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Overheard a deckhand talking about 'just a quick dip' without a standby diver
I was grabbing coffee near the docks in Seattle last week and heard two guys from a small workboat planning a quick inspection dive. The lead guy said, 'It's only 30 feet, we don't need to pull a standby diver for a 10 minute look.' That set off every alarm bell for me. Even a simple job can go wrong in seconds, and a standby isn't just a rule, it's your only real backup if something happens topside. I've seen a simple mask flood turn into a real problem because the surface crew was distracted. Has anyone else run into crews trying to cut this corner on what they think are easy jobs?
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evan_davis6h agoMost Upvoted
Man, that's terrifying. It reminds me of people who don't wear a helmet for a "quick" bike ride or skip the safety harness because they're just going on the roof for a second. We get comfortable and start seeing safety steps as a hassle, not as the thing that saves your life. It's always the routine job where your guard is down that things go sideways, because you've tricked yourself into thinking the rules are for the big, complicated tasks. That deckhand is gambling his life on nothing going wrong for ten whole minutes.
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wader716h ago
Ever wonder why we have these rules in the first place? It's always for the "simple" stuff that goes wrong, like felixm29 said. That deckhand's ten minutes of risk could cost him everything.
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