Mailing List Archive

Mailing List: techdiver

Banner Advert

Message Display

Date: Sun, 22 Aug 1999 19:38:04 -0700
To: "Richard Pyle" <deepreef@bi*.or*>
From: Kevin Connell <kevin@nw*.co*>
Subject: RE: Helium willies- leaning from the past
Cc: techdiver@Aquanaut.com
Not sure if this will make it to techdiver, but...

I am interested in this thought of stiffness with deeper dives.  In my 
discussions with my instructor (who's done a few deep dives, some somewhat 
long ones, too ;-)  during my mix course, he talked about how pressure in 
general can make you joints and muscles sore, which sometimes makes people 
a little paranoid about dcs symptoms.  This would certainly go along with 
what I feel, but if this were the case, would the commercial divers doing 
really deep stuff be in really bad shape, or are their decompressions so 
long, that the symptoms/inflammatin subside during that time?

Does equilateral pressure (water pressure) put pressure on joints and 
muscles in a fashion that causes some sort of inflammation?  What about you 
WKPP guys doing the long bottom times, do you get general soreness (I know 
ibuprofin is used a bit, too) on longer dives, or is depth the main factor, 
not time.




At 10:45 AM 8/22/1999 -1000, you wrote:

>I'm not going to argue with you.  You can believe whatever you want.  When I
>first started doing deep heliox dives, I wasn't sure if it was physiology of
>psychology (=fear).  I've done it enough times now, and have discussed it
>with others who have done it enough times now, that the "fear" explanation
>just doesn't hold water. 70% helium is about right - I use a mix of 70%
>helium, 20% nitrogen and 10% oxygen, and that seems good to about 380 or so.
>Below 380, my head is relatively clear, but my muscles start to stiffen a
>bit.  This isn't obvious - it's subtle.  You might not even notice it if you
>didn't need high muscular finesse to accomplish a task (such as capturing
>fishes), but it's definitely there, and it's definitely not "fear". Either,
>as you say, you've given up deep diving and will no longer be a player, or
>you will try a bunch to deep heliox dives and will eventually come back and
>tell us something similar to what you said below:
>
>"My 'fear' statement was pure bullshit, and I think we can all see that
>now."
>
>Aloha,
>Rich
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: kirvine@sa*.ne* [mailto:kirvine@sa*.ne*]
> > Sent: Sunday, August 22, 1999 2:22 AM
> > To: William M. Smithers
> > Cc: Richard Pyle; TechDiver
> > Subject: Re: Helium willies- leaning from the past
> >
> >
> > No, it was fear. The next dive we did screwed up so badly that Casey
> > quit diving. I called the "jitters" dive after 3500 feet, and the next
> > dive we all ran out of gas three times - not too cool. Everyone was
> > fumbling with the bottles. After that we jacked the helium.
> >
> > In fact, when Casey came back, he thought we were still diving the lower
> > helium mixes and higher oxygen.
> >
> > JJ, Bill Mee and some of the others are actually diving pure heliox now
> > . I do not have a booster, so I am at the 70-80% zone running backed off
> > pressures in my rebreather supply bottles and my back tanks.
> >
> > We looked at all of the possibilities of what was going on with us, and
> > came to the conclusion that we needed to add more margin for error to
> > the dives to reduce the fear and add more helium to increase the clarity
> > and improve the deco results.
> >
> > I did some dives nine years ago, like when Gavin aned I put the end in
> > the Turner Sink syphon, where I intentionally used high nitrogen to calm
> > me down ( dove 15X40 ), but all it did was cause me to slow way down and
> > have screwups, like losing my pencils and lights and compass while
> > surveying, dropping them from my hand and never knowing it .
> >
> > We were diving just the two of us with no support, no backup scooters,
> > no safties, diving to thirds in a raging syphon at 295 on the roof
> > adding line. We got out of the water with no gas to our names. This is
> > the kind of thing that got Gavin and others to quit this sport.
> >
> > I changed all of that in the last few years, have done some several
> > hundred of these dives the easy way now, and can tell you that after
> > several hundred deep wreck and ocean dives and several hundred extreme
> > cave dives, it is feer, not "willies", and nitrogen is bullshit of the
> > worst order. Now we come back wtih full backtanks.
> >
> > Now we take away anything from the dive that is a concen and replace it
> > with more backup, do it right, and love it.
> >
> > Will, I am not afraid to think out loud, learn and progress. I stand in
> > stark contrast to eveyone else who fails to really go out and learn
> > anything. I do not need to take it to the point of a death to change,
> > and have actively done so for the last few years.
> >
> > My "willies" statement was pure bullshit , and I think we can all see
> > that now. We have this down to paint-by-nunmbers at WKPP, and we are
> > still trying to improve it and learn more.
> >
> > You will note that you never saw me ever recommmend any of the insanity
> > we did in the past, and in fact Gavin said that if I ever told anyone
> > about any of our personal dives, he would deny it. The problem was the
> > he and I were bad company for each other when there was line on the reel
> > and open cave in front of us. The reality is that we are both here by
> > the Grace of God only, and we both owe it to everyone else to tell the
> > truth and show how it really should be done. Also, the caves are so long
> > now that our past bullshit would not cut it .
> >
> > Now we "walk down and ( do) them all", so to speak.
> >
> > William M. Smithers wrote:
> > >
> > > On Sat, 21 Aug 1999, Richard Pyle wrote:
> > > > > Will, this effect is called "fear" - what more of these
> > guys need - not
> > > > > pre hpns. It comes from the sudden realization that you are doing
> > > > > something very stupid, and then the environment becomes
> > more facinating
> > > > > than the fear.
> > > >
> > > > Ah ha! Just as I suspected.  You've never actually done a deep heliox
> > > > dive, have you....?  Just try a few - especially with fast descents.
> > > > You'll come around.
> > >
> > > Who knows, but here's the quote I was thinking of - from Sept. 3, 1997
> > >
> > > ltgmirvine@sa*.ne* <George Irvine> wrote:
> > > > narcosis in that case.  That side may be easier to explain that the
> > > > helium jitters. Otherwise, Casey told me I was acting jittery
> > on a dive
> > > > that was routine and easy, so maybe it is there for real.
> > >
> > > -Will
> >
> >
>
>--
>Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'.
>Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.


----------------------------------
  Kevin Connell <kevin@nw*.co*>

  NW Labor Systems, Inc
  http://www.nwls.com

  Who is John Galt?
----------------------------------

--
Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'.
Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.

Navigate by Author: [Previous] [Next] [Author Search Index]
Navigate by Subject: [Previous] [Next] [Subject Search Index]

[Send Reply] [Send Message with New Topic]

[Search Selection] [Mailing List Home] [Home]