Who here has done a real life CESA and what was your experience?

[Stu S.]

We were taught the emergency ascent in the '70's and I did it for practice. No harm came to me, and it was considered a "good" thing to do. Just keeping the windpipe open kept the air flowing out at the proper rate. It was easy, even though I wonder now if my ascents were really slow enough. I typically did this from a depth of 60 feet.

I had no BC at the time, just a "pop-up" vest. Pulling the cartridge inflator cord on that thing would have meant a dangerously fast ascent.

 

[Slonda828]

They didn't even teach buddy breathing in my OW class. Our instructor said, "by the time you're doing this, you should either CESA or ditch your weights."

I thought that your post was awesome until I came to this part. People should know how to buddy breathe. You don't need an octo if you can buddy breathe. Why depend on equipment when you can rely on skill? All things being equal I'd rather have a friend I can trust that much that many of the less than superlative and often dubiously maintained yellow colored paperweights I find on most rental gear these days. FWIW

 

[Rhone Man]

People should know how to buddy breathe. You don't need an octo if you can buddy breathe. Why depend on equipment when you can rely on skill? All things being equal I'd rather have a friend I can trust that much that many of the less than superlative and often dubiously maintained yellow colored paperweights I find on most rental gear these days. FWIW

I confess I don't have an octopus on my regulator, but for that reason I am looked at as a bit like a freak show on the dive boat. Buddy breathing my have been de rigeur in the old days, but alternate second stages clearly involve less task loading and have got to be safer (so please do as I say, not as I do!).

 

[themagni]

I thought that your post was awesome until I came to this part.

I try to make my posts out of equal parts awesome and fail so nobody can tell when I'm joking or just wrong.

People should know how to buddy breathe. You don't need an octo if you can buddy breathe. Why depend on equipment when you can rely on skill? All things being equal I'd rather have a friend I can trust that much that many of the less than superlative and often dubiously maintained yellow colored paperweights I find on most rental gear these days. FWIW

I usually have insta-buddies (and therefore, am often one myself) so I don't have grounds to trust them. I've had a few good buddies but mostly crap ones. (As the saying goes, the only common thread to all your failed relationships is you.)

If you're diving recreationally, any failure should be grounds to abort the dive. If your buddy's octo fails, that means you don't have a backup air supply, so you abort the dive. Yes, odds are you'll be fine and nothing will happen.

However, when your air fails and all you have is your buddy's reg, then you're going to have two stressed divers trying to share one reg when you could instead be having beers on shore because you aborted the dive when you encountered critical problems.

While we're talking about emergency procedures, don't forget Type One: Normal Ascent --> Something is wrong, let's go up.

There's also the overlooked Type Zero: Horizontal Departure --> Something is wrong (or, more conservatively, things aren't perfect), let's not dive.

 

[Big G]

A big thanks to all who have shared your stories here. I have never had an OOA situation yet, in 31 years of diving, but it obviously can and does happen and I'm not immune. It takes some courage to share stories of mistakes we have made. So ... thanks again for sharing info that can benefit the rest of us.

 

[randy54]

I too learned back in 1970, and whether it was an SSi requirement, or the instructors we were taught how to, and had to do one from 60 ft to get our cert. Training was much more demanding back then. Of course no one had BC's, computers, or Octo's. The tanks generally had J valves, which turned out to be more of a hazard than a help.

 

[MagicChicken]

Last CESA was during Rescue Diver certification so it doesn't really count.

I wanted to share a story so I can get some insight from more experienced and wiser divers. Like goodive, it was an OOA situation that didn't end in CESA.

This summer, my dive buddy and I spent a week diving off Ivy Lea Campground in Ontario. I have a great dive buddy : he dives twin tanks, he lends me his singles, he has his own Zodiac, he brought a friend to stay onboard during the dive, regular gear and Zodiac maintenance and he likes beer. He is also willing put up with me and my periodic request to practice safety drills underwater. A good guy, I tell you.

So, after an early morning dive at we proceeded to the Amerika barge (Neptune: diving in Ontario, American).

We plan the dive before hitting the water. We usually dive side by side (I stay left of him) and I lead the dive. This time he wanted me to take pictures OF HIM so he was to lead the dive.

