Phantom Incident

[FW]

by perryL927


on 12-26-2010 at 09:19 PM

My dive buddy and I were completing our third and final day of diving Gennie Springs. The plan was to penetrate the catacombs. Nether of us been there before and we felt it would be an interesting dive. My buddy took out his finger spool and tied off to a rock about five feet from the main line. I realized immediately this was a visual jump. I was never fond of visuals jumps so I took my jump reel and directional marker and tied onto the main line and attached my reel to his tie off. I then proceeded to follow him into the catacombs.

When I entered the catacombs I notice the minute distance between the floor and ceiling, also the substantial amount of silt. I'm conscientious about buoyancy, so I checked my trim before entering. As I approached my buddy he had already reversed his trajectory I was about to initiate an exit when he signal to me to follow the line he laid. As I followed the line deeper into the catacombs I was fascinated with the tertian. Wow, I thought to myself, this is amazing. I reached the end of the line, where he made a perfect tie off, and I retrieved the finger spool.

I turned around and started to roll up the spool. As I was exiting the line became very loose indicating that I was moving faster than I could roll in the spool. I reached my buddy and notice that the end of the spool was no longer warped around the rock, but in his hand. He looked at me and immediately I interpreted that look to mean, the line came loose and we’re lost in this cave. At that time I felt, what seem like, an electrical shock throughout my torso. I have had transitory moments of panic during past cave dives. However, I never truly panic. During those times I knew intellectually there wasn’t any real danger and my fear was based on emotion not facts. This situation was different, intellectually and emotionally I knew the danger was real.

Before I deployed my finger spool to start a line search I looked around the area. I didn’t recognize anything. Aggravating the situation it appeared that we were in a cavity. I took a deep breathe and started for my finger spool, however my buddy already had one in his hand. As my adrenal gland supplied a torrential flood of adrenalin to my body I took another look around. This time I notice a small white square object to my far right. I realized it was the grim reaper sign; I also spotted the main line about ten feet from me. My imagination ran wild because I didn’t expect my buddy to remove the tie off. As I was the last diver I was the one who supposes to remove it. My buddy also removed my jump reel, this was the reel I thought he took off his tank to start a search. We retrieved our reels and exited.

As my heart rate returned to normal I felt like a ….. That aside I remember what my instructor told me about periodically looking behind as you enter a new passage because it’s not going to look the same on the way out. He was right!

[FW]

FWIW, this type of incident happens a lot. One reason for this forum is so people will discuss this type problem with their buddies, before a dive, so no confusion exists during the dive.

[jj1987]

So, was the line tied off to a rock inside the cave rather than installed as a jump?

[FW]

So, was the line tied off to a rock inside the cave rather than installed as a jump?

I wasn't on the dive, I just moved it from the blog page to here.

The Catacombs are parallel to the Gallety, low on the left going in. It appears that instead of tying into the goldline, the lead diver tied to a rock near the goldline. Then the OP (the buddy) tied a spool to the gold line. Made sense to me, but apparently the lead diver didn't know about it.

[Jim Wyatt]

Thanks to the person who posted this.

[adam0321]

why diidnt he grab is buddy by pulling on the line or with a line signal and motion him to tie in correctly?

[whodunit68]

thanks for posting this Forrest.

Made sense to me, but apparently the lead diver didn't know about it.

As I was reading the post by Perry (here), my first thought when he tied in the spool was "I hope you let the lead diver know about this!" I tend to over-communicate and I realize it is slightly annoying to some but I sure want to reduce the chances that I feel lost inside a cave.

I can't imagine as a lead diver that I'd start pulling jump reels as a lead diver whether I knew they were there or not. I suppose if I saw that as a lead diver, I'd stop and communicate with my buddy about it. Thankfully it seems all are ok.

[scububa]

Seems the 'reel' problem began when, in an unplanned fashion, they swapped team positions. I won't do that unless it is pre-planned to do in a spot we all know to allow room and orchestration. Otherwise, assuming no failures, stay in formation. Each team position has responsibilities. Changing positions without coordinating the responsibility is dangerous.

In this case, the lead diver, when he changed position, was no longer the lead and didn't have pull the reel job. Also, as he became the follow diver, going out first, he should have been 'handling' slack problems, not creating them. So, in this case, Perry should have been pulling the reel he took over (as he was starting to do), and he would have pulled the 'no visual gap' reel he initially installed.

I always discuss who is putting in a line, who is pulling it, whether we pull or leave. If there is a dive dependency on pulling or leaving, I like to run thru the communication for leaving or pulling.

[FW]

why diidnt he grab is buddy by pulling on the line or with a line signal and motion him to tie in correctly?

I get the impression they were too far apart, which is another problem. Bad buddy teamwork all the way around.

[BabyDuck]

also, the post doesn't say anything about everyone's experience, but remember to be extra sensitive to new cave divers and whether or not they know where they are. i had a friend get out of cave diving because of something similar - he was following his buddy, a very experienced person, and followed off the line. the buddy knew without a doubt where they were, but it really shook my friend and he stopped cave diving. if the buddy had been with a similarly experienced person, it probably wouldn't have been a thing.