I learned that...

[NarkedAtZero]

...however inexperienced you are, you have to take responsibility for your own diving.

I dithered a bit before posting this because I’m so new here, but I had a couple of moments as a real novice a few years ago that could have gone seriously wrong, and if someone had given me a heads up I’d have appreciated it. These are really meant for new divers as they’re obvious once you’ve dived a bit, but I’ve seen a couple of comments from beginners about how useful this sub-forum is and I agree with them, so here goes:

First off, just because someone recommends a dive to you it doesn’t mean you should do it. Whatever of your level of experience, you can always say no to a dive.

My very first open water dive immediately after certification abroad was down to and into a wreck in strong current, recommended by the dive centre that had trained me. I was completely terrified throughout the dive, both by the current, which had us Superman-ing on the line on the way down, and by the recently learned words of my OW course which had drilled home the ‘don’t EVER dive in an overhead environment without training because you’ll DIE mwwwahahahaha’ message again and again. Now even though the wreck had been sunk for divers, with lots of external access points, it was still an overhead environment and I spent the whole time on the verge of real blind panic. It was only a handful of luck (and at one point a very beautiful moray eel out in the open to distract me) that prevented me from doing something really stupid. Of course the numpties in the dive centre shouldn’t have recommended it as my first ever dive - you'll be fine, you'll love it, they said - but the final decision whether to go ahead with a dive or not always rests with the diver. With my lack of experience I felt extremely uncomfortable about agreeing to dive into a wreck and could have, and should have, said no to it – but of course it was my lack of experience that prevented me from doing that too!

It takes more than that to put me off, so a few weeks later I passed my Advanced Open Water back in the UK. I met my buddy on the course (we’re still together – bless! ) and so we went out to sea for our first ever buddy pair dive, ie no instructor or DM around to hold our hands. This was my fourth ever (non-training) dive, my buddy’s second.

Various things went wrong during this dive. I was naively under-equipped - my buddy had splurged out for an SMB and a computer, good old buddy, so I thought that meant I didn’t need to spend money on them yet, well he had them and we’d be diving together. (The more astute amongst you will have noticed how readily I disregarded PADI training once money was involved.) Vis wasn’t great, so we got lost almost immediately. I invented which way to go and set off confidently in completely the wrong direction down the gentle slope to the bottom of Mixon Hole. My buddy was having some problems, not least with my behaviour – he couldn’t keep up with my blistering pace, simultaneously having trouble venting air from his rented dry suit and ended up doing an uncontrolled ascent behind me, taking his computer and SMB with him, the swine. So I found myself alone at 27m with no buddy, no surface marker and no timing device whatsoever, not even a watch. Oh, and bugger all diving experience too, of course. I waited there for a bit, hoped desperately that he hadn’t drowned, got scared, hoped I wouldn’t drown, did a guestimated safety stop and surfaced to find I’d drifted a considerable distance from the RIB. Luckily they saw me. And luckilyer (I believe that’s the word) my buddy was fine.

From this disastrous dive, among many other things (importance of navigation, speed underwater, reading underwater topography and depth gauges etc), I learned to pay proper attention to my buddy - communication is really hard underwater, if something’s up with the person you’re diving with, don’t ignore it or leave them to it, slow it all down, help them.

And I learned to get what equipment I need for a dive, and not share kit underwater! If your buddy happens to be the selfish bastard type who takes all the bits you’re sharing up to the surface with him when he uncontrollably ascends - and I think most of them are - you’ll need to get your own, and the time to learn that isn’t when you’re stuck on your own down there...!

[ardhill]

Good points!

[Sea-M]

good post - and yes for new divers the forum makes for some good reading

i dont think i would have even agreed to go on the wreck dive as a brand spanking new diver, just shows that you cant even trust the guys that train you sometimes... russian roulette anyone?

its funny how as a fresh OW diver you are free to buddy up with other OW's and merrily skip off to a dive site - cos youre both qualified....

the reality of how "little" you know doesnt become apparent until a problem occurs... im an OW and feel quite confident doing 25m dives with my buddy - this is because he is my old man and an ex bsac instructor that first started diving about 30 years ago..

however with another diver the same level as me... fk that!, im not nearly ready to be sure of my own skills, not to mention someone elses... and im certainly not ashamed to say "i need my hand held"

from experience and hearing what people have said here - its very easy to find yourself heading for the incident pit!

[Buoyant Babe]

Good post!

Hxxx

[ratcliffe]

Good post, NaZ, and one which is full of good reminders to divers, both new and more experienced.

[ShinyD]

Good post NaZ, and as I've said in other posts, useful pointers to us newer guys on the pitfalls to watch out for! Green incoming

[javisil]

Regarding the second incident, below quoted, when your buddy shot up. The only way to follow him would be to shoot up as well. Depending on the dive, you may need to do a controlled ascent or a decompression stop (it seems you only needed a safety stop, but I am not sure) If you do not ascent safely you may be in no position to help your buddy or even call for help if necessary.

You need to balance keeping in contact with your buddy and your own safety.

Experienced divers, please elaborate

Originally Posted by NarkedAtZero

...however inexperienced you are, you have to take responsibility for your own diving.

