What is your worst dive?

[smellzlikefish]

My scientific diving instructor posed this questions to us our first day of class and the responses were very interesting, so I would like to put the question to you.

At the time I only had a couple of dozen dives under my belt, so I didn't have anything impressive. I'd say mine was one of my first dives with my girlfriend. She gets seasick really easily, and here on Oahu there is a dive called Lanai Lookout that has an exit that is notorious for escalating surf conditions. We checked the conditions and while the rest of the seas looked a little bumpy, the waves weren't coming from a direction that affected the exit so as a result, it looked cleaner and flatter than I usually see it. Most of the dive went as planned until we made it to the exit and hit a wall of whitewash. Since the viz dropped to less than a foot, I lost her almost immediately and started for the surface. While we were down, the tide had shifted, channeling the waves right into our exit path, creating a natural washing machine that ricocheted off the surrounding basalt ledges. To my dismay, she was still on he bottom and in danger of being thrashed against any number of large boulders that were in her way. I dropped down again to look for her and ended up almost on top of her, but a huge wave ripped us apart again. We finally met again at the surface and headed in and she almost gave up diving. I now know that dive site a little better.

 

[pittyyofool]

the one i did not go on

 

[TSandM]

I have written about this before. Still, the worst dive I've done was a training dive I did early in 2006. I'd taken Fundies, and was trying to get out and practice diligently, and my Fundies instructor was running Wednesday afternoon/evening dives for his students. I wanted to attend this one, but I didn't want to try skills at night. So I signed up for the afternoon dive, which was supposed to start about 3 pm, when it would still be light. Then I found out who the other divers were going to be, and I got worried -- they were all people with tech certs or close to it, with way more experience than I had. I thought about canceling, but then I decided that everybody had to start somewhere, so I would go. (Mistake number one.)

When I got there, we waited for someone who was delayed, and by the time we were geared up and getting in the water, it was getting dusky (mistake number two). I was supposed to go down and do an air-sharing drill with my buddy, and I kept getting disoriented and bewildered in the poor viz and the dark, and losing my buoyancy control. My buddy was getting frustrated and angry with me, which was making me even more anxious. We surfaced, and my instructor said, "You don't have to do this, you know. But this is what WE do. WE do drills. You can do what you like." So, of course, I was going to get it done or die trying (which is not funny, given what can happen to you if you screw up when diving). We muddled through, and then went on tour.

It was, I think, my second night dive ever, and I was highly anxious and uncomfortable throughout, and kept having problems with disorientation and shaky buoyancy control. At the end of the dive, we were supposed to do a free ascent, with the other team shooting a bag. I realized, to my horror, that I couldn't read my depth gauge in the dark (old eyes). I lost track of the line, and found myself floating in the dark with no visual reference and unable to read my gauge. I began to yoyo violently, and my buddy tried to stop me by grabbing me, which made my disorientation worse. Finally, my instructor grabbed my harness and escorted me to the surface, where my weight belt fell off. It caught in my harness, thank goodness, but the next thing I know, I'm lying on my back on the surface, trying desperately not to cry, with my instructor between my legs trying to sort out the weight belt. I can't remember ever having felt so awful.

Lessons learned: Don't dive if you don't feel reasonably confident about it. Don't take on too many challenges at once (strange buddies, doing skills, at night, free ascents in the dark). Make sure you have a gauge you can read in all conditions (I'm still not sure how you know you'll have a problem with one, until you've had it, though.) And if at first you don't succeed, try again.

It was over a year before I did a night dive again. Now I love them, and I do skills at night, too.

 

[ssidiv3r]

well, mine was a while ago. It was in a small but deep quarry with a couple of guys using doubles. I was using a single ST-100. First problem was the depth, 127ft straight down. I did have my Deep cert but had only ever been to 90ft. The second was that I was diving wet and the water temp was about 43 throughout. Third problem was the lack of a sufficient light, I only had an SL6 (6 C-cell handheld). The forth and biggest problem was my reg, an MR-12 which I found out later was a warm water reg.

