How common is solo RB diving?

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I also do. 76m on 1200m in a cave was my max depth (and cave distance). I took an extra bailout stage with me. And way more decogas than needed.
 
Half of my CCR dives are solo.
I think at that level of diving, all of your dives are solo, even if you’re with a buddy.
 
I think at that level of diving, all of your dives are solo, even if you’re with a buddy.

Yup.. pretty much anything goes wrong on the CCR, and you need to bail out ASAP! Very slim chance a buddy can help you bail out successfully if let yourself stay on a bad loop. A buddy can help with lost line, broke scooter type situation.. but CCR failures are yours to fix.

I’m not s big fan of team bailout gas planning, but I suppose some are..
 
Yup.. pretty much anything goes wrong on the CCR, and you need to bail out ASAP! Very slim chance a buddy can help you bail out successfully if let yourself stay on a bad loop. A buddy can help with lost line, broke scooter type situation.. but CCR failures are yours to fix.

I’m not s big fan of team bailout gas planning, but I suppose some are..
+1 on self sufficiency.
The way we plan and brief things is that we are all self sufficient but if we bail out in order to cater for excess usage in distress/stress situation, we plan to swap stages at 100 bar. This way the distress diver has more gas than he need and the donating is not with an empty stage should he need the gas ... later.
 
I will say it is common.
I'll go solo, but not deco. I have had the classes, I can, have, and will continue to do decompression dives. But I will not consider myself an experienced deco diver. But that aspect I am inexperienced and respect my inexperience.

Thinking about it, the rebreather is more of a tool used by people who would go solo, not a cause of someone to go solo. I would go solo on open circuit much the same as I would now on a rebreather. Just a different tool.
 
it would be interesting to do a personality profile for divers to see if they correspond with recreational -technical -solo- rebreather cave -wreck diving etc
ive just started on a rebreather and with id bought one earlier although jumping back on OC is like throwing an old pair of jeans on. Id guess high achievers and competitive personalities go down the tech RB solo path more frequently than other personality types

and yes love solo diving but will do more hours on RB first
 
I strongly believe that any diver not mentally prepared to be solo on a dive is inadequate to the task and using another diver as a crutch. However this fact doesn't stop me realizing diving with a competent buddy is always the best policy.

The only way to dive solo and remain safe, is if you refuse to dive with an idiot.

I dive solo with my rebreather so often, deep, and far away from the opening that I built my own bailout rebreather once the logistics of carrying enough OC gas became impossible.
 
Self reliance and CCR diving go together. If you can’t diagnose and fix your own problems, very likely nobody else will be able to either, and you shouldn’t be diving CCR.

Forgot to mention that more than half my dives are solo by necessity due to a lack other CCR divers in many of my favorite destinations. I like diving with other CCR divers for wildlife spotting, 4 eyes are better than 2, but I don’t dive with other CCR divers for safety. In fact, I think any other divers except the most experienced are a potential hazard during an emergency. Obviously unless you are doing long exploration dives with team BO procedures...
 
Yup.. pretty much anything goes wrong on the CCR, and you need to bail out ASAP! Very slim chance a buddy can help you bail out successfully if let yourself stay on a bad loop. A buddy can help with lost line, broke scooter type situation.. but CCR failures are yours to fix.

I’m not s big fan of team bailout gas planning, but I suppose some are..
I remember a post here from someone here who got convinced to bail out from a CO2 hit by their team, and I had an instructor who talked about getting convinced by the people on her team shoving regulators at her face that she wasn’t OK and just having buoyancy issues. Both were CO2 hits that presented as confusion and clumbsiness, not breathing issues.

And another instructor talked about someone who managed to go diving without a scrubber installed. (Lots of layers of fail there) They got saved by another random diver, not an actual buddy, who decided that the unconcious diver they came across was in major distress and got them to the surface in time.

So I’m not convinced that a buddy won’t help a CCR diver having a really bad day.
 

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