I dithered a bit before posting this because I’m so new here, but I had a couple of moments as a real novice a few years ago that could have gone seriously wrong, and if someone had given me a heads up it’d have appreciated it. These are really meant for new divers as they’re obvious once you’ve dived a bit, but I’ve seen a couple of comments from beginners about how useful this sub-forum is and I agree with them, so here goes:

First off, just because someone recommends a dive to you it doesn’t mean you should do it. Whatever of your level of experience, you can always say no to a dive.

My very first open water dive immediately after certification abroad was down to and into a wreck in strong current, recommended by the dive centre that had trained me. I was completely terrified throughout the dive, both by the current, which had us Superman-ing on the line on the way down, and by the recently learned words of my OW course which had drilled home the ‘don’t EVER dive in an overhead environment without training because you’ll DIE mwwwahahahaha’ message again and again. Now even though the wreck had been sunk for divers, with lots of external access points, it was still an overhead environment and I spent the whole time on the verge of real blind panic. It was only a handful of luck (and at one point a very beautiful moray eel out in the open to distract me) that prevented me from doing something really stupid. Of course the numpties in the dive centre shouldn’t have recommended it as my first ever dive - you'll be fine, you'll love it, they said - but the final decision whether to go ahead with a dive or not always rests with the diver. With my lack of experience I felt extremely uncomfortable about agreeing to dive into a wreck and could have, and should have, said no to it – but of course it was my lack of experience that prevented me from doing that too!

It takes more than that to put me off, so a few weeks later I passed my Advanced Open Water back in the UK. I met my buddy on the course (we’re still together – bless! ) and so we went out to sea for our first ever buddy pair dive, ie no instructor or DM around to hold our hands. This was my fourth ever (non-training) dive, my buddy’s second.

Various things went wrong during this dive. I was naively under-equipped - my buddy had splurged out for an SMB and a computer, good old buddy, so I thought that meant I didn’t need to spend money on them yet, well he had them and we’d be diving together. (The more astute amongst you will have noticed how readily I disregarded PADI training once money was involved.) Vis wasn’t great, so we got lost almost immediately. I invented which way to go and set off confidently in completely the wrong direction down the gentle slope to the bottom of Mixon Hole. My buddy was having some problems, not least with my behaviour – he couldn’t keep up with my blistering pace, simultaneously having trouble venting air from his rented dry suit and ended up doing an uncontrolled ascent behind me, taking his computer and SMB with him, the swine. So I found myself alone at 27m with no buddy, no surface marker and no timing device whatsoever, not even a watch. Oh, and bugger all diving experience too, of course. I waited there for a bit, hoped desperately that he hadn’t drowned, got scared, hoped I wouldn’t drown, did a guestimated safety stop and surfaced to find I’d drifted a considerable distance from the RIB. Luckily they saw me. And luckilyer (I believe that’s the word) my buddy was fine.

From this disastrous dive, among many other things (importance of navigation, speed underwater, reading underwater topography and depth gauges etc), I learned to pay proper attention to my buddy - communication is really hard underwater, if something’s up with the person you’re diving with, don’t ignore it or leave them to it, slow it all down, help them.

And I learned to get what equipment I need for a dive, and not share kit underwater! If your buddy happens to be the selfish bastard type who takes all the bits you’re sharing up to the surface with him when he uncontrollably ascends - and I think most of them are - you’ll need to get your own, and the time to learn that isn’t when you’re stuck on your own down there...!

[Harlequin]

I had a similar incident on a dive a while back so as I had a back-up SMB simply sent this to the surface while I made my way up so the boat crew knew where I was and that I was OK.

Interesting post and I hope that more new divers go and buy themselves the basics such as a depth guage or computer and an SMB (especially if doing a sea dive).

Thanks for posting

PS:

When you have aformentioned SMB, practice. I know lsley helped me with mine quite a few times before I took it into the sea and also let me borrow a few of hers o I could find out which style I preferred.

[David]

Originally Posted by Harlequin

Interesting post and I hope that more new divers go and buy themselves the basics such as a depth guage or computer and an SMB (especially if doing a sea dive).

I think NarkedAtZero post is clasic :-)
should be saved for every new diver to read.
As for Sea diveing without an smb, Timer just madness

David

[NarkedAtZero]

Originally Posted by javisil

Regarding the second incident, below quoted, when your buddy shot up. The only way to follow him would be to shoot up as well. Depending on the dive, you may need to do a controlled ascent or a decompression stop (it seems you only needed a safety stop, but I am not sure) If you do not ascent safely you may be in no position to help your buddy or even call for help if necessary.

You need to balance keeping in contact with your buddy and your own safety.

Experienced divers, please elaborate

You're certainly right about always looking out for your own safety first, or else you're likely to compound the problem. In this case, as we were well within our NDLs I'd have been better off surfacing (safely, slowly) without a safety stop once it became obvious me and my buddy had become properly separated, and alerting the boat if he wasn't there.

Of course it would have been better still to have been prepared (skills, equipment etc) in advance, to save ourselves from being put in that position in the first place...

NaZ