the_rose•1mo agoProlific Poster

My secondary regulator free-flowed at 90 feet during a harbor inspection

Everyone says to just shut it off and switch to your octo, but that didn't stop the panic when my vision went white with bubbles. I had to manually close the tank valve for a second to kill the flow before I could even see my gauges. What's your actual go-to move when a reg fails deep?

3 comments

3 Comments

danieltaylor1mo ago

Manually closing the tank valve is the real move. Had a first stage start free-flowing at 60 feet once, and that whiteout is no joke. I shut the valve, took a breath off my octo to calm down, then cracked the valve open slow to see if it was just a fluke. It wasn't, so I just shut it down and finished the dive on my buddy's air.

zara_hunt1mo ago

Yikes, that sounds like a great way to flood your second stage.

ivanlewis1mo ago

Freeflow whiteout is terrifying, I once had a reg freeze open at 40 feet and for a second I thought I was inside a shaken soda bottle. Now I'm paranoid and probably look like an idiot every dive because I spend way too much time staring at my SPG and first stage like, "Please don't do that to me." Your move of cracking the valve slow to test it is genius, I would have just panicked and probably ended up breathing off my buddy's octo for the whole dive while making angry bubble noises.