Second Thoughts About Rebreather Class

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You can also put one bullet in the chamber of a revolver and click the trigger a couple of times so you know what it sounds like. If that sounds stupid, good because it's no stupider than your comment.
Whatever you do don't follow this idiotic advice. CO2 poisoning can come on so suddenly and be so debilitating you won't know you're in trouble until it's too late.
I am surprised at you michael-fisch

I found the end of a scrubber once, and it took me way too long to figure out how to bail out. Scared the hell out of my dive buddy.

I would never recommend anyone experience this on purpose. You would be much better served by not stretching the scrubber for that one last dive of the week, just swap it out and live to dive another day.

I have never been shot, but I’m sure it’s a most unpleasant experience. I’ll trust the word of those who have been through it, I don’t need to try it myself. Anyone diving CCR should follow this advice.
 
I found the end of a scrubber once, and it took me way too long to figure out how to bail out. Scared the hell out of my dive buddy.

I would never recommend anyone experience this on purpose. You would be much better served by not stretching the scrubber for that one last dive of the week, just swap it out and live to dive another day.

I have never been shot, but I’m sure it’s a most unpleasant experience. I’ll trust the word of those who have been through it, I don’t need to try it myself. Anyone diving CCR should follow this advice.
Exactly.
When I started rebreather diving it was offered by my instructor (and approved by ANDI HQ) if I wanted to remove my scrubber in the pool to experience CO2 breakthrough. I declined but years later I had a bad experience with "Mexisorb" in a cave that left me never wanting to repeat that. If not for a vigilant buddy I would not be here posting this.
 
I’m having some issues with this topic myself. I have an interest in tech diving. I’m not looking to set any records but wreck diving is what interests me the most and I would benefit from the additional depth limit and bottom time that tech training would give me and would allow me access to many more interesting wrecks. Right now, my only 2 bucket list dive sights that I feel I must accomplish in the next 10-15 years are Silfra and the sunken nuclear fleet at Bikini Atoll.

...

The majority of my diving will remain recreational in nature. I’m not super close to a lot of good tech diving, so almost all of my tech diving will be from weekend type trips that will be taken a few times per season. Since I have no interest in really crazy stuff I think I would be well served by OC type tech training and diving and if it wasn’t for Bikini I wouldn’t even consider CCR. I’m technically handy and like to tinker with some things, do wood working, etc. but diving is one of my main means of relaxation and I don’t want to be spending much time beyond rinsing and cleaning gear and changing batteries after diving. So I don’t think I would get a lot of fun from diving CCR, except for when it was absolutely necessary. I would have to spend a lot of time working on a CCR unit before I could tackle Bikini with a CCR, and while I won’t go so far as to say it would be drudgery, I know that it will take much of the zen away from my diving for relaxation. Also, it’s likely that I wouldn’t dive CCR much if at all again after, so as you can see I have serious reservations.

So for me, what will ultimately decide whether or not I get into CCR, at least for a while anyway, is whether or not I will be able to get the gas I need to do Bikini Atoll. Anyone else in a similar set of circumstances?

Also saw you were in Rensselaer County, NY. If you like wrecks then make the 3.5 hour trip down to NJ and come dive down here. We've got a tremendous variety of wrecks, many of which are well into tech ranges! We've got a couple of really great boats too -- one in particular often has a majority CCR divers, sometimes the entire boat is all CCR. I've dropped some links below if you are at all interested:

NJ Scuba - great source for local wrecks: njscuba.net
Last year's schedule from the tech-oriented boat down here: http://www.deepexpeditions.com/DeepX_2019Schedule.pdf
 
There are 2 liveaboards operating there from May thru November. Truk Master, which started 2 years ago, and Indies Surveyor, who have been doing it for 10 years. There have been tens of thousands of air dives performed safely at Bikini.
 
Tens of thousands seem high but I’ll give some benefit of the doubt if you include the land based operation of yesteryear. However, there’s nothing “safe” about diving air at 55M. Have people performed said dives? Yes. Is it concurrent with current understanding of gas density and END guidelines? Unequivocally not.

Unrelated, are you based out of Kwaj? I always found the “air only” and “no decompression” rules at that diving club rather odd.
There are 2 liveaboards operating there from May thru November. Truk Master, which started 2 years ago, and Indies Surveyor, who have been doing it for 10 years. There have been tens of thousands of air dives performed safely at Bikini.
 
There are 2 liveaboards operating there from May thru November. Truk Master, which started 2 years ago, and Indies Surveyor, who have been doing it for 10 years. There have been tens of thousands of air dives performed safely at Bikini.
And how many cases of DCS?
The size of the denominator is not important it's the rate that counts
 
Tens of thousands seem high but I’ll give some benefit of the doubt if you include the land based operation of yesteryear. However, there’s nothing “safe” about diving air at 55M. Have people performed said dives? Yes. Is it concurrent with current understanding of gas density and END guidelines? Unequivocally not.

Unrelated, are you based out of Kwaj? I always found the “air only” and “no decompression” rules at that diving club rather odd.
No, although I dove at Kwaj in the early 90's, I'm now the dive supervisor on Indies Surveyor. Yes, I was including the land based dives in my estimate. I first dove Bikini in 98 and am passingly familiar with the operation from that time to present. I can't think of a single incident where narcosis or gas density was in any way a factor. I wholeheartedly agree that diving mix would be ideal, but it's just not going to happen for everyone at Bikini. Would the world be a better place if those tens of thousands of dives never took place? I don't think so.
Kwaj now allows nitrox 32, but deco or penetration are still barred. Thus a lot of clandestine, risky behavior goes on, perpetrated by divers untrained in wreck or deco procedures.
 
And how many cases of DCS?
The size of the denominator is not important it's the rate that counts
I can't give you a definitive answer, but we were averaging a couple of cases a year, per maybe 2000 man dives, mostly rebreather divers on mix. Not one case was related to an error being made, all were unexpected hits.
 
I can't give you a definitive answer, but we were averaging a couple of cases a year, per maybe 2000 man dives, mostly rebreather divers on mix. Not one case was related to an error being made, all were unexpected hits.
1dcs case : 2000dives is about average for not especially extreme (<60m is pretty normal) decompression diving it seems
 
There are 2 liveaboards operating there from May thru November. Truk Master, which started 2 years ago, and Indies Surveyor, who have been doing it for 10 years. There have been tens of thousands of air dives performed safely at Bikini.

For some reason I was under the impression that the Truk Master was the only game in town now, probably because the instructor I talked to books with them. I honestly like the idea of diving a ship with its own chamber in that remote of an area. Given that, I would probably look to book through the Indies Surveyor for a trip to Bikini. Does the Indies Surveyor still maintain enough He to support open circuit trimix divers, and are you planning on continuing to do so? Thanks for contributing.
 
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