Saved my DM at 80ft. in Palau

[tedtim]

<<snipped>>
Then it happens...KABOOM.
I instantly am startled...see the DM's tank shooting air out. The diver above him ascends about 20 feet from the impact of the air hitting him.
<<snipped>>
I take ahold of his jacket and he grabs mine. Takes a couple of deep breathes and I'm waiting for him to gather his composure. He gives me the "OK" and then signals me to "shut off his tank valve" which I do. We make a controlled ascent...realllllly slow and surface.
<<snipped>>
Hope all of you gain something positive from this

I had a similar experience, except it was my O ring that let go. We were in about 30 feet on a wreck. This dive involves a surface swim to a marker float, descent in about 10 - 15 feet, follow the line to the wreck for 5 minutes or so. We were on the wreck for about 5 minutes when I heard a loud hissing. At first I thought that it was a boat way in the distance, but soon learned otherwise. I got my buddies attention. He was quick to offer me his octo. He then shut the tank down. We grabbed each other's BCD and paused for a few seconds. After the OK signs were exchanged it was a situation of "now what?" We made the decison not to ascend, but to return to the float and then ascend. This decision was made given due consideration to the length of time and amount of air available. The option of the long surface swim was available, but we would have been fighting the river current at the surface and ended up a long way from the entry point.

Stop - Breath - THINK - act. (many parallels to the Aviate - Navigate - Communicate model we used during my flying career) This worked extremely well for us.

I have received some criticism for not surfacing as per the procedures outlined in the diving manual. We sometimes forget that blind adherence to procedures can lead to other hazardous situations.

Well done mars2u

 

[Shasta_man]

You saved Terry! Thanks! He's a great guy.

During my last trip to Palau, I encountered another instance of a "close call". See this post for my report from the first trip: http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=28885

I went back to Palau and dove on the BIG Blue again. Had some of the same crew from the first trip a year earlier and was looking forward to diving without the typhoon conditions that we encountered during the last trip.
NOTE: These are all seasoned divers

BLUE CORNER

It was a calm day in Palau and we were all going to dive the Blue Corner. There was a group of 12 of us and 2 DM's. One of the DM's I dove with was ther during my trip a year ago. He was a very experienced diver from Australia with over 5000 dives under his belt. He also was a technical diver as well and in very good shape.

First Sign
We took the diveboat from the Big Blue and were heading to the dive site. As we were slowing down one of the divers started frantically looking around the diveboat.
"!@#$, I guess I'm sitting this one out...I forgot my fins!!!". Luckily the DM had an extra pair of fins that the diver could use albeit they were pretty small for his feet. He looked pretty funny wearing them and we all of course gave him a little grief for forgetting his fins back at the Big Blue. He took it with a chuckle and we all continued to suit up.

Second Sign
We all got in the water and began to descend when all of a sudden I notice one of our divers has surfaced with their buddy. We're all at about 25ft. when I realize he's out and heading towards the dive boat. I signal to both the DM's that he's out...we wait for a few seconds, abort the dive and surface to see what's going on. Seems that when the diver did a back-roll, he must have dislodged his computer which was attached to his hose. He didn't even realize it until he tried to look at his console and it wasn't there. Again, Luck was on our side (or so we thought...keep reading) since we had another spare computer that he could use.

Third Sign
OK...we all get back into the water. Start our descent again and get to about 50 ft. I look up and see a diver go into panic mode. He bolts towards his wife grabs the octo and starts sucking on it like a "baby from his mothers teet". I could see his wide-eyes and I was about 30 ft. away. Seems that he ran out of air...well technically speaking. You see once we all surfaced earlier and got into the boat, he turned his air off and forgot to turn it back on.

Fourth sign
At this point I seriously thought to myself..."Maybe this is a bad idea".
We begin our descent and I'm at about 70 ft. The DM is at about 80ft. and about 20ft. away from me. Directly above him is another diver at about 70ft.
Then it happens...KABOOM.
I instantly am startled...see the DM's tank shooting air out. The diver above him ascends about 20 feet from the impact of the air hitting him. I immediately nose dive towards the DM kicking as fast as my split fins allow. As I'm going towards him I grab my AIR SOURCE, put it in my mouth and grab my primary in my right hand ready to share air. I get to the DM, holding my primary in front of him waiting for him to grab it. His tank is still shooting air out albeit at a slower pace now. He looks at me quizically and then shakes his finger "no" and gives me the "OK" signal. I'm still holding the reg in front of his face and thinking "Dude, you're really going to want this since you've just disintegrated your O-ring". Again I shake the reg at him and he gives me the "No" and "OK" signal. I'm not relenting. He checks his gauge...he's at 1000 psi. His eyes get big like saucers and grabs my reg.
I take ahold of his jacket and he grabs mine. Takes a couple of deep breathes and I'm waiting for him to gather his composure. He gives me the "OK" and then signals me to "shut off his tank valve" which I do. We make a controlled ascent...realllllly slow and surface.

