diver 85
Contributor
In some cases---------1 death is better than 2......also, you can ask my buddy, his name is SOLO...
Why Leave a Buddy?
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JamesBon92007
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For me it all depends upon the circumstances. I would never abandon a dive buddy, but there have been many occasions where that "buddy" was a danger to himself, me, and the sealife in general. In situations like this I will, in one manner or another, make certain that they are either safely back to the boat or so close to the shore that the waves would do the rest. Under these conditions it's probably safe to say that the "buddy" was not having a good time and would be happier out of the water, and I was not having a good time watching them suffer. I generally dive alone now unless my wife is with me. In my earlier days of diving I mistakenly assumed that everyone who had a C-Card had the same training that I did and was competent in the same conditions and environment that I was in.
I never leave my buddy, ever for any reason. USMC training. wife training. we went into the water together we leave the water together.
Dragon Eye
Contributor
You can probably ask 100 people their response to a certain scenario and get a wide variety of answers.
Did your class teach you rules of diving?
1. Never hold your breath
2. You are responsible for your own safety- dive at your own risk.
3. don't be complacent- do a buddy check
Now in any situation you'd have to ask yourself about your personal safety. I've come to the conclusion that a buddy is nice, but redundancy is also a great option. I would highly recommend you do some more dives for practice between classes and head towards your Rescue certification. When you have rounded out this class, you will feel like a much better buddy and capable of assisting and recognizing emergency situations.
Did your class teach you rules of diving?
1. Never hold your breath
2. You are responsible for your own safety- dive at your own risk.
3. don't be complacent- do a buddy check
Now in any situation you'd have to ask yourself about your personal safety. I've come to the conclusion that a buddy is nice, but redundancy is also a great option. I would highly recommend you do some more dives for practice between classes and head towards your Rescue certification. When you have rounded out this class, you will feel like a much better buddy and capable of assisting and recognizing emergency situations.
fnfalman
Contributor
Sometimes a dive boat or dive charter won't let you go solo. Sometimes you don't know how the people going to act until you get in the water with them. You can talk dive plans until you're blue in the face and everybody nodded agreement...until you hit the water and next thing you know people doing stupid stuff like crawling into nooks and cranies that neither you nor them wanted to plan for. Or wanting to descend down to 140-ft on an 72-cuft tank because they saw a cool stingray.
It's very simple. You have the buddies that you have, either the ones that you have executed dozens or hundreds of dives with or they're insta-buddies. They could be fresh from OW, or have a few dozen dives under their belts, or hundreds of dives under their belts. Everybody is suppose to agree to a dive plan that's workable. When people begin to deviate from that plan, what are you going to do if you were to signal them and they won't repair from the deviation? Everybody has to make their own choices as far as their own safeties are concerned.
I personally wouldn't just take off, at least not without letting my buddy know that I'm heading up. But if my buddy were to drop like a rock down to 150-ft while our plan called for 80-ft, AND refused to even to look back at me? Sayonara. I'm staying where I'm at and either continue on solo or terminate the dive and go back to the boat.
There are lines that I will not cross. If I have 800-psi left and we're suppose to ascend but the person kept on swimming or descending heedless of my concerns? I'm outta here. If I KNOW for a fact that we're going out toward the open blue water and the buddy refuses to acknowledge my hand signals? I'm going back, good luck swimming to China. If the buddy thinks that it's cool to squeeze himself into a little opening? I'm not going in there. Descending down to 150-ft while we planned for 100-ft? Have fun by yourself because I'm not going.
I'm sure that there are lines where others wouldn't cross either. However, the points are that a) you should plan your dive and dive your plan, b) what are you going to do when people are deviating from the dive plan?
fnfalman
Contributor
I don't think that it's that much to ask for some common courtesy when a buddy team dives. You plan the dive and you stick to the plan. It doesn't get much simpler than that.
My best friend and main buddy wanted to go down to crack 100-ft depth because after 50-dives he had yet to go down that deep. He signaled descension and I refused to acknowledge and kept to the 90-ft depth that we agreed upon. At the end of the dive he said that he just wanted to crack 100-ft, but he didn't hold a grudge or have a drama moment because I wanted to stick with the planned depth. On the next dive, now that I know he wanted to crack 100-ft depth, we planned for it and did it. No big deal.
Plan your dive and dive your plan.
Everybody say out loud what they want to achieve on the dive and maybe work in a compromise then stick to the plan. If not then find another buddy.
My best friend and main buddy wanted to go down to crack 100-ft depth because after 50-dives he had yet to go down that deep. He signaled descension and I refused to acknowledge and kept to the 90-ft depth that we agreed upon. At the end of the dive he said that he just wanted to crack 100-ft, but he didn't hold a grudge or have a drama moment because I wanted to stick with the planned depth. On the next dive, now that I know he wanted to crack 100-ft depth, we planned for it and did it. No big deal.
Plan your dive and dive your plan.
Everybody say out loud what they want to achieve on the dive and maybe work in a compromise then stick to the plan. If not then find another buddy.
I'm a "plan your dive, dive your plan" kinda guy. If the plan is "we stay together" we're staying together. If the plan contemplates situations where we might part ways, we will discuss that during our dive briefing and then if/when we get to that point we will separate according to our plan. At no point - planned or unplanned - will I simply decide to leave you without letting you know. I'd appreciate if you'd do the same.
Accordingly, if you and I ever dive together and I simply "disappear" without letting you know during our briefing and again at the separation point underwater, something's gone wrong and you should initiate whatever lost buddy protocol we've discussed.
Related, if YOU simply "disappear" without letting ME know during our briefing and again at the separation point underwater, I'm going to assume something's gone wrong and I will initiate whatever lost buddy protocol we've discussed.