So we get in, go down and luckily I was able to keep track of my buddy because of the strobe on his manifold. At 110ft my reg started freeflowing and wouldn't stop (*sarcasm* I wonder why). Foolishly I decided to push on. I made it to the bottom, swam around and followed the contour of the walls up to 70ft. At that time I was down to 500 PSI. I told my "buddy" and he pretty much said, "Ok, see ya topside". So I left him, made a faster-than-normal ascent, made a 2 minute stop at 17ft and surfaced with 50 PSI (yes, 50) in my tank.

Since that dive, I immediately purchased a cold water reg and shortly after, a dry suit. I have gone diving with the above mentioned buddy once after that day, but fully accepted that I would more or less be on my own should anything happen. I have dove the same quarry about 3 more times but with an instructor.

Lessons: Use the right gear for the dive (and know what gear is NOT right) and use the proper exposure suit for the conditions; If there is a problem (i.e. freeflow) call the dive no matter what your "buddy" says/does; Do work-up dives prior to a deep dive

 

[Doc]

Brand new wreck, 200' Freighter tucked just behind Big French Key in Roatan. I was to be the first one to descend to check her depth and how she was lying.

She was an intentionally placed wreck (by Albert Jackson, then owner of FIBR noted here as "Ezekiel Key") that was on the lee inside of the reef- set for diving on otherwise rough days.

Kept sucking water. Had to abort. A barely noticeable tear in my mouthpiece was the culprit. Jimmy took over and made it down first. The wreck has turned out to un-diveable because of the surprisingly murky conditions in the area.

It still lays there for those who want a real wreck diving experience, even on Roatan.

 

[JDMerk]

I've never dove and felt that I was in danger, but I have had dives that were less than pleasant. One that comes to mind was a bridge we dove in early spring this year.
The viz was about 2-3ft, not that there was anything to see other than sand and the thousands of razor sharp oysters on the bridge pilings. I didn't need to see the oysters though, i could feel them well enough.
It was COLD so I had to wear a metric ****-ton of neoprene, on top of that I was under weighted by 10lbs or so...some of that is laziness on my part because our max depth was 15ft and I didn't want to surface swim the 150y back to shore to get more.
We mistimed the tide and/or somebody took too long to gear up, so current was becoming an issue toward the end of the dive.
Oh and the surge...with the oysters on the pilings...that sucked too.

But i still wouldn't call it a bad dive...just not the best.

 

[Reg Braithwaite]

At that time I was down to 500 PSI. I told my "buddy" and he pretty much said, "Ok, see ya topside". So I left him, made a faster-than-normal ascent, made a 2 minute stop at 17ft and surfaced with 50 PSI (yes, 50) in my tank.

Real Horrorshow on your part. But you need a new droog, Alex.

 

[smellzlikefish]

We later asked my instructor about his worst dive. He told us it was his fault from the get go. He was diving alone from a boat on Lanai for lobsters at night. He had his head in a hole shining his light in when something came from behind him and, as he described, hit him like a truck, jamming his head into the reef. He frantically grabbed his light and spun around but by the time he looked, whatever it was had swam away. We all assumed it was a big tiger or similar shark and he was damn lucky it grabbed him by the tank and not anything damageable. He called the dive.

 

[scubadada]

Hi smellzlikefish,

We've all had a few anxiety producing dives that taught us a great deal. I've had several dives with insta-buddies that made me very nervous but I never really thought that I was personally at high risk, though my buddy may have been. I will never forget a solo dive I took on the Spiegel Grove on which I descended 2 decks below the main deck without laying a line. It was very straightforward, directly down through 2 hatches and I did not stray far away. I came up through the 1st hatch without a care in the world but then, for the life of me, could not find the hatch up to the main deck despite swimming back and forth a few times over short distances. At this point, I thought I would run out of air here and die. Fortunately, I turned off my light, saw a dim blue color at the end of the long corridor, and swam out and up a narrow exit. Later that trip, I went back and explored my errors. I made several mistakes on this dive. This was an inappropriate penetration without a line and was probably an inappropriate solo effort (I would imagine this could be debated). I've not taken similar risks since that time and return home safely to my family after each dive trip. It only takes one really big error to end your diving career or life, I treat every dive with considerably more respect than I did before my enlightening dive. I'll be forever grateful that I have that opportunity.

Good diving to all, take care, Craig

 

[pollywogg]

Real Horrorshow on your part. But you need a new droog, Alex.

You're better off without Dim, Pete and Georgie. And none of the old ultra-violence