How diving changed my life (part 6)

Settling in to being a dive professional is normally pretty easy. Sure you will be nervous at the beginning because unlike other professions such as working in an office, a mistake on your part will normally not have the opportunity to kill someone. I think you would be hard-pressed to find someone in the diver profession that doesn't take this aspect of the job VERY seriously - I know i certainly did.

you can expect constant confirmation from your guide with the "ok" hand signal

It is extremely rare that a person comes diving alone, they will normally have a friend or family member with them. This is quite helpful as a dive guide because there is something called the "buddy system" where as a recreational diver, you are NEVER to get more than a certain distance from your buddy. It is a team effort. This makes the job of the guide a lot easier because the customers are always certified and are normally very aware of the functions of the equipment.

The exception to this is called Discover Scuba Diving (DSD) and this is for people that want to have a try at diving without being certified. These divers are kept safe by virtue of the fact that a dive professional (such as yours truly) is ALWAYS physically attached to them at all times and the maximum depth is 6 meters - which is still a safe distance to make a crazed emergency ascent (which is a big no-no in diving at greater depths.)

The only strange problem I had with certified divers came at the hands of someone that had nearly the same level of certification as I had. He had not been diving in a while, but was a certified rescue diver. He clearly knew his stuff and we had a nice chat before our planned 30 meter dive to a shipwreck called the King Cruiser. I thought that it would be an easy dive because one of my customers was also a pro. It just goes to show that you can't judge a book by it's cover.

About 14 meters into our descent on the mooring line, this rescue diver starts to behave erratically. He was hesitating in our descent and at points going back up a few meters and then just waiting there. I gave him the "ok" hand symbol (which I had explained in the dive briefing that when coming from me, the OK symbol is always a question,) he responds "OK" and we carry on downward. Now I will admit, there are very few things quite as eerie as a giant sunken ship but that is part of the fun. I was completely shocked by what happened at about 20 meters depth though.

All of a sudden, while at the bottom of the rope-line that leads to the top of the sunken ferry, this rescue diver freaks out, and even kicked one of the other customers in the face, filling their mask with water. The rescue diver is trying to get out of there. At this point i am holding onto the line, and holding on to him to prevent him from doing something really stupid like ascending too quickly.

QUICK SCIENCE LESSON: if you breathe compressed air at a depth beyond 6 meters or so, and then rocket to the top while holding your breath the area that this air occupies is going to expand and can rupture your lungs

This guy KNOWS this, yet is still trying to get away. He really trying to get away from me but I need to secure the mask on the other diver - who thankfully, with the help of his buddy is able to secure his mask and clear the water out of it.

Freak-out McGee rescue diver is not giving up. He is pressing and has now actually inflated his jacket so that it gives him a greater opportunity to get away from me. I succeed in releasing the air from his jacket and convincing him with my wide-eye glare to calm TF down. This works for about a second and a half and then he freaks out again, with renewed vigor. He is starting to make me ascend faster than I want to and I have no choice but to let him go.

I see him, from my vantage point of now 18 meters or so, make a truly dangerous uncontrolled ascent (you are supposed to ascend very slowly, not just because of the aforementioned air expansion principle, but also because nitrogen particles can get trapped in your bloodstream and well, bad things can happen.)

I didn't do anything wrong: You are never supposed to put yourself in harms way in order to save someone who can't be helped, especially not if you have other customers.

I pulled out my underwater writing slate and asked my other two divers to wait and i'll BRB. I ascend slowly (like you are supposed to) and when i get to the top he is in a panicked surface swim to get back to the boat. He wont respond to me so I just tell the dive captain on the boat to not allow him back in the water.

I return to my other divers who are still waiting at depth and we do the wreck dive and have a great time. They get loads of pictures and everyone was happy.

Back on the boat I find and speak to freak-out McGee to see what happened. He didn't really have an answer for me but he just felt increasingly nervous as we got closer to the wreck. I offered him a few pointers about how "in the future, if you are feeling panicked, and your guide gives you the "OK" symbol and you are not OK, don't tell them that you are!

He responded "you are right, I'm sorry, it wont happen on the next dive." I responded "that's right, because you wont be going on it."

That was my first encounter with a truly dangerous situation while diving. All the training that I had received prepared me for it, and later when we had to fill out the incident report (for insurance purposes) the senior divers all agreed that there was nothing i could have done differently to improve the situation.

I suppose the point of this story is that the training that goes into becoming a certified dive professional should not be taken lightly. This guy somehow managed to make it through the system despite the fact that he really doesn't belong with the certification. I don't even feel bad about the fact that our incident report resulted in his certification being rescinded until he goes through a refresher course.. Hopefully, the next time whoever is approving him will be a bit more careful.