A surface support guy named Ray taught me more than any dive school ever did

I was working on a bridge inspection job in Norfolk, VA about 4 years ago. My first dive, I was nervous and fumbling with my comms check. Ray, this older guy on deck, just pulled me aside and said 'take a breath, talk to me like I'm your buddy at a bar, not a checklist.' He showed me how to breathe slow and pace my words so the topside crew could actually hear me. Has anyone else had an older tender or supervisor give them one simple piece of advice that stuck with them?

2 comments

2 Comments

nancy_davis1mo ago

Old heads like Ray always know the real tricks. That breathing thing is gold.

brooke7125d ago

That breathing thing is gold"? Man, that hit me harder than I expected. I still catch myself doing that bar-buddy thing every single time I put a helmet on, even now when I'm the one topside calling the shots. It's crazy how one little trick from some random Ray can rewrite your whole approach to comms, like all that formal training went out the window the second someone said "talk to me like a normal person." I honestly thought I was the only one who got that kind of life-changing advice from a surface guy instead of an actual instructor. Now I'm wondering if every old Ray out there is just sitting on a goldmine of simple stuff that nobody writes down in the manuals.

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