Can we talk about the time a tender almost killed me with a bad comms check

Working a job off the coast of Galveston last spring, I had this tender named Mike who insisted on doing comms checks by just tapping the mic. No words, just a tap. I'm at 90 feet doing a weld repair on a piling and suddenly I hear nothing for 12 minutes straight. Turns out he was grabbing lunch and thought the taps were fine. Has anyone else had a tender that just doesn't get how critical clear comms are?

3 comments

3 Comments

rodriguez.diana15d ago

My buddy Jake had a tender on a job in the Gulf who thought it was fine to do comms checks by just humming into the mic. Like a low, steady hum like he was trying to tune a guitar. Jake's down at 60 feet patching a crack in a pipe and all he hears is this weird buzzing for ten minutes straight. He thought the guy was having a stroke or something, surfaced cussing him out. The tender said he was just checking the line was open, real casual like it was no big deal.

danielmason15d ago

That humming story makes me feel a little better about the time I accidentally muted my own regulator for a whole dive.

the_jason14d ago

The real problem here is nobody talks about how these comms checks mess with your sense of trust underwater. You're down there relying on audio feedback to tell you your breathing is right and your gear is working. A humming tender or a muted reg both break that. It's like having a copilot who's either dead silent or humming show tunes. Your brain starts second guessing every little hiss and pop. That kind of doubt is how you miss a real problem until it's on top of you.