What colors for purge buttons when donating from your mouth?

[MikeFerrara]

biscuit7 once bubbled...
First of all, this isn't about me, what happened to me, or the reactions be they proper or not by myself or anyone involved. I don't recall ever saying, "shot out of the water to my waist," so let's not get distracted.

I think what I've been trying to point out is that all the training in the world, the best buddy on the planet, and an absoutely perfect dive from your (the competent diver's) standpoint doesn't mean crap if you happen upon something unforeseen or someone swims up to you, up into you, crashes down on your head or otherwise makes contact that is having some sort of issue and needs air.

That individual is probably not privvy to your training methods and I'm guessing hasn't run OOA drills with you and perhaps not with anyone since certification. Now, given that set of circumstances, yellow="air for me" to someone that needs air. A yellow reg screams TAKE ME!! to that diver whether it be in your mouth or in your hand.

I don't know what OOA divers do when they approach a diver with air, I've never been one nor have I been approached by one. If they always grab the reg out of the mouth of the donating diver and they can always see clearly enough to accomplish this then I guess I'll just shut up and move on, but the reality is that at least once in my experience the yellow made a difference and I think it's something to consider.

That is all.

R

You hit on many points that concern me a great deal. Your statement from above about someone swiming up to you, into you or crashing down on you...sounds all to familiar to me. These are the kinds of things that I think realistic dive training should be able to do away with. I really think it needs to be fixed.

I had something similar hapen at Gilboa. I had a couple students out on a night dive. We left the instructors dock and followed the line past the air boat, cabin cruizer and to the bus. About the time we arived at the bus a whole mob of divers came raining down totally out of control right on top of us. My DM and I hearded my students off to the side to let the stampede pass. Suddenly a diver approached me giving all kinds of frantic hand signals I didn't at all understand. Eventually I recognized a thumbs up. I said "no". They frantically repeated the signal. I said "NO". I have no idea who this person was or why they wanted me to go up but I think they didn't know who they were with or where they were but for whatever reason they were in a big hurry to end the dive. They finally got the hint that I was a stranger and had no intention of going any place with them and waddled off. The whole bunch floundered and bounced off the bottom a bit then they regrouped and went up the way they came. I think it was a class and one of them maybe was an instructor. To be honest I didn't know if I needed to help some one or if I was being mugged and needed to defend myself.

Other than a long hose and maybe a black jack I can't think of any equipment that will help prepare you for this kind of thing.

 

[the sharkman]

I was seriously considering changing my setup. My wife and I bought new BC's with Seaquest AirSource alternates, but considered going back to regular regs/ octos. We were practicing OOA situations with the new gear, we both had brain farts and we both ended up sucking down water (as we watched each others eyes bulge). It was very difficult to not shoot to the surface, though we knew better. We had been practicing with our new equipment (even talked about it before dives) and one thing kind of lead to another, and to make a long story short, we both learned a valuable lesson. Be on the same page as your dive buddy, and practice. Now, 40 dives later, we are more comfortable with the new equipment, but know the value of being prepared. We also know that it is OK to grab each others primary if needed, because we will know what is going on. Though this doesn't follow the threads "color of regulator" topic, I do want to jump on the bandwagon and say no matter what you are using, talk about it, and practice it. I know I will on my next dive, come to think of it.

:guitar: