How often do you "Plan your dive, dive your plan"? Preliminary Survey Results

[RJP]

Did they elaborate on what constitutes "planning"? What I do for planning might not look like planning to other people. And vice versa.

As mentioned above, I asked about seven different ways that a person might plan a dive. After that you let the law of large numbers and normal distribution correct for variances in how people interpret the questions. With a quant study there's no way to solve for every possible individual response.

 

[Steve_C]

A lot of real world diving is guided diving,

Some places. I have hired a guide a couple times just to avoid an instabuddy on a special dive but in NC most dives are not quided.

I suspect the prevalent level of navigational competence in the larger rec. diving community would fall short of what the forum membership would hope. It's a weakness of mine. For example, would you...

1.) Always rely on a guide or buddy to navigate, or stay very close to a major landmark, such as an anchor line or small wreck, or in sight of the boat?
.......

You missed an option. To me the number one rule of navigation is to get back to the anchor with enough gas. If I want to get out of sight of the anchor and cannot rely on natural navigation, like a badly broken up wreck or low viz on a ledge, then I am not going to mess with trying to use a compass. I will run a line from my reel. Simple, safe, and guaranteed. Removes the risk of open water ascents away from an anchored boat and all that entails.

Do watch where you are going when coming back with a reel. Ran into the side of an 8 ft sand tiger while staring at my reel. Scared both of us. Lesson learned.

 

[spectrum]

For the vast majority of recreational dives that are usually more or less reciprocal there is no need other than each diver setting the appropriate turn pressure and signalling the team when one diver hits the number.

Following up after seeing post 22 I guess that's planning.

 

[JohnN]

I'll confess to answering the question that I don't use my computer or dive tables to "plan" a dive. My local diving is in very benign (although cold) environment. Jump off the boat, follow the mooring line down, return to the mooring line with enough gas to give me 500 PSI at the surface (and I dive with a HP120). If my computer says I'm getting close to my NDL, I just move a little higher in the water column. Based on the other answers, it doesn't look like your question was sufficiently nuanced.

 

[scubadada]

I do a lot of diving off commercial boats in south Florida. I imagine a lot of people who are on those charters do 90% of their diving like that. Here is a typical two tank dive:
1. Visit a wreck at about 70-80 feet and ascend when your gas hits the same level you have ascended from the previous 70-80 times you have done a dive like that.
2. Do a drift dive in which you drop to 45-50 feet and ascend when your gas hits the same level you have ascended from the previous 70-80 times you have done a dive like that, or 50 minutes, which ever comes first.

I am willing to guess that very few divers do any real planning beyond what that entails for the dives, and it doesn't bother me a bit.

That describes my average dives reasonably well. I do frequently check my computer dive planner regarding NDLs and SIs during repetitive dives. On the other hand, I do plan some dives quite carefully

 

[drmwc]

boulderjohn's post sums up my diving pretty well, which is club diving in the UK.

Most diving days are 2-tank boat dives, with a wreck for the first dive. The second dive varies, but is typically a drift to collect food after a long surface interval. The planning is typically not hugely complex, since it doesn't need to be.

 

[Storker]

I think I belong to the "always" group. But like it is mentioned before, how much planning is implicit and how much planning needs to be discussed before the dive largely depends on the dive and the buddies.

With a group of similar trained divers on fun rec dives, we usually already know what tank(s) each of us are using, we know we all use rock bottom gas planning, all we need to know is the max depth of the site, so that we know our approximate bottom time. Ascent strategy is also agreed upon, and usually need not to discuss. To observers, it feels like we don't have a plan. We have done some dives that we intended to get something done, like finding something or laying lines for something. In those dives, we talked about a lot more planning. With instant buddy, I usually bring up more topics. This sometime annoys the buddy, but I think it is always better to talk about things before the dive than to talk about it afterward.

Exactly this.

When I was less experienced, I usually did more explicit planning using my tables and/or my computer. These days, most of my dives are covered by a small handful of standard profiles¹ which I know more or less by heart. Although I don't use much time on the minutiae of planning unless I anticipate a non-standard profile, I'm still planning my dives IMO.

And any dive is preceded by a talk-through with my buddy: Max operating depth, max contingency depth, rough profile, direction and what's the primary purpose of the dive (scallop harvesting, sight-seeing, doing exercises, hunting, photo etc.). For my regular buddy, that discussion usually takes about 30 seconds, with an instabuddy it takes a little longer. And I always inform the dive leader/boat tender about max depth and max run time, that in itself requires a decent idea about the outline of the dive.


¹ e.g. max depth 25m, max time 25min or until 110 bar, ascend to max 15m, safety stop after 50 minutes run time or 50-60 bar. Bottom time 50min, reported total run time 60min (small margin for delays, so as not to worry the boat tender or get an earful from the dive leader if I miss a little on my time)

 

[BDSC]

I haven't planned a dive in years. Just got back from Little Cayman and last week the diving went like this,

1. The DM draws a map of the dive site on the white board and tells you what to look for.
2. The DM tells you to do a max of 110 ft. for 50 minutes (but you can pretty much do whatever you like)
3. You get your gear on and jump in.
4. Swim in one direction for about 20 to 25 minutes and turn and come back keeping a check on your air.

That's about it. There is nothing there I would call planning.

Most folks, when you talk about planning your dive, think back to when they got certified and you pulled out the tables and started doing some calculations etc. about how long you can stay at some depth and that sort of thing. Maybe now you could do that during a course using a dive computer. I don't know of a person or have ever seen a person on a boat use any sort of table or computer to go over their upcoming dive. I don't think I have even heard anyone discuss with a buddy what their "plan" is. For a lot of what I call typical recreational diving, I see no need to plan a dive.

 

[bradells]

Dive planning is like an envelope. You can add as much or as little to it as you please.

One side of that envelope is max depth, the other is bottom time (and if applicable deco)

You could fill it with things like:
What are you wanting to accomplish out of the dive? (Look at mud, fish, photos, video, practice, where to go, etc)
Who's going to do what and how? (Navigation/lead/ascend as a group or in pairs/dive flag/etc)
Equipment checks (do you have the right stuff, and does it work and will it be easily accessible?)
Ascent strategies (safety stop, continuous ascent, etc)
Gas (can you use it all, or do you need to come back to a location - ie shore/anchor)
Any other hazards like current/weather, boat/jet skis, visibility, etc.

This can be to yourself, to your dive buddies (preferably), and/or told to you in all or parts (DM/captain).

In Rec diving (no deco/penetration) you don't need to plan minute by minute details, and much of that dive experience is unplanable (ie. At 7min we will spot the Whale Shark high-5 a Manta on the right .....) but that envelope encompasses all the important stuff you don't 'see' underwater.



BRad

 

[Diver0001]

Just starting to dive into the results of the recent survey conducted on dive computer use and dive planning. (Thanks to all who participated - had more than 2,000 respondents across 21 different on-line sources.)

One thing that jumped out at me in skimming through the data is the frequency - or lack thereof - with which recreational divers actually engage in dive planning before jumping into the water. When you look at the 1,512 respondents who indicated that they only do recreational diving, we see the following:

I believe that DAN reports that running out of air is the leading cause of dive accidents... which I guess is not surprising.

Will be diving deeper into the data, looking at various crosstabs and correlations over the next week or so. I'm sure there will be more interesting stuff in there.

Seems to confirm what accident statistics have proven over 30 years..... clueless, brainless divers run the most risk.......

R..