AOW dive in the Spiegel Grove after 12 logged dives

[RonFrank]

I've done the Speigel grove three times. The first dive I did in 2005 was wonderful. There were strong currents on the surface, but at about 50fsw the current was mild. Vis was great, and the sea's were calm.

The second dive was likely the worst dive I've done in FL. Currents were ripping, 6+ foot seas. The current was also running across the wreck, so if one blew off, well, lost at sea. All this would have been OK IF the vis was good, but it was in the 10foot range.

The Captain on that dive indicated that the ONLY reason he allowed us in the water was because this dive was with the SB Invasion group, and I don't think anyone on the boat had less than 50 dives under their belt and all had experience with current, and depth. Most had done the Grove.

The third dive, just a day later was a great dive. Vis of maybe 50feet, so not wonderful, but good E-nuf. Sea's were rolling maybe 2~3 feet, so not too bad, and current was maybe +/- 1 knot, and reasonable at depth.

So three dives, three very different sets of conditions. I would say that in general the Grove is advance, but not difficult. However dive two was IMO an advanced dive. I blew through my air at a much faster rate then normal. For me, that resulting in over 1000psi remaining, however I blew through close to 500psi just getting to the ball to decend, so recognize that gas managment can become more of an issue when a diver is under stress.

People die on the Grove, and as a certified diver it's going to be up to you to help plan the dive, make sure your gas management is acceptable, and ensure that you are confident. Discuss the conditions with the Instructor, and the Captain. If you or other members of your AOW group are not comfortable call the dive.

As other have suggested DO NOT count on the instructor to make sure that your diving is going to go well. If he has two guys running out of air at 100', that becomes a bit of an issue!

 

[dbulmer]

Icarus,
Read what Loosebits, Mike Ferrara and FixxerVI6 have posted carefully then re-read it again - there's a lot of good advice given by those chaps and at the risk of being flamed I think there's more value in that advice than doing the dive you want to do at this stage of your diving career.

 

[FIXXERVI6]

Well, that certainly makes more sense, and I agree with you. But, this sounds just like what the original poster is doing. He is being instructed, incrementally, and is going to be introduced to a deeper dive, where there might be currents (although his instructor would most likely abort the dive should conditions at dive time be beyond their students demonstrated capabilities). He's not penetrating the SG, and most likely won't go much below the shallowest portions of the wreck. It seems responsible to me, expanding your experiences and capabilities under the supervision of a trained instructor.

Obviously, if the instructor is incompetent, all bets are off. But, there was no indication that the OP thought that.

he is not being instructed incrementally if he has not been instructed on smb deployment, proper gas planning etc, jumping in the water to do a dive like that with an instructor is a trust me dive without the skills first being tought and practiced before exposure to the environment.

 

[OHGoDive]

Nothing new about it.

Not really. It all seems to work best when you learn, practice and demonstrate the skills required for that level of diving before hand. Now by all reasonable reconning you could do the dive on your own and shouldn't feel too uncomfortable at all having to do so.

I'm not quite sure I follow this logic. I may have all the requisite skills to perform a dive on my own. And, I may even be quite good at those individual skills. But, I would never presume that I could put those individual skills together by myself to perform a higher level of diving unless I had instruction and supervision doing so.

No matter how good your training has been in the past, no matter how good you are with the requisite skills, when you're learning something new, you're putting yourself into a position where you're not capable of doing something alone.

I agree with you that your skills should be learned and practiced. But, if you're saying that you should never move forward until you've refined those skills to the point where you can move forward on your own... I don't understand.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I'm not quite sure I follow this logic. I may have all the requisite skills to perform a dive on my own. And, I may even be quite good at those individual skills. But, I would never presume that I could put those individual skills together by myself to perform a higher level of diving unless I had instruction and supervision doing so.

No matter how good your training has been in the past, no matter how good you are with the requisite skills, when you're learning something new, you're putting yourself into a position where you're not capable of doing something alone.

I agree with you that your skills should be learned and practiced. But, if you're saying that you should never move forward until you've refined those skills to the point where you can move forward on your own... I don't understand.

Let me try it this way. In OW, I think the students should plan the dive together and do the dive as if the instructor wasn't there...at least the tour portion of the dive. The instructor is there to oversee the planning, answer questions and step in in the case of a dangerous mistake or situation and of course to debriefe and criteque after the dive. However, if the instructor does need to step in then the student gets to do the dive again. So...if all goes well all the instructor does is watch. Obviously pulling this off is proof that the students are indeed ablt to do a similar dive without the instructor and that's what we're trying to do isn't it?