Accordingly, if you and I ever dive together and I simply "disappear" without letting you know during our briefing and again at the separation point underwater, something's gone wrong and you should initiate whatever lost buddy protocol we've discussed.
Related, if YOU simply "disappear" without letting ME know during our briefing and again at the separation point underwater, I'm going to assume something's gone wrong and I will initiate whatever lost buddy protocol we've discussed.
lavachickie
Contributor
In this world, not just diving, there are people that feel (whether it's learned or innate, probably a little bit of both) a strong sense of leadership and responsibility. Those people make great buddies, because you know you can depend upon them. They won't decide to deviate just because they want to, or because they feel something rises above the good of the group when it's really rather trivial.
The first time a new dive buddy left me, my first thought went to THEIR safety... it was only later I realized how ****ty it was that she left ME, having an issue and headed toward a bigger issue. But you'll find that post elsewhere. ;-)
That issue made me REALLY reconsider who I dive with and how. Because if you can't trust your buddy... you might as well be diving alone. Or, worse, they're going to do something stupid which could potentially put you in MORE danger than just diving alone!
The first time a new dive buddy left me, my first thought went to THEIR safety... it was only later I realized how ****ty it was that she left ME, having an issue and headed toward a bigger issue. But you'll find that post elsewhere. ;-)
That issue made me REALLY reconsider who I dive with and how. Because if you can't trust your buddy... you might as well be diving alone. Or, worse, they're going to do something stupid which could potentially put you in MORE danger than just diving alone!
CamG
Contributor
Greetings Zen Nomad and my opinion on diving with a buddy is that you plan the dive and discuss buddy separation if it takes place just like you discuss possible hazards of the dive site. Communication is priceless and should be proactive not reactive!
Has it happened to me yes and it was not appropriate as I was running down a diver who was oblivious. When I caught and corrected our exit direction the rest of the group was no where to be seen. We searched for a minute and then surfaced to look for bubbles. About two minutes later they surfaced at the exit about 200 yards away.
We surface swam over and by the time I reached the dock I was livid! I took a few minutes to gather my wits and de-briefed them and pointed out that the lost team members were to search no longer than one minute as discussed then surface.
A couple wanted to argue that they knew I was fine but when I asked what was planned pre-dive they were silent. PLAN THE DIVE DIVE THE PLAN! It just does not get any more plain than that. When dive practices are not followed safety is compromised and risks not managed thus allowing for accidents to happen.
I do have several buddies that when we dive together we have certain allowable practices that we embrace due to our training and experience in the water together.
All have embraced the self-rescue while being a part of a dive team philosophy.
Are we solo divers? Yes in a sense and really not in essence. We are part of a team usually 3 or 4 that have trained together and know each others dive quirks and manors. I know as they know if and when they have an issue that they can not solve one of us will be right there and sort it out. Only in extreme conditions would abandonment be an option only after all attempts were exhausted and gas supplies demanded a exit. This has never happened and I pray it never does. Those who have to make that horrible decision have to live with it the rest of their lives. In extreme cases one fatality is better than two but it is easier said than done!
I was taught in OW training to stay close to your buddy. Even when we are completely redundant loaded with back ups we are rarely more than 3-4 kicks away from each other.
When I dive with a strange or new dive buddy the pre-dive planning is a lot like briefing but I have gotten some great feed back. I am not a control freak but choose to outline safety practices extremely well. Good luck and safe diving.
CamG Keep diving....Keep training....Keep learning!
Has it happened to me yes and it was not appropriate as I was running down a diver who was oblivious. When I caught and corrected our exit direction the rest of the group was no where to be seen. We searched for a minute and then surfaced to look for bubbles. About two minutes later they surfaced at the exit about 200 yards away.
We surface swam over and by the time I reached the dock I was livid! I took a few minutes to gather my wits and de-briefed them and pointed out that the lost team members were to search no longer than one minute as discussed then surface.
A couple wanted to argue that they knew I was fine but when I asked what was planned pre-dive they were silent. PLAN THE DIVE DIVE THE PLAN! It just does not get any more plain than that. When dive practices are not followed safety is compromised and risks not managed thus allowing for accidents to happen.
I do have several buddies that when we dive together we have certain allowable practices that we embrace due to our training and experience in the water together.
All have embraced the self-rescue while being a part of a dive team philosophy.
Are we solo divers? Yes in a sense and really not in essence. We are part of a team usually 3 or 4 that have trained together and know each others dive quirks and manors. I know as they know if and when they have an issue that they can not solve one of us will be right there and sort it out. Only in extreme conditions would abandonment be an option only after all attempts were exhausted and gas supplies demanded a exit. This has never happened and I pray it never does. Those who have to make that horrible decision have to live with it the rest of their lives. In extreme cases one fatality is better than two but it is easier said than done!
I was taught in OW training to stay close to your buddy. Even when we are completely redundant loaded with back ups we are rarely more than 3-4 kicks away from each other.
When I dive with a strange or new dive buddy the pre-dive planning is a lot like briefing but I have gotten some great feed back. I am not a control freak but choose to outline safety practices extremely well. Good luck and safe diving.
CamG Keep diving....Keep training....Keep learning!
Yes! And unless you always dive with the same persons, sometimes you have to - unless you're ready to trust someone you just met after a 5 minutes conversation on a boat.
As a rule, I don't leave my buddies - and when I have to break that rule I try to make sure that they're aware they're on their own and that I'll be fine by myself thank you very much. When I can catch them...
My expectations are simple: in a team, everyone is responsible for each other safety (without endangering their own) - BUT everyone can also abort the dive at any moment, decide to turn the entire team back, or prevent the whole team to go further (depth/time/route/risk). Anyone ignoring the last part of the contract releases the others from their obligations.
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