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The Top 3 Dangers of Scuba Diving

Scuba diving is a risky sport. Make no mistake about that. But when asked just how dangerous scuba diving is, the answer comes in the form of another question – “How responsible is the scuba diver?”

Indeed, the danger of scuba diving can be said to be directly proportional to the responsibility of the diver. So if you are a safe diver – that is, one who has proper training and responsible attitude and also uses reliable modern scuba diving equipment, then scuba diving is only a bit more dangerous than say, sports like hockey or baseball.

However, if your brand of scuba diving is one attended by recklessness and bad judgment, then scuba diving may even be more dangerous than most extreme sports, like street luge or mountain climbing.

Indeed, there are many risks to scuba diving. That is why before you can scuba dive or get certification, you need training where you can learn about those risks and how to avoid them.

Here are some primers of the three greatest risks that every scuba diver faces while underwater, from an explanation of why they occur and what you can do to avoid them or minimize the damage caused. 

Barotrauma

There are more than 9 million recreational scuba divers in the United States alone. And each year, a high percentage of divers report dive-related disorders and injuries, the most common of which is barotrauma.

What is barotrauma? It is described as pressure-related (baro) injury (trauma) to tissues that have air spaces in them – e.g., lungs, ears.

To better understand what pressure does to our bodies, we would have to go into physics and explain Boyle’s law. It makes for an interesting read…on a rainy day, the weather too bad to even consider a short dive. So let’s just make this simple and brief.

Have you tried climbing up a mountain? Have you noticed how it is more difficult to breathe when you reach the top than when you are at the bottom?

That is because there is less air pressure up there than down here. When you are in space, there is absolutely no pressure and you can’t breathe. That is why astronauts have to wear these special suits to enable them to function normally.

Now, when you go underwater, the situation is reversed. Water is denser than air and therefore exerts more pressure. The deeper you go underwater, the more pressure you get.

Pressure can do many interesting things to the body besides the obvious – e.g., when you hit your thumb with a hammer or when you punch somebody’s face. That is barotrauma right there. In the literal sense. Barotrauma in scuba diving, however, takes a far more serious note.

Several parts of the body may be affected by barotrauma as you go deeper underwater. Virtually every part that contains air – ears (the middle ear in particular), the lungs, the intestines, the stomach, the chest cavity, etc. – can get affected by barotrauma.

Barotrauma in the ear is perhaps the most common and the most easily resolved. When talking about making their descent, divers often talk about “clearing” or “popping” the ears. This is the process of equalizing the pressure inside the ears

and that of outside in order to prevent the middle ear that is filled with air from getting damaged, making one lose his orientation and go dizzy.

You can do this by pinching your nostrils or pressing your thumbs underneath your mask, placing your tongue to the roof of your mouth, and gently blowing through your nose. This way, the air will go up to your middle ear and equalize the pressure inside with the pressure of the water outside.

In order to minimize the effects of changing pressure on the body, divers also have to maintain control over the speed of both their ascent and descent. You can’t go down or up too fast because there would be serious consequences.

For instance, on the ascent, lung-squeeze or over-expansion could occur, resulting to serious disabilities, if not death.

Lung-squeeze occurs when the air inside the lungs are lesser than the residual volume (the minimum size the lungs become when you exhale all the air out). Your lungs are never completely empty. Because if they totally deflate, there is a very big possibility that they will not be able to re-inflate since the small surfaces tend to stick together, making it impossible to un-stick them. This condition is called a “collapsed lung.”

With barotrauma, the lungs do not always completely collapse but they could rupture due to rib penetration. There might also be a fluid build-up in the lungs, leading to pneumonia.

Another possibility is lung over-expansion. This happens when you take in air while underwater and do not let it out on your way to the surface. Take an inflated balloon and bring it with you at 33 feet. The balloon will reduce to half its original size. However, when you bring it right back to the surface, it will return to its normal size.

Now, take the same balloon and this time fill it with air only at 33 feet. When you bring the balloon to the surface, it will explode. Imagine what would happen to a diver’s lungs when they are filled with water and the diver goes up to the surface. Awful things could happen. So it is advised that you ascend slowly, blowing out air as you go.

Also, remember this one rule: Never hold your breath when scuba diving. 

Decompression Sickness

You can better understand how decompression sickness happens by doing an experiment involving seltzer water. If you hold an unopened bottle of seltzer water to the light, you will find that the contents look exactly like water. But if you shake it, you will notice bubbles quickly going to the surface.

Wait until there are no more lingering bubbles before opening the bottle. A blast of gas will greet you. These are the bubbles and they will continue gurgling in the liquid for some time until all the gas is released.

