Out of Air in No Time with a Recalled Computer

On my first CoCo View lionfish hunt, I back-rolled into the clear 84-degree water with my new weapon and started down alongside divemaster Gringo Gomez, who was carrying a Zookeeper container for our catch. Among the 15 other divers was another experienced diver I'll call Alex. He was descending headfirst and hadn't noticed the massive cloud of bubbles streaming from his computer hose connection on his tank; his computer was in his BC pocket, and at 75 feet, his cylinder was empty.

He signaled "out of air," and his novice buddy began sharing air with him. Gringo took over the air-sharing and began to ascend calmly with Alex. The Zookeeper and their two spears hampered the ascent, so I took them, and we all ascended calmly to the surface. Alex said he was fine and climbed up on the boat. Gringo and I shook our heads and resumed our hunt.

That night at the CoCo View bar, two divemasters, a dive equipment repair technician, the diver who was out of air, and a few others did a post-mortem. It seemed that the high-pressure hose tank connection for Alex's computer had ruptured, and he only noticed when it became hard to breathe. The technician said that the high-pressure hose on his air-integrated Atomic computer did not have a restricted orifice, an industry standard, to limit air loss in the case of a rupture. In fact, the Consumer Product Safety Commission recalled that Atomic computer in 2012 due to precisely this manufacturing problem. Alex was unaware of the recall and said his dive shop had serviced it without any comments on the recall.

It seems that a trained service technician ought to know what gear has been recalled. While Undercurrent always reports on recalled equipment, you can easily find official SPSC recalls by going to https://www.cpsc.gov/recalls and typing in scuba.