mask squeeze?

I'm sure I'm not the first...so how long does the blood take to go away?
It's not so nice to look at.

On Thu, 06 Jul 2006 21:48:58 -0500, Emily <rachelp2037@yahoo.com>
wrote:
> I was snorkeling, actually. I didn't think I was down long enough or
> deep enough to do any damage. Never happened while diving.

Then apparently you were far enough below the surface for it to
happen... If you exhale slightly through your nose as you descend,
you'll equalize the pressure in your mask and it shouldn't happen...
It probably never happened for you when you were diving because you
are equalizing your ears and depending upon how you do it, that would
also equalize the pressure in your mask... Then again, since the
airways of the nose and the mouth are connected, just the act of
breathing through your mouth might automatically equalize the mask by
letting air leak back through the nose... Frankly, I've never paid
much attention to it to see if it was possible to get mask squeeze
while breathing through a regulator... Then again, with a mask and
beard, my mask always leaks anyway, so it might be difficult for me to
even get mask sqeeze... I assume that you don't have that problem,
right? <grin>

Emily wrote:
> I'm sure I'm not the first...so how long does the blood take to go away?
> It's not so nice to look at.

One of the guys in my dive club manages to do this fairly often,
usually takes several days to clear and it was well over a week when he
did it badly. Think of it like a bruise.

I read that you did this while snorkeling, you are probably aware of
this but if you are snorkeling with swimming goggles then you should
never dive under the water. Even a few meters decent without the
ability to equalise can give you a barotrauma.

Tony

Tesseract wrote:
> Emily wrote:
>> I'm sure I'm not the first...so how long does the blood take to go away?
>> It's not so nice to look at.
>
> One of the guys in my dive club manages to do this fairly often,
> usually takes several days to clear and it was well over a week when he
> did it badly. Think of it like a bruise.
>
> I read that you did this while snorkeling, you are probably aware of
> this but if you are snorkeling with swimming goggles then you should
> never dive under the water. Even a few meters decent without the
> ability to equalise can give you a barotrauma.

Nah, I was doing it with my diving mask. The odd thing was, every time
I tried to equalize, the air flowed back through my nose and out through
my mouth, and the make stuck right back down on my face. I don't
remember having that happen while diving.

Impossible. Mask squeeze is caused by a vacuum forming in your mask as you
go deeper, not by an overpressure. If you exhale a bit through your nose
you equalize the pressure between the inside of your mask and the external
water pressure. The only other explanation is your strap is too tight.


"Emily" <rachelp2037@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:oaidnfIfJf8IzjPZnZ2dnUVZ_tSdnZ2d@comcast.com. ..
>
> Nah, I was doing it with my diving mask. The odd thing was, every time I
> tried to equalize, the air flowed back through my nose and out through my
> mouth, and the make stuck right back down on my face. I don't remember
> having that happen while diving.

Maxheadspace wrote:
> Impossible. Mask squeeze is caused by a vacuum forming in your mask as you
> go deeper, not by an overpressure. If you exhale a bit through your nose
> you equalize the pressure between the inside of your mask and the external
> water pressure. The only other explanation is your strap is too tight.

Not impossible, because it did happen. Although the strap might have
been too tight.