Mistakes I've made.

[Greenwood_60]

This weekend was my first cave diving trip post intro certification... and I made a few little mistakes. I have been kicking around the idea of posting about them for two days now. The idea here is to get a thread going about all the little mistakes we all have made at one time or another, so that I don't have to make them myself to learn better.

My mistakes:
1) Used too short of a spool trying to tie in to the mainline in OG. Grabbed my short spool rather than my long. Luckily my buddy had more, but the first one my buddy grabbed wasn't long enough so we had to run a third (end to end to end). The third one would have been long enough to make the entire run, but we only use about 10' of it.

2) Followed to cave and not the line. Ended up off the line in OG when around p800 the line goes off to the right and up through a really cool crack. The cave continues around without line and rejoins the line a short run later. My buddy notified me of my mistake a few feet past the crack.

3) Got up off the line to check out a dome around p400 on the OG line, spun around a bit checking it all out and I ascended. Got back down to the line and realized I lost me sense of in/out. Worst case here I would have traveled <100' in the wrong direction. The dome is actually JUST past the 400' arrow, and it was within sight by the time I descended back on to the line.

4) Ran my line through a line trap, while I was preoccupied with the 3 spool ****-up getting in to OG. Luckily my buddy caught it, and wrapped the line appropriately, then informed me of my mistake on our exit.

Lessons learned:
1) Bring more spools/reels. I had my 2 spools, but I neglected to bring a reel to tie in to the OG line. The next dive in OG I had a 400' reel for that job.

2) Pay attention! (DUH) ... the line doesn't always follow the cave.

3) Pay attention! Or simple drop a line arrow before poking around. This was not a situation where I was ever going to be out of sight of the line, so I don't know if a spool would make any sense here, but an arrow would have been nice.

4) Pay attention! This was a situation where I had my attention on looking like a retard running 3 spools in to OG, and not on running the line appropriately.

All these mistakes were made on 2 out of 8 dives this weekend. For some reason they all happened to be in OG, which is the cave I have the most dives in, by far(about 6 now).

[stairman]

We all make mistakes and as long as their little ones, they can be learning experiences. Lets see, that same dive I didnt have my big primary because my buddy from the week before still had it. I knew how far it was to the sign in there and I always grab my spools with my left hand so keeping my longest orange lined spool to the left will allow me to grab it first next time. I got in the water geared up and had to have Gisselle retreive my fins from the truck.Dah! Then at the end of the dive I lost my wet notes, after the safetystop. Didnt zip my chestpouch back up being that close and they still jumped out. Jason and Rich got em for me so their safely topside. Oh I didnt have any money to pay the admission to Peacock, only a debit card, so I waited till I got caught, which I never did. My main buddy has a family pass but he was at the Daytona 400. I dont remember the dome incident but made sure I could see your light after rounding any corners. Your the third one Ive dove with that missed the cut thru the fissure at zigzag, it end up back at the line but its real silty down there.

[FW]

It can happen to the best of us. I have had the same problem at upper OG too. I have even scootered into a tunnel that was went straight, and was the same size as the one with the line, but the line made a hard turn there. You are right, you have to pay more attention.

You might consider making this an IRAP, since it could have been a big issue if you silted out that bypass.

[Kelly Jessop]

3) Got up off the line to check out a dome around p400 on the OG line, spun around a bit checking it all out and I ascended. Got back down to the line and realized I lost me sense of in/out. Worst case here I would have traveled <100' in the wrong direction. The dome is actually JUST past the 400' arrow, and it was within sight by the time I descended back on to the line.

3) Pay attention! Or simple drop a line arrow before poking around. This was not a situation where I was ever going to be out of sight of the line, so I don't know if a spool would make any sense here, but an arrow would have been nice.

.

May seem excessive,but running a reel will handle any disorientation. Domes can be areas with silt on ledges or fissures with material that will percolate out,so you could be returning to the line in a silt out,and then doing a lost line search. I have seen the most veteran of cave divers go off to look at something,and come back and be disoriented as to direction of travel. Murphy is always looking for an opportunity to strike,and taking extra caution keeps him from striking,or at least turning an emergency into an inconvenience.

[Bobby]

I tell my students that we have a dollar bills worth of attention. We can divide it up however we want but only have a dollars worth. As a new diver to a specific level of diving the new tasks and skills suck up the majority of our dollars worth of attention. The important thing is to know that you are spending more of that attention on basic stuff and to work on keeping the dive as simple as possible.

Interestingly one of my tougher lessons was learned in OG as well. I was off the line a bit "poking around" and stirred up a little silt resulting in lost orientation. I opted to deploy my safety while finding the main line. After finding a rock I tied off and began my search when the line quickly was cut from the sharp rock I had tied off on. This was not the best time to find out that the normal way of tying a bowlin knot (around the tree and through the hole) does not work well under water and under pressure. After an ugly way of securing the line I did find the main line and the direction out. The next dive I retrieved my safety then figured out how to do what I call a one handed bowlin that is easy to do under water.

Glad that your dives were nothing more than good learning experiences.

Bobby

[Line Squirrel]

I was told once "experience comes from mistakes that you manage to live through." I don't remember who I heard that from or where I read it, but it's stuck with me.

[MORGAN]

I was told once "experience comes from mistakes that you manage to live through." I don't remember who I heard that from or where I read it, but it's stuck with me.

A pilot buddy says, "Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment!" and "The superior pilot uses his superior judgment to avoid situations where he might have to use his superior skills." I've often thought both of these apply to diving as well.

Greenwood_60, the most important thing here is that you're realizing your mistakes, thinking about them, and determining to avoid them in the future. That indicates that you've got the most important (and most difficult to teach those that don't have it) attribute - the right attitude.

Mike

[bdd4565]

Thanks for the post Greenwood_60, I've not met many divers who are willing to admit they ever make mistakes!

[Marc Bryan]

Recently, I was diving Little River with a very experienced buddy, both of us have numerous dives there together and know the system very well. We were exiting the system on the merry go round, after a trip to the well casing. Just before the last/first T I decided to run through the screens on my Predator. Checking my ppo2's, GF%, cell mv's, TTS, etc......this takes about 10 seconds. While doing this, I swam right past the T to the left heading towards the exit. Never even saw it. It just so happened that at that exact moment, my buddy decided to check his gas pressures in his SM tanks, and then look up his stop table on his X1. He also swam right by it. Of course I quickly noticed the change in flow, but it just didnt make sense. We then ran into an arrow pointing in the opposite direction of our travel. At this point we both realized what happened, and turned around.

No harm, no foul.......this time. We had plenty of gas, and the excursion the wrong direction only took two minutes. However, if we already had an issue to handle (OOG, equipment failure, medical, etc...) this slight inconvenience could have been the catalyst for disaster.

[OFG-1]

Yours were very minor mistakes, I was hoping to read about more significant mistakes like:

1 - Marrying a transsexual Satan worshiper
2 - Penile piercing
3 - Tattoo of Rosanne Barr on your left buttock
4 - Quitting your job to become a street performer
5 - Opening a dive shop

Hell, now those would be real mistakes.