If you lay a line from A to B, is there a way to retrieve a line from B?

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When you lay line from A to B the reason is to get back to A when at B, if you don’t need to get back to A, why lay it in the first place. Just search for B with your compass.
Tying off means that in poor visibility and current you most definitely do not drift from the starting point.

Relying on your compass, counting kicks and turning 90 degrees *may* work, but if it doesn't you're now in a worse place than you started from.
 
Tying off means that in poor visibility and current you most definitely do not drift from the starting point.

Relying on your compass, counting kicks and turning 90 degrees *may* work, but if it doesn't you're now in a worse place than you started from.
Why worry about the starting point if you don’t plan to go back. The reason for laying line is to get back. Just a waste of time reeling back if there’s no need.
 
Why worry about the starting point if you don’t plan to go back. The reason for laying line is to get back. Just a waste of time reeling back if there’s no need.
Or to find something you HAVE to find, when you don't have other references. Like a lost line in a cave.

Cave divers: what's the protocol after finding the line if you're tied off to something off the line in the lost line search? How do you retrieve the line in a non-emergency? Or would you always treat it as an emergency if you have lost the line during the dive?

Edit: I just noticed this was in basic scuba. But I don't see why you would need to run a line in basic rec diving, so maybe the thread should go somewhere else?
 
Or to find something you HAVE to find, when you don't have other references. Like a lost line in a cave.

Cave divers: what's the protocol after finding the line if you're tied off to something off the line in the lost line search? How do you retrieve the line in a non-emergency? Or would you always treat it as an emergency if you have lost the line during the dive?

Edit: I just noticed this was in basic scuba. But I don't see why you would need to run a line in basic rec diving, so maybe the thread should go somewhere else?
A cave would be a mayor shift of the goal posts. No access to the surface changes everything.
 
Why worry about the starting point if you don’t plan to go back. The reason for laying line is to get back. Just a waste of time reeling back if there’s no need.
Thinking of the times this has happened to me.

Every time I've lost something -- the wreck -- I assume I can just swim out 15m/50ft and find it. Then turn left/right and go in a square search format. All to no avail. Current, inability to swim straight, drifting from the start point...

My successful searches are nearly always when I pin the end of the reel/spool on a rock/anything, swim out by 15m/50ft. Then search around in a large circle around the start point.


For a laugh, my worst example of a failed search was the largest wreck in Sussex, 35,000 tons, using a scooter I managed to get half a mile off the wreck, no matter what circles I swam in. I know that as when I finally abandoned HMS seabed and surfaced, the boat could barely be seen.

So now I stop. If I cannot see it then it's tie down a spool/reel and do a proper search with line.
 
Why worry about the starting point if you don’t plan to go back. The reason for laying line is to get back. Just a waste of time reeling back if there’s no need.
I am doing a circular search (semi circular)
 
Cave divers: what's the protocol after finding the line if you're tied off to something off the line in the lost line search?
Tie off, find the line, tie off and gtfo, basically...
How do you retrieve the line in a non-emergency?
If you've lost the line, presumably things have gone sideways on a dive and you aren't going back then and there. You leave your spool behind.
Or would you always treat it as an emergency if you have lost the line during the dive?

Edit: I just noticed this was in basic scuba. But I don't see why you would need to run a line in basic rec diving, so maybe the thread should go somewhere else?
I reported the thread, and recommended it be moved out of Basic, so I feel ok responding :)
 
Or to find something you HAVE to find, when you don't have other references. Like a lost line in a cave.

Cave divers: what's the protocol after finding the line if you're tied off to something off the line in the lost line search? How do you retrieve the line in a non-emergency? Or would you always treat it as an emergency if you have lost the line during the dive?

Edit: I just noticed this was in basic scuba. But I don't see why you would need to run a line in basic rec diving, so maybe the thread should go somewhere else?

Lost line=emergency if it's bad enough that you're tied off to go find it then you leave that spool and come back and get it later/ask a buddy to get it for you. There is obviously gray area depending on your experience, equipment configuration, and how far you are from the line, but generally speaking if you have to tie off to go find it then the viz is really bad and you got turned around so you leave it and come back when conditions are better. If conditions don't return then you would leave your buddy on the line and basically get reeled back in after you released the other end but in a cave we aren't talking about huge distances when this happens. They feel like a mile in 0 viz, but are usually tens of feet or less
 

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