Fifth sign- We're not done yet. :11:
The DM gets out and we get him a new tank.The O-ring was blown to bits...really wild. He tells me he's never experienced that underwater and told me he'd buy me a beer on the Big Blue when we got back. I chuckled and thanked my lucky stars I was dealing with a cool headed guy in that type of a situation.
MY golden rule is STOP-THINK-REACT. And we followed that to a tee.
Well, we get a new o-ring and get back in after a surface interval.
I notice the currents pretty strong and as we're approaching the site we all grab our hooks ready to hook into the dead coral. As I approach the site I grab some dead coral and am looking for a spot to hook into. The current is whipping us around. As I look up I see the back of a tank heading towards me. The diver can't obviously see me and basically he's wanting the right of way whether I like it or not...lol. I release and the current sweeps me up...and there's no way for me to kick back down.
I give the DM's the abort dive (for me) and give them the OK. They respond back and I see the entire group at a distance struggling for spots on the reef. I surface and have the dive boat pick me up. "Great"...I'm thinking..."so much for that dive, I bet they're having a blast". 5 minutes later everyone surfaces. Seems they couldn't handle the current being hooked in. One of the guys in the groups fingers were all bloody and scraped from the dead coral trying to claw his way across the reef.

Well we all got back safe and the DM and I got buzzed that night and swapped diving stories. I think we all got some great experience during that dive. Now that I look back I chuckle to myself at the look on his face when the DM checked his gauge and it read 1000 psi.

Hope all of you gain something positive from this

 

[mars2u]

You saved Terry! Thanks! He's a great guy.

Those involved will remain nameless
Terry is a GREAT guy...with a wicked sense of humor and a wicked temper as well (as told by his stories).

As soon as we surfaced the "I owe you a beer, mate" with his ossie accent was priceless.

He invited me to his place in the Phillipines to go diving...I might have to take him up on that one day.

 

[Scuba_Steve]

Wondering.....

1/ Did the Dm not hear the air escaping? Sounds like it was a lot.

2/ Since there was a communication lag, did ya give him the "bubbles" sign?

Other than that, good eyes, good call, good work.

 

[ShakaZulu]

Good job, that's why I dive DIN.........

 

[mars2u]

Wondering.....

1/ Did the Dm not hear the air escaping? Sounds like it was a lot.

2/ Since there was a communication lag, did ya give him the "bubbles" sign?

Other than that, good eyes, good call, good work.

Oh he heard the air escaping...the problem was he assumed that it was his console o-ring that burst since that's what he had encountered before.

 

[tc]

I had a similar experience, except it was my O ring that let go. We were in about 30 feet on a wreck. This dive involves a surface swim to a marker float, descent in about 10 - 15 feet, follow the line to the wreck for 5 minutes or so. We were on the wreck for about 5 minutes when I heard a loud hissing. At first I thought that it was a boat way in the distance, but soon learned otherwise. I got my buddies attention. He was quick to offer me his octo. He then shut the tank down. We grabbed each other's BCD and paused for a few seconds. After the OK signs were exchanged it was a situation of "now what?" We made the decison not to ascend, but to return to the float and then ascend. This decision was made given due consideration to the length of time and amount of air available. The option of the long surface swim was available, but we would have been fighting the river current at the surface and ended up a long way from the entry point.

Stop - Breath - THINK - act. (many parallels to the Aviate - Navigate - Communicate model we used during my flying career) This worked extremely well for us.

I have received some criticism for not surfacing as per the procedures outlined in the diving manual. We sometimes forget that blind adherence to procedures can lead to other hazardous situations.

Well done mars2u

I also had a similar experience- A couple of months ago at Catalina I had the LP hose on my primary reg blow. Heard a really loud bang and felt a major impact to the back of my head and shoulders. At first I thought someone had dropped an anchor or weight belt on me. I could hear a kind of fizzing sound from behind my head after the initial bang. Rolled over and looked up and could see lots of small bubbles heading up from my rig. Checked my SPG and saw that the tank pressure was not dropping rapidly (I carry a pony so OOA was not a problem). Pulled my rig off and found a 5" split in the hose near the first stage. After the outer cover blew the hose just fizzed- inner braid held together.

I also made a decision to not immediately surface and return to the boat under the kelp canopy rather than fighting through it on the surface. As long as the situation is under control why not use the most effective route to your exit.

The thing that struck me about both situations discussed in this thread is that the divers involved had the experience to take potentially life threatening situations and react calmly to deal with the problems. WELL DONE!

Tom

 

[DiveGolfSki]

Years ago, I had the same experience using doubles. They didn't have the modern manifolds back then (or did they?) so I had one of those three yoke setup. Three O rings spells three times the probability of failure. Sure enough my left tank O ring blew at 60 fsw but I simply went on my buddies octo, he shut down my valve(s) and I aborted the dive. The sound of all that air escaping is disconcerting though (sound like your next to a jet engine). I can't imagine how someone can think it's a console O ring but....

I'll never dive doubles without an isolator manifold again and am considering going DIN but can't stress how important it is to stay calm. In my case, I think I was more pissed that I had to abort the dive ...

 

[mnj1233]

I too had a first stage blow out but had a stage bottle to turn to. For the record this happened in 36 degree water in January. Ive had several mishaps under winter conditions. Cant stress enough to be prepared at all times.

 

[Scubaroo]

I had a yoke o-ring extrude last year - luckily was only at 15'. Did an ascent and got back on the boat. There's NO mistaking that noise underwater!

Apparently the view from the surface was fairly spectacular - quite a large geyser of bubbles with me popping up in the middle of it about 15 seconds later