Wing failure

[Filipe Marques da Costa]

I’m interested in probing the large amount of experienced divers here to understand some accidents and have at least an idea of the real incidence of some phenomena.

I’m curious about wing failure, either not being able to inflate or air trapping inside. The idea for the poll came after reading the recent discussion about the double bladder wing.

Have you ever seen or heard about a wing failure accident or near miss? I mean equipment failure, not poor technique in venting, or forgetting to connect LP hose before jumping in the water. If so... where did it fail? If you have seen more than one, select more than one. If you have seen more than one of the same failure unfortunately I can’t make the poll work that way.

Feel free to discuss below too.

 

[Centrals]

Never seen it but experienced it twice(tec dive with dual bladder):
1. Pre-dive check on land. I set up the kit, deflated the wing and left it overnight(tank valve opened). On following morning the wing was fully inflated.
2. The inflator suddenly stopped working while on initial descent. So I have to inflate the other wing orally and kicking hard to slow the descent.

Power inflator and the Schrader valve(lLP hose)

 

[rongoodman]

I found a small hole in the bladder of my wing during a cave course once. We patched it with some duct tape and I replaced it when I got home. On another trip an inflator developed a leak, slow enough that I was able to keep ahead of it by dumping the extra gas while I finished the dive. I replaced it with the generic spare I carry when I returned to the boat.

 

[BlueTrin]

I saw a person having a broken corrugated hose.

He noticed only after jumping.

 

[drakcheslav]

After cleaning my wing, I've opend the elbow, and didn't seat the oring and the hex key properly. And the next dive was a nice blackwater lake cliff, around 180m tall, I was at 35m, and suddenly I start sinking, and I try to inflate, but my wing is not inflating. I'm wearing a wetsuit, 5mm, properly neutrally weighted. I managed to swim up and reach somewhat a neutral state at 18m depth. Safe to say, have I been carrying more weight than what I should, the firefighter robot would be working that evening. It was a good life lesson, to always double check my gear, and to have a backup buoyancy method. Even if its a DSMB. I was a beginner then, but that dive taught me a lot.

 

[tbone1004]

I've seen all of the options you listed occur at least once, most several times. Usually it is in poorly maintained gear though and usually it is in the form of it not holding air. I have never personally seen one where it wouldn't dump

 

[drakcheslav]

I've seen all of the options you listed occur at least once, most several times. Usually it is in poorly maintained gear though and usually it is in the form of it not holding air. I have never personally seen one where it wouldn't dump

I've seen a BCD with salk crusted dump walve where it fused shut, but then, you have the rest of the valves. Also seen a BCD with a stuck inflation knob.

 

[tbone1004]

I've seen a BCD with salk crusted dump walve where it fused shut, but then, you have the rest of the valves. Also seen a BCD with a stuck inflation knob.

but ever together? I've seen stuck dump valves before and stuck inflator valves before, but never together. I suppose it could happen, but seems unlikely.

 

[drakcheslav]

no 2 different mares dive club bcd's.
To have it fail to that extent to have all 3 dump/over pressure valves seized, and the inflation button seized.

You either have to be the unluckiest person in the world or you SO is after you

 

[Wibble]

My dump valve fell off my wing whilst I was underwater. I think it was almost certainly when I fully inflated it upon reaching the surface: noticed I was low in the water, so injected some more and heard some bubbles on my LHS. Felt down and no dump, just a hole! Never recovered it so don't know if it was cracked and gave way.

Had a drysuit which aside from keeping you warm is your redundant buoyancy. Also had a couple of SMBs which I could inflate and stick between my legs.

Kind of keep calm and carry on.