Below water embarrassment

[steveharriss]

Off to Eyemouth to do my PADI advanced open water after having been certified in Grand Cayman a month earlier. Had tried the drysuit in a pool but hadn't used the thing in anger yet. Drove up at 5am to get there nice and early to find out everyone else had gone up the night before and were suffering the effect of long discussions in the bar! A hearty breakfast followed whilst everyone tried to bring themselves round meaning that no decisions were made on the weather immediately.

Sea rolling over the retaining wall onto the promenade made it unlikely that we'd be diving but the Instructor insisted he'd go to Nessends and check.

Came back half an hour later to inform us the weekend was canned there BUT if we'd like to drive to Capernwray we could get there in time to do one dive later the same day.

Being as keen as mustard I elected to set off in my Clio and see if I could make it before closing time. Arrived a Capernwray on a Saturday at 3.20pm to find the place deserted. Now at this time I had no idea that the place should be swarming with divers, dog, small children, and assorted other animal life as I'd never dived in the UK. 15 minutes later the centre bus rolled up followed by another keen diver trainee.

The instructor looked around in amazement at the deserted car park and had just turned towards the shop when the reason for the situation became apparent. HSE officals were making a beeline for the transit van.

Lots of pointing and arm waving ensued, before the Instructor came and confided that none of the DM's who had come on the trip had HSE medicals and we therefore couldn't go diving that day. BUM!

I decided I was off in anyway, and recruited the other trainee to buddy up for a quick dip in the water for the brief time remaining.

Jumped in and sank with no problems but the auto dump on the drysuit was anything but.... my bouyancy was completely shot but we submarined ourselves over to the gnome garden and I felt like a real diver.

I'd checked my gauges regularly, but the combination of my first UK dive, drysuit, non-auto dump, and general uneasiness had meant I was sucking air like I had 10,000 litres of it on my back rather than the single 15lt tank, filled helpfully to 180 bar by the dive centre.

On checking out the gnomes, I was suprised to find I had less than 50 bar. I signalled to my buddy, showed him the gauges, and we agreed to surface, with a three minute stop at 6m. My lack of understand of the auto-dump had me bouncing up and down whilst my buddy held a perfect stop. In the end I gave into the irresisible forces in operation and popped to the surface.

There then followed the longest swim, well it felt like it, from the gnome garden back to the entry point on the surface. I had pulled my mask onto the top of my head and my reg out of my mouth and was attempting to use my arms to increase speed through the water. Fortunately, due to the lack of any observers whatsoever, the boat wasn't called out.

Perhaps this should have appeared in the 'I learned about diving from that', but it's one dive I'm happy to have walked away from with just embarrasment.

The following day the dive centre had rustled up another instructor with an HSE medical and my diving training continued.....

[Dave G]

i've had a fair share of numpty-style dives, including:
assuming, although my suit had flooded during the first dive, that my undersuit would have dried out enough for a second dive without freezing.... i was wrong
jumping in without fins
jumping in without reg in
jumping in without weight
forgeting that snorkel does not equal reg
diving in medieval outfit (don't ask) including swords, sheild and axe!! which was fine until my buddy (instructor) got too cold to use her hands so i had to juggle fancy dress accessories whilst sending up the SMB.....



but the star accolade goes to one of the guys i joined up to diving with, who managed to annoy the skipper of the Phoenix (a rib in plymouth) enough to warrent being pushed overboard, unfortunately his reflex was to grab the skippers coat, pulling him in aswell, and loosing the poor guys wallet & ruining his mobile......not a happy skipper

[Arfie]

On my OW training in the pool, I scared the bejeezus out of the instructor, doing my first mask removal drill, she was a fair few feet away, when I started. I removed the mask and for reasons still unkown I also spat my regs out

Instinct took over and I managed to replace the mask, clear it, then recover my regs and carry on I was however instructed to ascend to the surface for a bollocking

Arfie

[skuba-steve]

that sounds like some daft shit i would end up doin!

[Leigh G]

Diving out in Egypt with a certain Frenchman and my buddy. We decided to do a dive on one of the reefs to 50m on air. Pre dive, Frenchman says 'Will you be ok on air?'
'I'm absolutely pissed silly at 50 on air, but quite happy.' says I.
'Not me' says buddy, 'I don't get narked'.
At 50m, said frenchman thrusts a dive slate at me with a neatly written maths problem. Only problem is, there's no +, -, x symbols, nothing. I tried to explain, to no avail, that I didn't understand what calculation he wanted me to do and in exasperation, said grumpy frenchman snatches the slate out of my hand and shoves it at my buddy.
After several minutes of looking blankly at the slate, my buddy is relieved of it by a now completely pissed off frenchman, who swims off in disgust, leaving my buddy and I looking blankly at each other.
I get out my dive slate and scrawl in a drunken scribble ' I didn't understand what he wanted me to do!', referring to the missing symbols.
At which point, my buddy, who never gets narked, wrote 'Me neither, it was all in french!!'

You know who you are, an if you're readin this, it's time you came diving!!

[rustferret]

This isnt really below the water but not sure where to post ....... and not about me but just had to put some thing in about what Captain Pugwash (to his friends but not sure of his name in here) did yesterday.............. come on captain pugwash tell every one about yesterdays boat trip...................you might as well get it out now or we will just keep reminding you again and again and again.......

LOL Rustferret

[jonesor]

1) surface swim to shot.
2) find buddy.
3) signal OK and thumb down.
4) descend to 3m.
5) notice something not quite right.
6) find reg, insert, and breathe!

Ooops!

[Scu-bamboo]

Been diving in my pyjamas before - that was fun!

[puddlediver]

1. Forgot to plug in dry suit feed
2. Dropped and lost forever weightbelt in Farnes getting back onto RIB
3. Not fastening waist strap on wing
4. Having got a new drysuit and undersuit just before a weekends RIB diving I found that my fins wouldn't fit the new super width boots - borrowed someone elses. Hit the water and found I couldn't descend - loads more lead required than the previous set up, got the lead and started to descend only to find that I couldn't clear my ears. Buddy well P@@@@d off at this point so I gave up and got out leaving my buddy to team up with another diver. Not very happy and yes I know I should try out new stuff in quarries only there wasn't enough time between getting the gear and the trip. Was well amazed about the suit as the new one was from the same company but the boots were a broader fit with flared edges like trainers unlike on the previous suit. The undersuit was a different type too but couldn't imagine that it would make so much difference to weight. My old drysuit and undersuit were stolen from our van after a dive at Trefor. Had to have the flared bits ground off the boots to enable my fins to fit. Changed undersuit for a weezle and reduced the lead again.

Lyv.. safe diving

[Dr T]

Originally Posted by Scu-bamboo

Been diving in my pyjamas before - that was fun!

hubba hubba


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