c/commercial-divers

Overheard a dive supervisor say 'if it fits, it floats' and now I question everything

Last Tuesday on a barge off Galveston, our supervisor pointed at a 55-gallon drum we were rigging for a lift and said 'if it fits, it floats, just strap it.' We put a skid of rusty anchor chain on top anyway. Thing dipped but held, so now I'm wondering where the actual limit is. Anyone else got a sketchy rigging call that somehow worked out and scared you more than if it failed?

Hyperbaric chamber drills saved my butt on a job in Galveston

Last month I had a routine inspection dive turn sketchy when my comms went dead at 80 feet. I remembered this drill we practiced about hand signals for emergency ascent, and I used it to tell the tender something was off. We got me up slow and steady, no bends, but the whole thing took 4 minutes longer than the textbook says. Has anyone else had a comm failure mid-dive and had to wing it with backup signals?

That $1,300 drysuit repair bill taught me a lesson about zippers

Last season my drysuit zipper started leaking on a job off the coast of Norfolk. I sent it to a shop in Virginia Beach and they quoted me $1,300 for a full replacement and valve service. I almost bought a cheaper suit instead, but I'm glad I paid it because the old one has been solid for 14 dives since. Anyone else spend big money keeping older gear alive instead of upgrading?

Anchor chains keep failing because divers ignore the twist

Last month on a job near Port Arthur, I watched a crew spend four hours fighting an anchor chain that had a full twist two links above the shackle. Everyone checked the shackle pin and the crown, but nobody looked at the twist until I swam up and spun it out in under ten minutes. Why do so many divers skip the simple twist check before calling for a lift?

New drysuit vs my old shell, night and day difference

Finally swapped my beat-up Viking shell for a new Scubapro drysuit after 6 dives in Puget Sound last month. The old one leaked at the neck seal every single dive, I just dealt with it like an idiot. New suit has the quick-dry liner and better wrist seals, no more freezing water down my back. Did a 4-hour harbor job near Seattle and stayed bone dry the whole time. Should've made the switch back in March honestly. Anyone else stick with gear way longer than they should out of stubbornness?

Old timer told me to check my dry suit zipper lube, now I redo it every 2 weeks

The day my drysuit flooded on the first dive of a 6 week contract

Water hit my chest at 40 feet off Aberdeen and all I could think about was the 5 hours of surface interval I had left before the next dive, not to mention the spare suit was back on the boat. I switched to my backup reg and finished the job, but has anyone else had a suit fail right at the start of a long hitch and just powered through?

18 years of drysuit zipper wax and I had it backwards

Been slathering wax on the outside of my drysuit zipper since 2006, then a dive supervisor in Aberdeen told me to wax the inside tape first because that's what actually seals. He was right, my last 15 dives in 4 degree water had zero seepage. Anyone else been doing the outside only this whole time?

Diving in Hood Canal changed my mind about dry suits

After 8 years of wet suit diving in Puget Sound, I did a job in Hood Canal last month and watched the water temp drop from 48 to 41 degrees between two stops, so now I'm saving up for a dry suit, has anyone else made that switch mid-career?

A dive supervisor in Galveston taught me to trust the knots, not the chatter

Out on a pipeline job last spring, this old supervisor I barely knew walked over while I was double checking my lift bag rigging for the fifth time. He just squatted down, looked at the knot for a second, and said "that's not gonna hold if you keep tugging at it like a nervous puppy." He retied it, left one tail longer than I ever would, and walked off. It held a 300 pound spool piece no problem. I spent 10 years obsessing over extra wraps, turns out my tension was the issue, not the knot. Anyone else had an old hand give a tip that went against everything your cert course drilled into you?

Drove 6 hours to a job and my drysuit zipper locked up on the first dive

Tbh, I thought I was good after checking the zipper lube before I left, but the seal got pinched in the damn thing near Port Angeles. Water started seeping in around my chest on a 40 foot wreck dive, so I called it after 10 minutes and had the tender haul me up. I tried working the zipper with some silicone spray and a wrench, but it was fully bound up. Ended up using my backup wetsuit for the rest of the week, which sucked in those temps. Anyone else had a zipper failure like this and found a better way to prevent it in transit?

The 'cheap' titanium hammer finally broke a 90 day streak

I've been trashing guys for years who show up with those bargain bin tools from Harbor Freight... then I grabbed one at a swap meet in Mobile for like 30 bucks, just for demo work. That thing survived 90 straight days of chipping coral and beating on seized bolts, while my $180 brand name hammer bit the dust on day 40. It felt wrong to admit it, but that red handle did the job longer than anything I've trusted. Anyone else had a cheap tool outlast the expensive one, or am I just cursed?

