Have you ever wondered what an earthquake would feel like if it hit you while scuba diving? If you have, here is a first hand account from Philippines. She survived a big one; 7.2 on the Richter scale.
Source: theguardian.comI could see waterfalls of sand pouring over the coral, and on the seafloor, a few metres below us, cracks began forming and the sand was sucked down
Read the full article at theguardian.com
Underwater Herald has earlier brought you a story about How ice prevented the traditional New Year’s dive at Michigan. Now, here is an equally icy story from Quad Cities. In this story, however, it the ice that makes the diver happy and excited.
Source: qctimes.comThe scariest part of scuba diving under ice for Joe Collins of Eldridge is knowing there’s a ceiling 9 inches thick above you.
“You just can’t go up,” Collins said Saturday.
He spent 17 minutes in water that was 36 degrees. Afterwards, he climbed out, where the air was crisp and the temperature was in the teens.
Read the full article at qctimes.com
Sitting in a speed boat, my dive buddy and I were looking forward to the dive waiting for us at the end of the somewhat rough ride across the waters around Muscat, Oman. We were headed for Three Sisters, a popular dive site in the Ad Dimaniyat Islands Nature Reserve.
There were five of us — a young couple, the dive guide and us — entered the water and started the dive. I was wearing dive gear that I had rented from the dive operator. It was agreed that we would follow a coral wall and then turn back based on air consumption. The young couple was consuming air much faster than us and the dive guide signaled us asking if we would like to continue on our own for the rest of the dive. The conditions being perfect and the route easy to follow, we gave an ok.
We continued a few more minutes before turning back to return to the boat. Some 10 minutes before reaching the boat I suddenly realized that I am not getting air even though I had just checked the pressure gauge, which had been reading over 80 bar. Training kicked in and I swam to my buddy to get the octopus before we ascended to the surface in a surprisingly orderly fashion.
On the surface, I had to inflate the BCD by blowing air in it. Neither the octopus nor the normal regulator worked. After a few attempts the air started to flow through the regulator; first intermittently and then in quite a normal fashion.
A few minutes later we had swam to the boat. I told the dive crew what had happened, recommended servicing the faulty regulator set and required a new set for the subsequent dive. I found it a bit unnerving that they did not acknowledge the seriousness of what had happened in any way. I can only hope that this indifference was not due to them feeling that this was business as usual.
In retrospect I have been trying to identify if I could have avoided the whole situation by doing something differently. Selecting a reputable dive operator and checking the rented gear thoroughly before the dive were not enough this time. Any thoughts anyone?
I never found out what was the root cause of the malfunction but I suspect it was corrosion or dirt in the first stage. While researching the topic I came across of an article that describes a similar experience and a potential explanation: “Weird , Near death causing stuff in regulator!!!”.
Here is an underwater story from Playa del Carmen, Mexico full of romance and with a dash of danger.
A man who filmed his proposal to his girlfriend while diving in shark-infested waters off the coast of Mexico said the proposal took a lot of planning.
Michael Benson said he and his shark-loving girlfriend, Ana Rawls, were on a scuba diving trip in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, and they were swimming with bull sharks when he handed her a diving slate board bearing his proposal, Yahoo! News reported Wednesday
Read the full article at dalje.com
