Resort's " New Normal " Rule - No AIR 2 or diving your long hose

[Compressor]

There is such a thing as fecal transplants, that can be life saving for some people with antibiotic resistant infection. Gives an entirely new meaning to give a sh*t... There is also such a thing as ear wax transplant from one person to another which helps treat chronic external ear infections. So getting someone else’s oral bacteria especially in a situation of emergency is not that big of a deal Many are concerned about COVID and maybe rightfully so. However, there are Herpes, HPV and other things that once you get may cause a lifelong infection and probably more likely than corona to stick on the moist surface longer.

Yes; fecal transplants are used often for people to recolonize bacteria lost to prior use of antibiotics.
You are correct @Ukmc; we are surrounded by pathogens including bacteria, viruses and fungi. Even in seawater here is a common pathogen; vibrio vulnificus. But unless we are immunocompromised, we are not defenseless.

 

[uncfnp]

Which begs the question, how far do we go to protect ourselves and others. Personally I’d much rather see a fellow diver stay home if sick and wear a mask on the flight down then worry how contaminated her regulator may be if I am OOA.

@tursiops I applaud your social consciousness and where diving is concerned I fall short. I am fanatical about social distances and I wear a mask for both my personal protection as well as protection of others on the rare occasions that I am in public businesses. But I yet remain skeptical of the primary donate restriction as implemented by BD. Admittedly, if they also make me dive with the group, that alone will keep me off the boat. And have you ever dove using a bungeed regulator? It, or at least mine, does restrict head movement. Fine for brief periods but not 60 minutes.

 

[tursiops]

I applaud your social consciousness

Thanks.

And have you ever dove using a bungeed regulator?

My rec rig is set up with a bungeed alternate and a 40-inch hose on my primary, run under my arm. The alternate has a 20-inch hose length and a 110-deg swivel so it is pretty comfortable to use. I've never actually tried it for a full dive.

 

[saxman242]

And have you ever dove using a bungeed regulator?

I don't mind diving a bungeed reg, assuming there's adequate slack in the hose. I did my first few sidemount dives with a bungeed reg on too short of a hose and it was a pain after more than a few minutes.

 

[MichaelMc]

+1 on diving half my dive on my necklaced backup. Likely most sidemount dives do, two tank sidemount divers .

Getting the length right, a flexible rubber hose, and a ball joint help.

 

[Bob DBF]

There is quite a lot of discussion about pathogens, but the elephant in my room is diving with an alternate that has not been tested, so we just assume it will work properly in an emergency.

Maybe we should start to train on buddy breathing off a tank valve again, as it may come in handy.

 

[Blackcrusader]

I always wear a mask while on Scuba.

How often do you run out of air? Since I attached an SPG to my rig, I have never, ever run out of air. IOW, I plan my dive and dive my plan. Running out of air is simply not an option for me. And yes, I have even rescued people and still had air to spare.

I have never been out of air on a dive. I've had three other people with me on dives who went to out of air situations since January 1986, all were instructors. I have on several occasions shared my secondary to OW and AOW divers who have been low on air ( say 60 bar ) ( including my son ) to get them to the end of a dive so they can do a safety stop on their own tank.

On this dive the boat takes us out we dive and come back to the house reef and exit there. We were perhaps 15 mins from the dive shop and I checked one of the new OW divers. His wife had enough air but her husband I thought would struggle to the end of the dive. It was unsafe to finish the dive right there as there was no safe exit point where we were due to reefs and corals. Don't want a diver breaking corals or walking across a reef and getting injured by the reef or the marine life. Stone fish scorpion fish lion fish blue ringed octopus are there and also we don't want the diver killing marine life. I signaled to the DM I was putting the diver on my secondary. The diver understood what was being done even though he only had 8 dives since getting his certification. His wife made a video of us. I brought the diver to around 5m so we would clear the safety stop and we had a nice slow swim back to the dive shop. He also learned to check his air and in future come more shallow. His wife usually had more than 50 bar at end of dive then her husband. I believe all round it was a good experience for that newly minted OW diver. He got to use a secondary without being stressed out.. It also taught him he should approach the guide or another diver and let them know his air situation before it became critical.

 

[Blackcrusader]

Exhaled breath still has 17% O2, good enough for rescue breaths, and good enough for rebreathing from a BCD. The down side, why it was dropped from training, is the high potential for legionnaires disease.

I believe that there has only been one proven case of a lung disease from a diver who did that be he did die over a year later.
As I wrote there are special solutions for preventing diseases and bacteria everyone who owns their own BCD should flush it with.

Still yes it is no longer taught which is why I would live and others would drown if they had no buddy nearby. As I wrote there will always be a small amount in the secondary line as well. Personally I was taught how to do it in an extreme OOG situation for saving ones own life. Not even to be practiced. My BSAC instructor was also head of a commercial diving operation for Shell Oil.

I recommend you all read this about the likely hood or not of getting an infection from a BCD. We see many divers manually inflate a BCD to rinse them after diving, so they getting contact with the air from inside the BCD .

Emergency Breathing from Your BCD: Undercurrent 06/2011

 

[Celt]

I’ve never used an octopus or ran out of air. In 50 years continuous diving I’ve donated twice and to me the mindset that if I run out of air I can always get it from someone else is ridiculous.

 

[Edward3c]

I believe that there has only been one proven case of a lung disease from a diver who did that be he did die over a year later.
As I wrote there are special solutions for preventing diseases and bacteria everyone who owns their own BCD should flush it with.

Still yes it is no longer taught which is why I would live and others would drown if they had no buddy nearby. As I wrote there will always be a small amount in the secondary line as well. Personally I was taught how to do it in an extreme OOG situation for saving ones own life. Not even to be practiced. My BSAC instructor was also head of a commercial diving operation for Shell Oil.

I recommend you all read this about the likely hood or not of getting an infection from a BCD. We see many divers manually inflate a BCD to rinse them after diving, so they getting contact with the air from inside the BCD .

Emergency Breathing from Your BCD: Undercurrent 06/2011

We used to practice breathing off the ABLJ from the crack bottle.