Whats your WORST dive ever?

[FoSheZZie23]

So i am curious as to some of the stories people have of THEIR WORST dive ever.

Here is mine:

When i first started aquiring my own equipment when i was a new diver i was really excited to get my new reg set up in the water. Myself and two other dive buddies went out one dark and stormy night (really it was raining and the waves were crazy) no thunder or lighting though. So I go this ****ty scubapro bc from the shop (to this day i will never dive a scubapro bc again) we jump off the huge rocks into the water i struggle to put my fins on because of the waves crashing over me and struggeling with the ****ty bc. I cant stand the SP bc's because the inflator button and the exhaust button are so damn similar and close to eachother. my 5mm gloves have a hard time pressing one or the right one. (let alone i had never dove a scubapro bc so i was unfamilier with it) So finally i get my fins on and we go down. The visibility was probably 3 feet at best, water looked like gasoline was in it for some odd reason. So my mask keeps fogging up, i forgot to spit in it at the surface. So i just keep flooding it and blow ing it all out but really it didnt matter because we couldnt see anything anyways. So we are swimming along and... o what is that... seems like something is on my fin (oh probably just some eel grass)... i keep swimming my buddies infront of me. and all of a sudden STOP... i think to myself well this isnt right, one moment im swimming and now im at a dead stop. FISHING LINE! So calmly i grab my knife and cut what seemed to be 50lb test line that was all wrapped around my fin, off. And i get my compass barring again and look for my buddies. Since i took a moment to cut the line and the visibility was next to nothing, they were all but gone for sure. So i keep swimming for about a minute and i see a faint light in the distance, and the next second i run into one of them. Guess it wasnnt so distant. So a maricle has happend and i find my buddies again and we go on with out dive a couple minutes later my light canon goes out. Oh great now i get to use the little Q40 back up light i have. Believe it or not, after that one of my buddies lights goes out. He didnt have a backup light so i gave him my light little Q40led that i have attached to my HP hose. (wow am i prepared, knife and 2 back up lights!) By that time we were more than frustrated about the vis so we finished the dive early. Suprisingly enough we didnt have an out of air situation to top the dive off. So thats my worst dive ever!

 

[rakkis]

Not to sound like the SCUBA police; but I'd personally be very hesitant about going out with those conditions. Let alone with unfamiliar gear. Glad you made it out.

 

[almitywife]

provided it doesnt kill you in the attempt you learn alot when youre a newbie and dumber than the diver you are now, dont you?

my worse dive had somewhat similar conditiions and almost 10 years later i still have never been back to the site and have no interest in diving it either.

im too tired to write a long post tonight but i always clearly remember telling myself that if i lost the little hold i had on common sense i was going to loose control completely and panic and die.

cheers and thanks for sharing

 

[Goatfish face]

My worst dive was one of my first night dives. an instructor leading a group of 6 divers at a very familiar site in calm water. We swam through some surge until we got to the edge of our reef and the dive proper began. Vis was about 5m (16f) and I stuck my head under a ledge to look for some life. When I looked around, maybe 10 seconds later, everyone had gone. I looked up the reef in the direction we were going. I looked down the reef just in case they turned around but found no one.

Training 101 kicked in and I surfaced to await my buddy or dive leader. 15 mins later I'm still on the surface, pitch black ocean (overcast and no street lights nearby) and 300m (1000f ish) off shore. I distinctly heard the Jaws theme music, decided it was an easier swim back while on the bottom so did my first solo dive back to the beach.

After throwing half my gear across the car park the instructor and other divers arrived back. I said quite a few choice words to the instructor and my dive buddy and got the response that they knew I was missing but didn't surface because they knew I would be OK.

I almost stopped diving that night.

Now I own a dive store and the first person I banned from stepping through the front door was that instructor.

 

[DiveTub]

My worst dives are the ones I didnt do for one reason or another, usually a hangover that felt like my head was going to explode.

Cheers
Chriso

 

[Steve50]

After throwing half my gear across the car park the instructor and other divers arrived back. I said quite a few choice words to the instructor and my dive buddy and got the response that they knew I was missing but didn't surface because they knew I would be OK.

I almost stopped diving that night.

Now I own a dive store and the first person I banned from stepping through the front door was that instructor.

Good move!

 

[m3830431]

Worst dive was a private pond in June. Vis a green two feet and a max depth of 13 feet. Wanted to see what was there. Did it again only earlier before the algea bloomed there still wasn't anything good to look at.

 

[stephhhhh]

My worst dive was in the Philippines, it was like awashing machine down under! Very strong current, we were all getting separated! I couldn't handle it and I totally panicked going up way too fast!

 

[tstormdiver]

My Adv. OW class Deep dive was the worst dive ever, so far, for me. I signed up for an AOW class. After doing the home study for the AOW class, I met up with some other students that I had taken my OW class with at Pennyroyal. The deep dive was to be the first dive of the day. Because the water temp. stays at 45 degrees, year round below 60', we had to wear 7mm suits. I found out real quick that I don't like thick wet suits because of the restriction of movement. We went over weighting requirements very briefly. By the recommendations I should use about 18# of the 24# I had available (perhaps I had too good an image of myself (weight) in this matter:blinking: ). We suited up and made our way to the the beach area. After wading in waist deep we donned our fins & masks. While putting on my fins (or attempting to) I kept losing my mask (did this about 3 times). After finally getting all set we made our way to the deep drop off and the platform buoy. We all let the air out of the BC's and everyone started to descend, except me. I was too light. After several attempts and failures, I finally hand over hand pulled myself down the buoy line. Once I got to about 30' the air compressed out of the wet suit & I was able to finish descending without further pulling myself down. When I reached the platform (which seemed like it was the roof of a van or truck) at 85", I was a bit out of breath (it's amazing how much energy it took to pull myself down), but OK. The instructor had us perform some simple math problems to determine if we were having problems with nitrogen narcosis. I did OK through this part, though I had no love of the cold water in my face. Everyone then took off together to explore the bottom. As I left the platform I suddenly lost my right fin. I had to use my remaining fin to swim after the wayward one. I then found out that I was unable to put it back on, though I was trying, because of stiffness from the cold & the confinedness of the wet suit. An attending dive master saw what was going on & came over to help. By then my breathing was really quick & short. The combination of the cold water & the fact that air coming out of compression is cold caused my regulator to start freezing up, and instead of free flowing it prevented me from getting the air my body was demanding and I started to over breathe it. At that point I started inhaling some water, which sent me into a panic (this is the first time in my life I can remember truly panicking over anything). The dive master quickly assessed the situation and grabbed my BC and we started a controlled ascent. The reg was just a rental & not of the best quality. Once we hit the warmer water, my regulator unfroze & I started to get the air I needed. I quickly calmed down and finished the 3 min. safety stop. The dive master & myself surfaced and after making sure I was alright & safely floating at the surface, he re-submerged and went to find the others. They all came up about 10min. behind me. Although it was not a good dive by any means, I did learn a lot about my new equipment, weighting and the importance of trying to stay calm in bad situations. Thank goodness this happened during a class where I was under the watchful eye of the instructor & a dive master who had seen this sort of thing happen before & knew how to respond quickly. I have since done a couple of deep dives (in the nice warm Caribbean) withthout any real problems. I, in no way look at this episode as a failure, but as a vast learning experience. It did not stop me (in fact it spurred me on), and is something that hopefully will make me a better and more cautious diver.

 

[RikRaeder]

Mine would have to be Tsubishi, near Okinawa with the All Nippon Champion Dive Team on Prospero III. Detail have all ready been posted:
http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=146850&highlight=okinawa+trip+report