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Ive only had one true panic situation, which did not happen in a cave.  I was
penetrating a broken up wreck in the gulf of mexico searching for grouper.  I
found a passage into the bow where the ship had crashed to the gulf floor and
opened an entry way into the superstructure.  the opening was approx 1.5 divers
wide and a diver thick, so I did not have alot of room to move around.  I
crawled approx 40 feet into the wreck, vis was about 15feet with a light.
There was a large concentration of snapper (mostly mangrove) and no sign
of any grouper. I decided that I would lay there and wait for the largest
snapper to swim in front of my sights, pop him, and then back out (as there
was insufficient room to turn around.  I shot the largest one I could see after
about five minutes of waiting. At this point I had only been in the structure
for 11 or 12 minutes.  I did not get a good shot off because of distance and
vis.  The fish was gut shot on the lanyard (spear passed thru him) and thrashing
about madly.  This caused the school to panic and I was instantly in a zero
vis situation.  At this point I was not happy about my vis, but I was not
at the point that I considered the situation an emergency.  Because of the lack
of working room and zero vis I decided to back out of the structure and deal
with getting the fish off my lanyard after exiting.  I had backed up about 30
feet and could see the entrance light around me when I suddenly was stopped.
I pushed hard but was snagged on something down at my waste.  Because the
restriction was so tight I could not see what was stopping me, the vis did not
help matters either.  Thoughts about the serious mistakes I had made started
rushing through my head.  My buddy was god knows where hunting just like I
was, I was very tangled in my lanyard as the fish I had speared saw the light
and headed for open water repeatedly.  My first thought was to try and wriggle
out of all of my gear and head for the surface or find my buddy.  The problem
was that I could barely get my hand under my body (and then only forced) and
could not feel where I was snagged or what I was snagged on.  I laid there
and took about five deep breaths and relaxed for a moment.  I decided to move
back into the structure to try and unsnag myself. I went forward and back
several
times but was unsuccessful at clearing myself.  I looked down and back as far
as I could to again try and see what was holding me, at the same time I spotted
the steel beam with fresh dig marks around it, I suddenly remembered hooking my
steel stringer around the bottom ring on my BC.  I was unable to reach the
hook and disconnect, which momentarily panicked me again, until common sense
took over and I crawled back up to my deepest point of penetration where I
could see a break in the beam, which had allowed my stringer to drop down
and become entangled.  I freed myself and carefully backed out of the structure
ignoring the lanyard which was badly tangled around my gear.  I was in the
wreck about 24 minutes.

I contained my panic by laying on the floor of the wreck and just relaxing
for a moment so I could think.  Since then I have made some mental rules
for even casual penetration...

ps...that fish tasted pretty good..

dan

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