Trapped air

[needforspeed751]

so I was diving the Charlie brown off statia last year and was ascending from about 80 feet. As I ascended I made sure to gradually empty air from my bc so it didn't expand and cause a runaway ascent. The water was pretty rough that day however so we all decided to hang on the anchor line during our safety stop. I was wearing only a rash guard under my bc since there was no need for a wet suit. I went to make a quick adjustment in my bc and suddenly heard the alarm on my dc going off. I looked up only to see that I had suddenly shot very close to the surface. I felt a quick grip of fear but identified the problem as a buildup of air under my rash guard which I quickly released by pulling the collar away from my neck and I was able to descend. Once I reached a safe depth I grabbed the anchor line once again and realized that the source of the problem was that the bubbles of the divers below me had gotten caught in the rash guard. While I was sightly ashamed of my fearful reaction to the incident instead of keeping completely relaxed I am glad that I was able to quickly find the problem and solve it. Had this occurrd at a greater depth the result could have been considerably worse than minor embarassment.

 

[fisheater]

Who wudda thunk?

Thanks for sharing.

 

[Ann Marie]

Thanks for sharing. Glad to hear that you are fine.

Don't worry about the few moments of fear, you overcame it and handled the problem. That takes courage.

How did you like Statia? Did you find a blue bead?

Welcome to SB, by the way.

 

[needforspeed751]

Thanks! statia was amazing, but unfortunately I was only there for a day or two. The trip I was on (broadreach? You might have heard of the organization.) only spent a few days there before moving on to Saba. Didn't really look for any blue beads at the time because I wasn't really familiar with that piece of history. Guess I have an excuse to go back

 

[TSandM]

Actually, this was a very good experience to post, and thank you! It came as a big surprise to me to learn that a diver directly below me would make me positive -- You don't need a rash guard to trap bubbles. They can be trapped elsewhere in your gear as well. New divers need to know that they have to watch their buoyancy if there is something directly beneath them.

 

[doctormike]

Yup, and a very good thing to keep in mind, air can come from strange places! I had something similar happen to me with a rental BC in the kelp forest off Catalina island...

The inflator valve must have been malfunctioning enough so that a steady stream of air was leaking into the BC. I remember at depth feeling that my buoyancy wasn't quite right, but I just dumped air every once in a while. Each time I would say "Didn't I just empty this thing a few minutes ago?" but didn't make the diagnosis until I started to ascend.

Had a new dry suit and was dealing with those issues, when I started to ascend uncontrolled... fortunately, I was able to grab some kelp to slow my ascent until I was able to dump air again... at that point, I realized the problem and just kept the dump valve open until I surfaced.

Mike

 

[do it easy]

Glad you survived!

In addition to getting trapped in your rash guard and other gear, I think the bubbles create an upwelling current that will also cause to you to ascend.

 

[Walter]

As I ascended I made sure to gradually empty air from my bc so it didn't expand and cause a runaway ascent. The water was pretty rough that day however so we all decided to hang on the anchor line during our safety stop. I was wearing only a rash guard under my bc since there was no need for a wet suit.

Next lesson - if you are not wearing a wetsuit and you are weighted properly, there's no need to put air in your BC.

 

[scubadiver888]

I wouldn't have thought bubbles from below could have made this big an impact but thanks to your post I realize it could. I've been at depth and had someone swim under me. I end up getting hit by all their bubbles and find occasionally I either have to get out of there or drop a little air in my BCD; just exhaling no longer lets me descend and on inhales I actually start to rise.

I usually avoid the line when coming up. If there is a current and I have to hold the line the bubbles from the diver below don't rise straight up and therefore have never affected me.

 

[scubadiver888]

Next lesson - if you are not wearing a wetsuit and you are weighted properly, there's no need to put air in your BC.

With over 2000 dives that is easy for you to say but a lot harder for us newbies.