Dive plan. Dive plan review. Gear up. Buddy check. Backroll. OK. Game on.

An easy dive. At around 50-55 feet (?) breathing gets a bit harder. "Uh?" I thought. I take slow deep breaths and exhale at the same rate. There was a noticeable increase in effort. FYI : I use a Zeagle 50D/ZX balanced reg.

Check my gauge : over 3000 PSI. "Uh!"

I stop. Breathe again : I gauge needle goes down! I'm thinking "That's it, I'm high on nitrogen!". Look at the gauge again : over 3000 PSI.

It's going down with every breath! By the third breath I'm OOA. First reflex was to swim to my sneaky friend. I didn't think I could swim that fast but I reached my buddy at the wreck entry point.

Cutting throat gesture, he stares at me (turns out he thought I wanted to practice OOA drill). I repeat, thankfully he hands me over his long hosed-reg. Air tastes soooo good when you need it!

At this point I was perfectly calm and we slowly returned to the boat. Along the way I thought I might have only turned on the valve 1/4 turn. Nope. Apparently it was a loose oversize O-ring in the H-valve that blocked the air-flow.

I'm glad I found out my buddy was reliable. I did not think at all. Getting air was my first priority.

The wreck is nicely located in the middle of the St-Lawrence seaway. Cargo ships pass directly above the wreck frequently. At least 2 did during our dive. Now that I think of it, I'm pretty sure I did the right thing.

Anyhow, what should I have done in such an OOA situation? Or more precisely : what are the appropriate problem-solving steps?

Thanks in advance. I apologize for my sub-par storytelling skills.

 

[Merchant.r]

A couple weeks ago, my boyfriend, Joe and I were diving in Playa Del Carmen. Our first time there. Our first drift dives. The only dives we are used to were the lake up here where its cold and the vis is about 15'. I am new with 14 dives going in to this. Joe is newer with 5 dives.

We are tooling along at about 40'-50' and Joe signals he's OOA. He then gets the DM's attention and the DM helps him surface. I stayed glued to the both of them all the way up. Apparently, he checked his guage and had 2000. When he started having to struggle for air, he checked again. 200. I surfaced with 1100. We usually manage to use our air at about the same rate.

After the dive, the gear was checked. It was all ok. In fact, we did our second dive a few minutes later.

It was scary, but I am so proud of him for how he handled himself with so little practice. And yes, he got drunk that night. It hit him a couple hours later that he almost died.

 

[Bill D]

One of the biggest problems with new divers is the tendency to not practice what they have learned. Some hate to clear their mask. Some don't like emergency drills. Some don't like to remove and replace their gear at the surface. And then a situation arises that is easily solved but the diver panics because he or she doesn't remember what to do. And panic kills! The CESA is a good example. It is there to solve the emergency of running out of air when your buddy is not around. So doesn't it make sense to practice it? I make a habit of doing one on each trip early in the week, the first dive of the day, at the beginning of the dive. That way I have little residual nitrogen to worry about. I go down to 60-70 ft and then start up on one breath keeping my regulator in my mouth. I get a feel for how much air to release at a safe ascent rate with little chance for either an embolism, dcs, or running out of air. I don't practice any deeper because I spend little time at those depths and it results in short dives anyway. I much prefer staying down for an hour or more. It gives me the confidence, skill, and knowledge to know I can do it without any concerns.

 

[InTheDrink]

Thanks Bill - you make an excellent point: most new divers don't practise what they've learned.

I certainly didn't until recently, but the difference since, in my ability and confidence is huge. However, it has come at the expense of my ego. I've had to play around in a pool by myself looking strange.

For people who mostly dive on vacation (an erstwhile myself) the opportunity rarely presents itself to practise most drills. Sure masks skills, finning, buoyancy, etc. but not a lot of the drills that I practise in the pool would be available on a holiday. It just doesn't happen. Probably because of the factory conveyor belt approach by most resorts (albeit probably a financially necessary conveyor belt).

I'm still trying to work out when and where I can practise a CESA. No obvious opportunity presents itself. And I'm obsessive; the vast majority of vacation divers just won't even realise that it (being drills) is something they should be doing regularly.

What's the answer? No idea (except perhaps enforced enrolment on this board )

J