dumpsterDiver
Banned
- Messages
- 9,003
- Reaction score
- 4,660
- # of dives
- 2500 - 4999
This is the raw video which I shot some time ago. The objective of the dive was for my teenage son and a women (and I) to dive to a depth of about 80 feet in a mild current and drift into a shipwreck. This is a typical dive for the local divers where the boat stays around the area and follows a surface marker float towed by a diver (me) – so no anchor line to go up or down.
The lady had not dived for the last few months I think and was somewhat nervous about the dive and her overall experience was pretty thin; I don’t remember if I had ever seen her dive. We were planning to stay together in a tight buddy team, but things quickly fell apart. The dive ended with the lady aborting the dive and then losing control of her buoyancy and making a rapid ascent from around 20 ft – with the BC full and her kicking.
Before the dive I asked her if she had any issues with maybe ducking inside a wreck a little or had trouble equalizing on descent . She quickly responded that she was fine with that and can typically descend quickly with no issues. I made sure to tell her we were going to stick together in a tight team.
In reviewing the video, I was somewhat disappointed that I did not handle the situation better. I was not mentally prepared for the rapid dash for the surface at the end of the dive and I should have done more to prevent it.
I thought the video might be interesting for others to review and envision how they would have done things different or better (than I did). People may want to critique the lady who aborted the dive, but that is not my intent. Her problems are understandable and obvious.. mine are a little more “interesting”. I think the video might be useful in helping others have a better idea about how to help another diver.
A little more description of the dive.. upon entry and within about 12 seconds, my son tugs on the floatline and points to his ears – so he signaled that he was bailing on the dive due to equalization issues. I don’t think I have ever seen him do this before and I probably should have signaled back that I understood his problem. Then to follow up, I never looked around for him and instead kept my eyes glued on the third buddy only. I was not even sure if he was only momentarily delayed on the surface (and was coming down with us) or had aborted the dive. I should have looked around more and confirmed his status.
In my defense, he is a good diver and has redundancy, so I am not too worried about him, but I should have paid more attention to him. It turned out that he bailed on the dive immediately and got on the boat (as he should have).
On the feet first descent, it was pretty obvious the diver was not doing perfectly and when I gave a hand signal for her to flip over and swim down (instead of falling butt first) she seemed to do it.
She was having a terrible time with her mask filling with water. I could see the issue clearly, but the video does not show it that well. She was using a technique of pushing in on the top skirt of the mask and blowing. I don’t teach that method and her failure to look up hindered her ability to clear water effectively.
We got close to the bottom and she eventually got the water out of the mask and I assumed she was good to go - Even though she was still kicking in a vertical position. I turned my back on her and swam down and away about 12 feet to hook the float off, since the current was pulling on it.. I probably should not have done that either.
When I turned back around she was nervous and she surprised me with a signal to abort/go up. I added air to her BC since she was obviously too heavy and not doing anything about it. I then ignored her thumbs up signal and tried for a few moments to calm her by getting closer and touching her hand.. but she quickly gave me another signal to go up (hard to see in my exhalation bubbles) , so I responded with a big thumbs up and started kicking up and I directed all my attention to her and did not worry about recovering the float and reel.
Maybe I should not have even tried to calm her down at all, after she gave the first abort signal?
So we start the ascent, she seems calm but is still negative, She is a strong runner, so I am not worried about the slightly vigorous kicking for the ascent. After about 15-20 ft of the ascent, I look over and see the string from my reel to the float which is pulled tight and almost vertical – so I figure that is a good crutch to help us with the ascent, so I swim over to it and she follows my lead– plus it makes it less likely to get run over by a boat if we ascend under a float.
As we are coming up the line, she seems OK to me. When we reach a depth of maybe 30 feet, you can see the BC (BP/W) is full and she is holding the yellow string tightly and using it to pull herself down as we ascend (around 4:20). Looking at the video now, it is pretty clear what is happening, but I did not respond appropriately. I failed to take more control and grab her inflator and dump air.
I’m not sure exactly why, maybe I expected her to dump air - she was over weighted with a 5 mm suit and a back plate and steel tank. At around (5:08) I dump air from my BC and I think I assumed she would follow suit, but it was too late. I must have been nervous because you can hear that I initially pressed the inflate button, when I meant to dump air
I also did not expect her to pass me on the line- she seemed to be doing the ascent OK and I did not want to be overbearing. I was kinda regulating the ascent by blocking her (on the ascent line) and she went around me quickly and then she just started moving. She stopped grabbing the line and allowed her hand to slide up the line and then, she looked to the surface, decided that is where she wanted to be and let go of the line and KICKED for the surface. It was not some panicked run for the surface, but on the other hand, it was not a good decision to shoot for the surface on the most critical portion of the ascent. I should have been better prepared for this to happen, I think.
On the boat she commented: “ I never panicked before”.
In my defense, once she got away from me- I was hesitant to chase her because I had just done a deco dive about 40 minutes earlier.
When she reached the surface she immediately took off her mask and you can see me ascending faster than the air bubbles to get close to her on the surface. She was reasonably calm and followed my directions to put the regulator in her mouth. I didn’t tell her to put the mask on because I did not want to stress her in any manner. The boat came quickly.. and the whole situation was pretty much a non-event. I was not even thinking about the fact that I had the head mount camera running when this happened, but it recorded the situation pretty well.
