Attitudes Toward DIR Divers

[Wallowa]

To the extent these thoughts are directed to DIR/GUE (the thread topic), it's not like they don't recognize that different kinds of dives require different equipment and protocols or that you shouldn't seek out local knowledge for local environments; it's just that for all dives deemed to be of the same kind, the equipment and protocols are standardized. Sure, I might ask myself if "they could be wrong" that the standardized equipment and protocols for the kind of dive I'm thinking of doing are not "the best way," but if they have been successfully employed in thousands of dives like this one plus many that are way more challenging than this one, it seems to me their way has proven to at least work well enough (even if not clearly "the best"--if there is even such a thing as "the best"). So, while they could be wrong, I think they are more likely to be right than wrong. Tinkering to make some change or addition to the standard equipment or protocols might result in some benefit (if all of the buddy team members agree to it), but I suspect that more often than not the benefit isn't worth it.

Loren,

We are on the same page. I think. Sorta.

I agree with your points about those protocols and skill sets which have been 'time tested' are most likely right rather than wrong. Where I deviate and take umbrage is not with your intent and formatting of standardization of gear and protocols to meet dive conditions or dive profiles, but rather that any rigidity in required standards restricting personal selection of equipment and use may not provide the utility needed by an individual in response to an emergency, change in UW dive parameters or be within their skill set abilities.

CCR is an intriguing arena, so are innovations in support gear for the extreme dive profiles as exampled by deep wrecks, caves, under ice or any overhead. I consider going deep just to set records is just insane; obviously that is not the goal of Tech. For this pushing the envelope to be done safely requires meticulous attention to all details and in my opinion well above average diver judgement and skill development. That is why I feel the diver not the group or litany of standardizations is the key to diver survival. We both know that when things go sidewise it can be in small accumulating increments or sudden blurs of "oh, crap" events. Distance and responses are time imperative. Seconds or meters may make all difference. Your approach, if I read it correctly, is primarily to stop-gap, prevent negative outcomes with standardization before the negative events. By preparing to abate negative eventualities through visualization and standards on the dive, fair enough. Once in the water no amount of personnel, gear or planning can cover all negative eventualities. If an individual is to return topside safe and alive, it will be due to their own judgment and actions; the group can not vouch safe your life, only you can. Reviewing the diving negligent events [true accidents are rare] all too often not only does a "team" member generate the emergency but again all too often can thwart an individual's self-rescue actions.

I am not nor have I professed to be a Diving Guru [no pun]. And I am still learning after almost 7 decades of diving. So my approaches may not be what any individual thinking diver needs to stay safe. Time tested to be sure, but they may not be in you best interest. Think about the essentials needed for a successful dive; the personal attributes, the planning and the gear. In my experience your diving enjoyment and safety, first and foremost needs you to make the right decisions; nobody can make them for you. What happens to you is up to you; not the team.

But hey, I still love to freedive, use double hose regs and the freedom of solo diving. Go figure!

DSO

 

[Lorenzoid]

Your approach, if I read it correctly, is primarily to stop-gap, prevent negative outcomes with standardization before the negative events. By preparing to abate negative eventualities through visualization and standards on the dive, fair enough. Once in the water no amount of personnel, gear or planning can cover all negative eventualities. If an individual is to return topside safe and alive, it will be due to their own judgment and actions; the group can not vouch safe your life, only you can.

This is not "my approach." I have been relating what I (not being any kind of authority or expert in this) understand to be acceptable DIR approaches to things you have brought up--things such as team diving in the rec context, which you seemed to want to find a way to see as alien when in fact it's little more than the familiar buddy system done seriously. Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but I get the impression you want to paint the DIR crowd as robots who don't think for themselves. One of the first things I pointed out was that they are not blind to the inherent tradeoff between standardization and flexibility, both of which have benefits. Rather, the intent of the system that has been devised--which we should all acknowledge may not be objectively a "best" system because there never will be a best--is to strike a balance between those competing objectives. At higher levels of training and more challenging dives, you'd darn well better be ready to devise solutions on the spot to problems you did not specifically train for. Nobody has ever said otherwise.

Reviewing the diving negligent events [true accidents are rare] all too often not only does a "team" member generate the emergency but again all too often can thwart an individual's self-rescue actions.

I'm not following what you're saying here. Do you have some example in mind?

