at me? If so... No when I did the PADI rescue class it was very structured and the rescue skils and scenarios were known in advance. The angency in this case was Los Angeles County. They did other things that PADI didn'tcover too like free dive rescue skills where you retreive a scuba diver from the bottom by free diving down and removing his weights (In traing we would only put our hand on the weights and tap the release to simulate least we kill our rescue dummy with an uncontrolled ascent. There were other differences to like in how to get a victm through larger surf that would break over your head. But basically the same as PADI only the class is from July through October and so has time to cover more material

I see you are in LA so PM for details if you want.

 

[TheRedHead]

I teach it not as a rescue technique but as a confidence building tool. IRL if anyone ever gets to buddy breathing on the "what to do?" scale, so much has already gone wrong that the parties involved should take up crochet.

I have to agree with this. When I learned buddy breathing, the procedure was that the donor held the reg hose and the recipient had his/her hand on the donor's arm. There was no death grip on each other.

 

[ChrisA]

All of this sounds suspiciously like the advanced diver program through LA County- they do a lot of drills like this that make people think and I for one am a glad alumni of that program- not a certification - a program - to make divers more comfortable with all these types of incidents-

Yes and I'd have to ay that it worked. I've done PADI through rescue have about 250 dives in and dive mostly more than one day a week. But there were a few OW brand new divers in the program. Quite a few droped out but of those remainnig they have improved their skils dramatically. A few that have been afraid of the beach and just done boat dives are now able to enter and exist on a 7 foot surf day and are comfortable in zero-viz blackout conditions. I've done a few things I've not done before and improved my rescue skils and greatly improved earch and reoverry skils. We spend a day with the Long Beach fire department and lifegard SCUBA team and they gave some good insight, the type that only people who do this every day for a living can. Little things like doing a head first decent so your eyes are ajead of your fins and you don't slit out the bottom

 

[plot]

I've never heard of the "death grip".. only holding onto the other person's BC while sharing air for the sole purpose of calming them down... so they'd know someone is there and has them during the ascent.

I still don't get why they lost control ascending... with a beeping computer, why did noone dump air?

 

[NIK CANCUN]

Yeah, I don't have anything further to add to Racheal's self-important
judgement of my OW skills or level of panic. Her training is obviously
far superior to anything I've received.

*rolleyes*

Peter

from what I have been reading, you should both be ashamed! :shakehead

1,
peter, you have next to no experience and yet you are talking to an instructor, someone who has been trained in methods of teaching and has proven to everybody just by her cert level, that she holds a certain amount of experience and diving wisdom! TO BE RESPECTED!!!!! she will have proven in the exam room and in the water that she does know what she is talking about. You should be tapping into these valuable knowledge sources that are available to you as someone who is planning on going pro! NOT ARGUING WITH THEM!!!!!!! you are entitled to your oppinion mate, but be aware of how daft you come accross when publicly butting heads with people who know better than you! her level of training could well be superior to any you have recieved as it is down to us instructors to be as thorough as possible but we are only policed be people like you! lets hope you remember all of this when you teach! good luck!

2,
as for you Racheal, you should know better than to come on scuba board and rise to this sort of bait! you know as well as I that you will come across these types of people in the industry from time to time but we as instructors should be harnessing their enthusiasm and encouraging them! not easy I know but I tend to try and help, as you should be, and If I cant ......... well walk away, you can do that in a forum with no shame! you dont need to proove anything here and you dont need to get into that kind of silly row with an up start!!!!!!!!
now both of you go and play nice!!!!!!!!!!!