I can’t imagine how I would feel if she had held her breath on that last bit of the ascent and was injured – or worse. I guess I should have really assumed the worst and been “in her face” for the whole ascent?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=1&v=ETTDCsT1kWo
[video=youtube_share;ETTDCsT1kWo]http://youtu.be/ETTDCsT1kWo[/video]
The lady had not dived for the last few months I think and was somewhat nervous about the dive and her overall experience was pretty thin; I don’t remember if I had ever seen her dive. We were planning to stay together in a tight buddy team, but things quickly fell apart. The dive ended with the lady aborting the dive and then losing control of her buoyancy and making a rapid ascent from around 20 ft – with the BC full and her kicking.
Before the dive I asked her if she had any issues with maybe ducking inside a wreck a little or had trouble equalizing on descent . She quickly responded that she was fine with that and can typically descend quickly with no issues. I made sure to tell her we were going to stick together in a tight team.
In reviewing the video, I was somewhat disappointed that I did not handle the situation better. I was not mentally prepared for the rapid dash for the surface at the end of the dive and I should have done more to prevent it.
I thought the video might be interesting for others to review and envision how they would have done things different or better (than I did). People may want to critique the lady who aborted the dive, but that is not my intent. Her problems are understandable and obvious.. mine are a little more “interesting”. I think the video might be useful in helping others have a better idea about how to help another diver.
A little more description of the dive.. upon entry and within about 12 seconds, my son tugs on the floatline and points to his ears – so he signaled that he was bailing on the dive due to equalization issues. I don’t think I have ever seen him do this before and I probably should have signaled back that I understood his problem. Then to follow up, I never looked around for him and instead kept my eyes glued on the third buddy only. I was not even sure if he was only momentarily delayed on the surface (and was coming down with us) or had aborted the dive. I should have looked around more and confirmed his status.
In my defense, he is a good diver and has redundancy, so I am not too worried about him, but I should have paid more attention to him. It turned out that he bailed on the dive immediately and got on the boat (as he should have).
On the feet first descent, it was pretty obvious the diver was not doing perfectly and when I gave a hand signal for her to flip over and swim down (instead of falling butt first) she seemed to do it.
She was having a terrible time with her mask filling with water. I could see the issue clearly, but the video does not show it that well. She was using a technique of pushing in on the top skirt of the mask and blowing. I don’t teach that method and her failure to look up hindered her ability to clear water effectively.
We got close to the bottom and she eventually got the water out of the mask and I assumed she was good to go - Even though she was still kicking in a vertical position. I turned my back on her and swam down and away about 12 feet to hook the float off, since the current was pulling on it.. I probably should not have done that either.
When I turned back around she was nervous and she surprised me with a signal to abort/go up. I added air to her BC since she was obviously too heavy and not doing anything about it. I then ignored her thumbs up signal and tried for a few moments to calm her by getting closer and touching her hand.. but she quickly gave me another signal to go up (hard to see in my exhalation bubbles) , so I responded with a big thumbs up and started kicking up and I directed all my attention to her and did not worry about recovering the float and reel.
Maybe I should not have even tried to calm her down at all, after she gave the first abort signal?
So we start the ascent, she seems calm but is still negative, She is a strong runner, so I am not worried about the slightly vigorous kicking for the ascent. After about 15-20 ft of the ascent, I look over and see the string from my reel to the float which is pulled tight and almost vertical – so I figure that is a good crutch to help us with the ascent, so I swim over to it and she follows my lead– plus it makes it less likely to get run over by a boat if we ascend under a float.
As we are coming up the line, she seems OK to me. When we reach a depth of maybe 30 feet, you can see the BC (BP/W) is full and she is holding the yellow string tightly and using it to pull herself down as we ascend (around 4:20). Looking at the video now, it is pretty clear what is happening, but I did not respond appropriately. I failed to take more control and grab her inflator and dump air.
I’m not sure exactly why, maybe I expected her to dump air - she was over weighted with a 5 mm suit and a back plate and steel tank. At around (5:08) I dump air from my BC and I think I assumed she would follow suit, but it was too late. I must have been nervous because you can hear that I initially pressed the inflate button, when I meant to dump air
I also did not expect her to pass me on the line- she seemed to be doing the ascent OK and I did not want to be overbearing. I was kinda regulating the ascent by blocking her (on the ascent line) and she went around me quickly and then she just started moving. She stopped grabbing the line and allowed her hand to slide up the line and then, she looked to the surface, decided that is where she wanted to be and let go of the line and KICKED for the surface. It was not some panicked run for the surface, but on the other hand, it was not a good decision to shoot for the surface on the most critical portion of the ascent. I should have been better prepared for this to happen, I think.
On the boat she commented: “ I never panicked before”.
In my defense, once she got away from me- I was hesitant to chase her because I had just done a deco dive about 40 minutes earlier.
When she reached the surface she immediately took off her mask and you can see me ascending faster than the air bubbles to get close to her on the surface. She was reasonably calm and followed my directions to put the regulator in her mouth. I didn’t tell her to put the mask on because I did not want to stress her in any manner. The boat came quickly.. and the whole situation was pretty much a non-event. I was not even thinking about the fact that I had the head mount camera running when this happened, but it recorded the situation pretty well.
I can’t imagine how I would feel if she had held her breath on that last bit of the ascent and was injured – or worse. I guess I should have really assumed the worst and been “in her face” for the whole ascent?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=1&v=ETTDCsT1kWo
[video=youtube_share;ETTDCsT1kWo]http://youtu.be/ETTDCsT1kWo[/video]
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