PMac

I have been a Divemaster for 18 years and I don't see that you really made a mistake.You could have checked your bottle valve but at 80ft and with no air decisions aren't alwayseasy to make perfectly. The odds of an anchor rope hitting your valve in a manner to turn your bottle off is pretty hard to comprehend. There was no reason for your brain to say, "hey my valve probably got closed, I should open it." In fact a first stage failure while almost unheard of makes allot more sense than a rope magically turning your bottle valve off. You made decisions that resulted in you being alive so it looks to me like you made a reasonable decision and you got lucky. I appreciate you sharing this story, it is a good reminder for all skill levels of divers how fast things can go wrong while diving. This event will take you to a new level of diver, one that they don't make a card for!