As apposed to, getting a briefing from the instructor and following him around through the dive which just proves that you're follow the leader skills are improving and not much else.

At 12 dives, how many of these have been outside of the training environment and done without an instructor? Has the student yet shown that he can even do a shalloe dive in good conditions on his own with a buddy? Note, those are questions and not statements but if the answer is no, why bother doing more complex dives yet?

 

[loosebits]

I agree with you that your skills should be learned and practiced. But, if you're saying that you should never move forward until you've refined those skills to the point where you can move forward on your own... I don't understand.

You should be able to do the planned dive without your instructor. It may not be pretty, you may spend an extra 10 mins doing something that the instructor could have helped you with (e.g. finding a good spot for a tie off) but remember it is you that will get hurt if you're not prepared and something goes wrong.

Every class I've been in from OW to full cave, I've always felt comfortable with the next dive. In my early days, I probably would have done that first OW dive even if I wasn't comfortable just because I was a new diver and new divers (such as the OP and HappyFunBoater) tend to worship the all knowing instructor. As you gain more experience, you'll realize that if, during training, you are doing a dive you aren't comfortable with , you've either not gotten good instruction or the instructor should have never let you take the class to begin with.

I know this is sort of a cop-out by saying "trust me, you'll understand someday" but as the dangers of the environments you train in become more and more obvious you'll realize that taking too large a step into that environment with or without an instructor is risking your life.

What we are all saying is baby-steps. If you are completely comfortable and proficient at your current level (12 dives makes a proficient OW diver?) then you've probably got adequate skills for the next level and it's appropriate to move on.

 

[Web Monkey]

Of course I wouldn't be diving the SG alone. I am doing it because 1) the instructor says it is ok and 2) the instructor will be with me. BTW the LDS from where the instructor comes is one of the oldest and best known in the area so that makes me comfortable about the opinion of the instructor. If I don't trust him TOGETHER WITH MY COMMON SENSE to who am I going to trust at this diving level...

12 dives isn't enough for you to be doing a deep wreck in potentially high current, regardless of who your buddy is.

You'll be just fine, unless you aren't.

What happens if there's a ripping current and you lose your mask, or one of you gets blown off the wreck and ends up surfacing a 1/2 mile from the boat, or you make a mistake and follow some other guy with the same color fins who turns out not to be your instructor, an isn't heading towards an ascent line when you're low on air?

There are all sorts of things that can go wrong, and until your reaction to them is be "cool!" or maybe a little annoyance instead of "oh ****!", I'd say you're not ready for the dive.

Now these are just my opinions, based on nothing more than a desire to limit the number of people who get freaked out, injured or killed, so you can take them for what they're worth or ignore them as you wish.

Terry

 

[Web Monkey]

Quote:
Originally Posted by HappyFunBoater
If you're comfortable diving, and you have an instructor, then go for it! The current isn't so bad that it will blow you off the wreck. Just make sure you don't let go of the line while ascending or descending. Always be with a buddy and don't do anything stupid. You'll be fine.


What if he does let go of the line?

Hmmm. diving in high current without a spool and an SMB?

I'd say that he gets to see how good the captain's vision is, or the world's longest drift dive.

Terry

 

[spectrum]

The instructor should be supervising as you and perhaps a fellow AOW student make the dive, not leading you on a deep discover dive. It should be an intro to deep, not task loaded with high currents and a big wreck.

Just say no.

Pete

 

[TheRedHead]

I think those of us who are cautioning Icarus have seen unfortunate things happen to new divers on dives like the Spiegel Grove. New divers have a lot of faith in their instructors to keep them safe and it's very hard for them to disregard an instructor's advice, even when they feel very uncomfortable with the dive. In my case, I had to step in and avert a potentially deadly accident on another wreck, the Adolphus Busch, which my buddy and I were diving in doubles as our plan was for a long bottom time. We were diving with 2 newly minted AOW divers. It became apparent after a while that they were following us and I'm not sure if they even knew where they were or how to get back to the mooring line.

After 20 minutes, I signaled one of them for his pressure reading and he looked at me like he had never seen that signal. I looked at his SPG and he had less than 700 psi. We cut our dive short and escorted them back to the boat, offering to share air which they refused. If we hadn't ended our dive, I'm not sure how the situation would have played out. When we talked to them back on the boat, the said they were following us because we were obviously more experienced with all the equipment we were wearing. That's when I started thinking about AOW and what a potentially dangerous class it is. Without that card, they would not have been allowed to dive the wreck.