Scary divers

[Carribeandiver]

I was in Cozumel diving off a boat with a group of stangers. there was two groups of 9 of us each. My group had a lady in it that had 8 previous dives as her sole experience.
I quickly learned to stay as far as possible from her as she swam with her arms and hit me at least 5 times in the first 5 minutes. When we finished that dive, she was on the boat with her head slightly bleeding. I discovered that she hit her head while going through a swim through and the dive master had to get her up because she knocked herself unconscious. Buoyancy was a foriegn term to her. I should have stayed close to her because she made even me look good, but that is another story.
Anyway, on the next dive, she flailed around waving her arms and shooting up like a cork then down like a brick as she continuous added air and dumped air from her BC.
The dive had a photographer that shot a video for us for around $30 or so. We were to pick it up at the dock later that afternoon. As I sat waiting for the video guy, I learned that "Mary" (not her real name) was in the chamber because she suffered from DCS. From what I was told, she had to stay around another 5 days for more treatments before she could head home.
Made me do a great deal of thinking. If you are not skilled enough for the dive, dont do it.

 

[dcdev]

I just got back from (unnamed Caribbean island), where my last "dive" was actually snorkeling above some friends. I was flying out the next day so my vacation was over, but wanted to go along, especially because one friend's mom was doing the Discover Diving course (she's 70!).
The boat headed out to the dive, but on the way we picked up "Jack" and "Jill" at another hotel. They'd told the dive shop that they had plenty of experience, and showed their C-cards and really wanted to dive right away. They were told that this was really a Discover dive, so the DM's main focus was on the student, and that they should probably wait until the next day. Nope, they were fine with being self-sufficient and wanted to get in.
So I'm floating above it all, marveling at how good my friend's mom is doing - except for the fact she won't let go of the DM's hand you'd think she'd done a bit of diving. Then I look over a Jack and Jill and it looks like they're wrestling! What the? Then she pushes him away and swims on. Geeze I thought, great time to have a lover's quarrel. Next time I look and she's obviously having major buoyancy problems and is swimming with her arms trying to keep down. It looks like Jack lets some air out of her BC. A minute later it's the same thing, but now the DM is involved. He resolves the situation by giving her more weight (even though they'd insisted they knew the weight they needed) and the dive ends with no more drama.
Back on the boat it turns out that her BC was 2 sizes too big (I almost burst out laughing when Jack claimed she'd lost a bunch of weight since she got it). Our guess was he talked her into diving and she'd just got her OW and he gave her all his old gear so he could get new stuff. I guess their relationship was built on trust.

 

[james croft]

That is why more divers are diving solo.

 

[RoyN]

Never had a scary diver before, but had some divers that spooked the hell out of my before

 

[WesTexDiver]

This is clearly 3 solo divers, not a buddy system of 3. I would prefer to cut my losses and go alone. Seriously whats the chances of them saving you in any situation, more likely that they would make any serious situation worse. If I don't grab one of my regular dive buddies I just solo.

 

[Imagesetter]

Did a local night dive recently with two buddies. This is an open call dive Wednesday nights at Veteran's Park in Redondo Beach.

This guy was talking to one of two girl dive buddies I was diving with that night and he asks if he can join our buddy group. She made some motion and pointed towards me telling him to talk to me.

I assumed she knew him and I became instantly elected to lead the dive. (no problem there)

I question his experience, newly certified, and adjusted the dive plan accordingly. OW certified but he said he has done a few night dives.

After he heads off to gear up, I speak with the girl to find out her take on his dive experience.

She did not know him and motioned to me to be the bad guy and say no to joining.

I made him my official buddy and told the two girls if he hinders the dive, we will split off so they can enjoy the full dive.

5 minutes into the dive, we crossed paths with another group. The diver starts following the other group heading down into the canyon. (deep) I chase him down and brought him back.

Buoyancy control? You guessed it. Control was lacking so I signaled splitting off with the girls and started heading back to spend the rest of the dive in the shallows. (20'30') Yo yo pattern continued and I was very happy to call the dive after he shoots to the surface.

Afterwards, we came up with a single to let me know they did not want certain divers to join.

Arm crossed in an X pattern while furiously shaking their head NO!

(since I can pick up on subtle signals )

 

[gomi_otaku]

Gomi, come out and dive with me and my friends one of these days. We may be annoying in many ways, but we dive to stay found, as my dear friend Claudette would put it.

Hmm...I think I started reading your dive experiences when I first started getting certified. I'm at less than 25 dives in about a year, from reading your posts it sounds like you're doing 5 a day now? Maybe we'll be able to meet up, I only have weekends free. I'm looking for something to do Sunday since my club doesn't have a non-advanced dive planned.
gomi_

 

[TSandM]

I'm going to be in Nanaimo with a bunch of friends this weekend, but stay in touch. I'm not doing 5 dives a day (yet) but I'm in the water two or three times a week. And I don't take off on anybody

 

[dmdoss]

Seems that Buoyancy control is the main problem with new divers. My 15 yr. old son got his cert. this past summer, and within a few dives he had great control. But, me, and his unlce are divers. So was his grandfather, thou he past before he started diving. Just wonder if something had soaked thru to him.

 

[gomi_otaku]

This wasn't necessarily a problem with bouyancy control, though they were both doing their first dives in new deysuits and one had never worn a drysuit before. The problem was that they did no pre-dive check, didn't know what each other's air capacity was, didn't know any hand signals, and didn't know how to alert each other to their own remaining air, other than holding up their console for the other to read (not an easy thing to do) Keep in mind that this was a father/son team, and had just gotten certified together. It seems the father was probably just treating it as his "mandatory refresher" since he had been certified before, and the son just ignored everything because he (even his father told me before the dive) was headstrong and felt invincible. (gee, I wonder where he got it?).
Should I feel guilty about not having said anything before or after the dive? (I didn't really have a chance before, since either one or the other was underwater whenever I had the chance) Should I call the shop where they got certified and bought their new drysuits? (Underwater Sports in Olympia). Or should I just wait for a posting on Scubaboard about two fatalities in Cabo?
gomi_