Now, for the experiment, your assignment is to open the bottle of seltzer water in such a way that no bubbles will form. Is it possible? Yes, by way of a valve in a special cap on the bottle. The valve can be turned just a bit to let some of the gas out before quickly shutting the valve to prevent more gas from escaping.

If you do this numerous times for a period of time, then your assignment is possible. The seltzer water will go flat and no bubbles will form. Now, relate this to scuba diving.

You are a bottle of seltzer water. If you go underwater and then come up to the surface too quickly, the effect is similar to opening a bottle of seltzer quickly. Bubbles will form in your blood and elsewhere, causing decompression sickness.

However, if you dive and then come up slowly, that is like opening the valve just the slightest bit and doing so until you finally get to the surface. 

How does this happen? It’s an old story really about how high pressure always flows to low pressure. The bubbles in the seltzer water are high pressure air molecules and they are all raring to go up to the surface where the pressure is lower. In their excitement, they tend to stick together, forming one gigantic bubble big enough to take billions of molecules up to the surface at once.

Imagine this happening inside your body. You are a scuba diver and after spending some time underwater, the molecules inside your body are pressurized. If you go up too quickly, the result can be unpleasant. On the other hand, if like turning the valve, you go slowly up, this will allow some of the molecules to escape without resorting to bubble formation and thus avoid decompression sickness.

So remember this rule: Don’t go too fast up. 

Nitrogen Narcosis

In scuba diving, there is a law known as “Martini’s Law.” It states that “every 50 feet of seawater equals one dry martini on an empty stomach.” Of course, this is not exactly accurate, but just imagine. If a diver was at 200 feet, that is like being intoxicated after drinking four martinis. This condition is called nitrogen narcosis, and although it is not quite as common as barotraumas or decompression sickness, it has been said to occur when deep diving.

The first widely read description of the intoxicating effect of nitrogen under pressure is found in Chapter Two, titled “Rapture of the Deep,” of Jacques Cousteau’s book, The Silent World. In this chapter, Didi (Frederic Dumas) wrote an account of his experience deep diving to a depth of 210 feet of water:

“The light does not change color as it usually does underneath a turbid surface. I cannot see clearly. Either the sun is going down quickly or my eyes are weak. I reached the hundred foot knot. My body doesn’t feel weak but I keep panting. The damn rope doesn’t hang straight. It slants off into yellow soup. It slants more and more. I’m anxious about that line, but I really feel wonderful. I have a queer feeling of the beatitude. I am drunk and carefree. My ears buzz and my mouth tastes bitter. The current staggers me as though I had too many drinks.

“I have forgotten Jacques and the people in the boats. My eyes are tired. I lower on down, trying to think about the bottom, but I can’t. I’m going to sleep, but I can’t fall asleep in such dizziness. There’s a little light around me. I reach the next knot and miss it. I reach again and tie my belt on it.

“Coming up is merry as a bubble, Liberated from weights I pull off the rope and bound. The drunken sensation vanishes. I’m sober and infuriated to have missed my goal. I pass Jacques and hurry on up. I am told I was down seven minutes.”

Many of the gases have a narcotic effect when mixed with 21% oxygen. So when you breathe nitrous oxide in the dentist’s chair, you feel drunk and happy as a bee. Xenon, another gas, also has narcotic effects, far stronger than even nitrous oxide so that it has been used for anesthesia.

Your body’s reaction to nitrogen narcosis underwater is much like how you would react to alcohol. It depends on several different factors, not just the degree of pressure. Personality, body size, fat content, mood, breathing, depth, activity, and what you are looking to do could all come into play.

And the reactions could be varied. One famous anecdote is about this diver who was trying to break a record. A safe diver was observing him from 200 feet. The last thing he saw was the diver (at 300 feet) offering his regulator to the fish before the latter sank down to 3,000 feet.

Many certification agencies try to overcome this very real danger to a diver’s life by performing simple cognitive tests while going down. For instance, you are diving with your buddy and you give him a signal with a thumbs up. He is supposed to signal you back with two thumbs up. If one of you makes a mistake, then you should abort the dive because it’s possible that nitrogen narcosis has set in.

There are several more risks that you will likely encounter while scuba diving. However, this should not deter you from having fun. Just follow the rules, be responsible, and don’t get a bloated sense of self, and you should be fine. Training will teach you the rules. Common sense will teach the other two. And the rest is fun.

The world underwater is a truly breathtaking and enchanting place. Why do you think so many recreational divers go down there all the time? It is one thing to look at static pictures of corals and fishes. It is completely another thing to see these things for yourself.