Divemaster life – Rescue course

maj 2, 2014   //   by supernova   //   Blog, Divemaster

What a day! Can’t believe how much fun learning can be.
A couple of days ago me and Jill (not just a great divemaster trainee but also an amazing friend) helped Andre with a rescue course in Sanur. An experienced diver called James had decided it was time to learn about taking care of others in any kind of dive emergency. Me and Jill were being the victims for all the skills he needed to learn.
I’m telling you: so much fun!

The day started out when I, Andre and Jill arrived to Crystal Divers at 08.30.
Andre made a briefing for us, so that we would know what was about to happen later.
Basically it was more or less panicking and being tired, being out of air underwater, cutting ourselves or being overexerted.
James would had to recognize the situation and handle it the best way he knew.

Half an hour later James arrived and we all packed ourselves to a cozy green bemo, and drove 5 minutes to the beach.
A small taxiboat took us to the real boat, where all of our gear was waiting for us with another divegroup from Crystal.
Me and Jill checked so that everything was on board, and afterwards started setting up our gear and weightbelts.
Because the other group was doing 2 dives and we were only doing one, we let them enter the water first.
While waiting them to get ready, Andre briefs James about the skills.
Me and Jill help the other group find their fins and other small stuff, so things would be as easy as possible for them.

When we got in water, Andre keept signaling us how to act.
We were practicing panicked diver and overexerted diver for several times, and me and Jill really started running out of air for
real as we needed to breath so shallow and quick.
But I’m telling you, it was so much fun seeing how he managed the situations with both Jill and me.

lumi2

Before we were done with the underwater skills, James needed to organize a find-a-missing-diver-situation.
We all went up, and Andre told me and Jill to go down to a certain spot we had decided earlier.
We went down near to a Jackline on the bottom, and when James and Andre arrived, I was acting unresponsive.
James needed to get me to the surface, and with a little misunderstanding the skill was getting too realistic…

When I did my own rescue diver, we did Rescue 7 skill right after this one. That skill is the one where the rescuer keeps giving the victim rescue breaths while taking off his/her gear off and towing him/her back to the boat. Once James had got me to the surface, I kept on acting unresponsive, evenhtough we were supposed to be done with the skill. After a few moments I started hearing worried voices ”Lumi? Lumi, are you okay?”, but first though it was part of the game.
When I finally response Jill was pretty horrified and said that it wasn’t a funny joke. Yeah, sure, but I wasn’t trying to be funny. Sorry Jill! :)

Once everyone was okay again, it was time for surface skills. Mostly same as underwater, but much more exhausting!
Definitely no need to hit the gym after all the jumping in water…

After all we all were so to say okay. I might have fallen off the boat just by being clumsy, normal me, but no big injuries done.
In any case, we had our amazing rescue diver James taking care of the ”small” leg-covering scratches!
Amazing day and 4 smiling, happy divers coming back from the dive!

//Lumi Divemaster Traine Crystal Divers