Sand Pebbles and Observations on Panic in Shallow Water

The water was clear and and it was sunny day in '62 as I entered the water for a short swim to my favorite wreck, the Carl Gerhard seen above, an inshore wreck near the beach at Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. I backed into the waves, letting the tank take the hits with my flippers and mask in my hands. The visibility looked promising even in the surf zone and it was good to be back in the water after almost four days of not diving. I was alone.

When I got chest deep, just beyond the gentle breakers, I put on my mask, turned over, shook out my regulator, placed in my mouth, and hit the clear button. The reassuring flow of air jetted out. Everything was perfect. As I dumped out the sand pebbles out of my flippers, I was astounded as a sand pebble flew into my windpipe from my regulator. It hurt like hell.

The choke and gag reflex took over, but the pebble remained in my windpipe. There was some air going past it but not enough in my high state of anxiety. I tried coughing it up. It did not work. I was afraid to breath fast or hard because it would go down deeper. While my lungs screamed for me to pant, and drawn in deep breaths, I slowly inhaled a full breath past the stoney intruder and when my lungs were about to burst, coughed as hard as I could. The pebble flew up out of my windpipe and went up into my nasal passages, not into my mouth.

Now I had a pain somewhere above the junction between my mouth and nose. I could breath through my mouth but I was hurting. I sneezed several times as hard as I could and ping, the pebble flew into my mask. Everything was fine except my composure. My gear was spread about around me, and I realized I could have stood up with my face out of the water and handled the problem out of the water. In the seemingly hours of the momentary ordeal, I never had the presence of mind to just stand up. This is the essence of panic. When you panic, you are always alone.

The rest of the dive was uneventfull in that there were no emergencies, gold treasure, or mermaids. A couple of years later, on the site of the same shipwreck a shallow water panic attack reared its ugly head again. This time I was not the victim.