[Phideaux]

I know I've been out of active diving for some time now and only just getting back into it, but I'm becomming more and more alarmed at the posts that I see about (alleged) diver behaviour in an OOA situation. It apears that everyone is of the opinion that the first thing an OOA diver does is rip the DV from his/her buddy's mouth; hence the discussions about the best way to store/deploy the main and back-up DVs, their length, position on the body/neck, how htey're securred, colour etc.

Perhaps I've been fortunate as I have never experienced, seen, or heard from a reliable source, this sort of behaviour from a properly trained diver (or any diver, actually). Yes, I have been an OOA diver and yes I have had an OOA buddy (novice, to my shame). On neither occassion was there panic or anything other than a well rehersed series of signals and responses (both occassions requiring buddy breathing).

I would be very interested to know just how many divers out there have actually experienced being an OOA diver, or have aided an OOA diver. I'd particularly like to see their views on how the situation was initially appraised (an "O my God, I'm going to die" event or a "hmmm, I've been trained for this and practiced what to do" event), how it was dealt with at the time, and particularly what the learning outcomes were.

Perhaps, with so many more people 'holiday' diving, the level of training - read 'practiced drills' - has deminished to a level where every buddy should be viewed as either a leathal risk, or perhaps as a mobile, expendable, air source depending on your attitude.

Provocative? I hope so!

PS. Is there a spell check facility on this site? I'm crap at long words.