Supervisor swore a drysuit would fix my 40 foot winter dive. It did not.

Last January off Port Angeles, water was 42 degrees. My foreman, old school guy named Dale, says 'just get a drysuit, you'll be fine.' I'd never used one before. First descent, air pockets shift, I'm upside down for 5 seconds. Buddy saw it. Laughing the whole way up. Had to pee in the thing after 2 hours, that was the real struggle. Anyone else get thrown by a drysuit on the first job?

Overheard a supervisor in Port Fourchon say "check your filters twice"

I was sitting in the galley after a 12 hour shift and this old supervisor was telling a green hat about a job where a clogged filter on a Kirby Morgan band mask almost made a guy surface too fast. He said he always checks his exhalation valve filters before every dive now because one grain of sand can mess up your breathing. Makes me wonder how many of us actually do a full pre-dive check on every piece of gear. Anyone else got a habit they picked up from a close call?

Found a simple trick for getting wetsuit zippers unstuck fast

I kept fighting with salt-crusted zippers on my wetsuit after shallow dives in the Keys. Tried rinsing with freshwater but that didn't cut it. Rubbing a candle along the zipper teeth before each dive works way better. Anyone else use something different for this?

Three days straight in 45 degree water near Port Townsend last spring

We were doing a pipeline inspection and my drysuit seal started leaking on day two. By day three I was running on cold coffee and sheer stubbornness while my hands went numb every dive. Anyone else have a job where everything just went sideways?

Had a lift bag fail on me 60 feet down off the coast of San Diego last Tuesday

I was doing a routine pipeline inspection near the Coronado bridge and my primary lift bag just ripped at the seam. Suddenly I'm wrestling a 200 pound piece of equipment that wants to sink straight to the bottom. Managed to clip on a backup bag I always carry (thank god for that habit) and got it up slow and steady. Has anyone else had a bag fail on them like that, or was I just unlucky with a bad batch from the shop?

Found a cheap trick for cleaning my Kirby Morgan mask lenses

I kept getting foggy lenses on my KM 37, tried all the fancy sprays and wipes. Then an old timer told me to rub a drop of dish soap on the inside and rinse it off, no more fog for the whole dive last Tuesday. Has anyone else got a low cost fix like that for their gear?

Took me 3 tries and a blown lift bag to figure out the right recovery angle

I was working on a salvage job in Galveston last month and kept fighting with a 500 lb prop that wouldn't budge. Tried lifting it at a 45 degree angle for 45 minutes and it just kept tipping sideways. Ended up blowing a lift bag because the pressure was all wrong. Finally called a buddy who said to approach it at a 30 degree angle with two bags offset. That took maybe 10 minutes total after I relented. Anyone else have a wreck recovery that took way longer than it should have because of a simple angle fix?

Finally switched from drysuit to wetsuit after 10 years of diving in Puget Sound

I always thought drysuits were the only way to go for cold water, no question about it. Then I saw a guy named Mike doing a 4 hour hull inspection in a 7mm wetsuit with water temps at 48 degrees. He told me he just runs hot and moves fast. I tried it last month on a simple dock repair job and actually stayed warm the whole time plus I had way more freedom of movement. Has anyone else made the switch and stuck with it?

Forgot my backup regulator at the dock in Port Fourchon

Last month I setup on a platform job near Grand Isle. Got to 60 feet and my primary started free flowing. Reached for my backup. Empty. Just the hose dangling. Had to buddy breathe back up. My partner wasn't happy. Now I double check my bag before I leave the truck. Anyone else check their gear three times and still miss something?

The whole "just breathe slow" advice for deep dives is backwards in my experience

I've been doing offshore work out of Aberdeen for 12 years and every time I hear a new guy say they're gonna control their air by breathing slower on a 60-meter dive, I cringe. Your body needs oxygen at depth, and holding your breath or breathing too shallow is how you get a blackout or squeeze injury. Anyone else find that pushing a steady, full breath cycle works better than trying to conserve every bubble?

Toured a dive boat in Louisiana last month and flipped my opinion on commercial hookah setups

I always thought hookah rigs were just for hobby divers, but seeing how efficient the deck crew was with one on a salvage job in Grand Isle really changed my mind. Anyone run a hookah for real money work or is surface supply still the way to go?

Took me 6 years to realize I was flooding my regulator on every surface swim

30 feet down on a salvage job in Galveston last month I saw a guy's bailout bottle gauge reading empty and he kept working

That moment in the chamber after we surfaced made me completely change my mind about pre-dive checks being optional, does anyone else double-check their own gear even when the tender already did it?