As I promised last article here is the second dive: After we got back on the boat after the first dive the same student that got nauseated was once again not feeling good so we put a life jacket on him again and let him float in the water while on our surface interval, he felt much better.

The surface interval was finished so we all suited up and jumped back in the water. During the surface interval the captain moved the boat to the bridge span 14. We descended down the anchor line to the top of the span; it was 57 feet to the top. I swam around to monitor the students/new divers and saw them doing a great job with their buoyancy and staying close together.

The bridge span 14 was part of the old Hathaway Bridge it joined Panama City to Panama City Beach a few decades ago. I remember this particular span because shortly after they sunk it I brought a bicycle down to rest on it when the expanded metal base was intact. When the Hathaway Bridge was still in place you would drive over it and the expanded metal roadway; your tires would make it vibrate causing a hum, they called those types of bridges singing bridges. Well someone replaced my original bike over the years with a different bike so the tradition lives on.

While I was swimming along the spans I noticed about a 6-foot barracuda swimming alongside of me about 3 feet from my right side. When I stopped it stopped, it swam with me for about 10 minutes then got bored and disappeared into the water column. I surfaced after everyone else and climbed back onto the boat.

Once on the boat I congratulated the new divers and proceeded to talk with a fellow instructor on the port stern of the boat. The dive master of the boat hollered to me that one of the divers was lying on the floor of the boat and was presenting. That means that there is a possible DCS victim, I immediately got there to him and it was the student now diver lying there with his arms folded and hands curled up to his chest. His pupils where pinpoint small and would not react to the light or when he closed his eyes and opened them quickly.

His speech was slurred and he was complaining of a tingling sensation all over his body. We immediately started administering pure O2 and started taking his vitals.

I yelled to the captain to call the Coast Guard and let them know what was happening. They instructed the captain to get underway as quickly as possible and to go to the St. Andrews Park boat dock. That was the closest one to us.

With the O2 the diver started to feel better but not out of the woods yet. While in transit the diver started feeling much better but was still cramped up and tingling.

Well I’m out of space so I will give you the rest of the story next article.

So keep the bubbles flowing.