 

[Wallowa]

This is not "my approach." I have been relating what I (not being any kind of authority or expert in this) understand to be acceptable DIR approaches to things you have brought up--things such as team diving in the rec context, which you seemed to want to find a way to see as alien when in fact it's little more than the familiar buddy system done seriously. Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but I get the impression you want to paint the DIR crowd as robots who don't think for themselves. One of the first things I pointed out was that they are not blind to the inherent tradeoff between standardization and flexibility, both of which have benefits. Rather, the intent of the system that has been devised--which we should all acknowledge may not be objectively a "best" system because there never will be a best--is to strike a balance between those competing objectives. At higher levels of training and more challenging dives, you'd darn well better be ready to devise solutions on the spot to problems you did not specifically train for. Nobody has ever said otherwise.


I'm not following what you're saying here. Do you have some example in mind?

Not my intent or objective to "paint" or define the standardizations taught and espoused by what are called Tech organizations or groups.
Standardizations to the degree outlined in the "The Fundamentals of Better Diving", Global Underwater Explorers, established what I assumed was the framework and context for this thread. May not be what you subscribe to and therefore not your approach, a false assumption on my part. Interesting read, but did not note any flexibility in the training or mandates. For good reasons the pioneers of what is not call tech diving took their dives to extremes as 'solo divers'; yes, with a support network but in the end it always came down to them only returning alive it they could sort out life threatening events by themselves. Evidence Exley or Gilliam; one survived one did not.

Look, comparing the recreational/sport diving instructional and educational system to DIR/GRU's programs and standards does not wash. "Buddy diving" is not in the same context or scale as the DIR team concept as best as I can tell; buddy diving was and is fallacious since once divers submerge it falls apart. Your dive buddy is not your rescuer but rather your dive companion. All divers have at some point lost contact with their dive buddy. Why is it in the curriculum of diving organizations? For beginning divers it gives them something akin to Dumbo's Feather, a sense of security. Not a bad idea, like training wheels on a bike, but at some point the diver needs to assume full responsibility for their own survival. In our "law suit happy society" [again reflecting current, "not my responsibility, but yours" mindset] climate the buddy system gives a modicum of protection for the certifying organizations from law suits by transferring the accountability to the dive buddy. "Them not me".

Not knocking your experience or knowledge but when you ask for an example of how a dive buddy or team can become a liability and threat to an individual's safety I would refer you to the decades of diving accident summaries [negligent events] which are replete with diver errors that lead to the injury of death of those trying to aid them and of attempted rescues resulting in the injury or death of the diver experiencing the emergency. Exampled in "Dark Descent', McMurray's well written book on extreme dives and in particular on the "Empress of Ireland" Canadian wreck are details of fatalities when events within a team and buddy pair go wrong and both buddies [Pg 127], Parent and Hardenne, lose their lives. Likewise on page 79 when Moissan died in spite of having his two dive buddies there with him but could not assist him when he ran out of air. Look, forget the literature and turn to your experiences UW; undoubtedly you have been witness or involved in what could have been or was a dire emergency, but which the individual diver made the correct decisions to solve the issues and take themselves out of harm's way. It neither takes a village or a team but it does require individual competency to avoid injury or death UW. Murphy is the unseen dive partner and you need to be capable of dealing with him.

My "use by date" on this thread is way overdue. I encourage self-reliance before dependency during dives and can only beat that drum for so long. All diving systems have applicability and should be scrutinized by the individual diver to find what best fits their needs to give them the optimal [like that more than 'best'?] chance of avoiding injury or death and equally providing the most fun on a dive.

So I will bow out from posting on this thread and let individuals make their individual choices without imparting my views. Diving for me is freedom and it has been a magic carpet ride that has no end in sight. Enjoy!

DSO

 

[PfcAJ]

Man, what a bunch of drivel.

 

[Lorenzoid]

"The Fundamentals of Better Diving", Global Underwater Explorers, established what I assumed was the framework and context for this thread. May not be what you subscribe to and therefore not your approach, a false assumption on my part. Interesting read, but did not note any flexibility in the training or mandates....

Look, comparing the recreational/sport diving instructional and educational system to DIR/GRU's programs and standards does not wash. "

That book, while it provided an overview of DIR as well as a vision for how it could be applied in not just tech diving but also rec diving, does not contain everything that someone as curious as you seem to be about DIR might want to know. If you're interested in knowing, then take a course from GUE, not try to learn by challenging here on the internet everything you have heard or read about DIR. You could also read GUE's Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), which is published on their website. Where is the flexibility, you ask? There is far more that is omitted or left open, to be decided by the team or to be worked out in real time, than is explicitly mandated in the SOPs. Those merely provide the framework. It looks detailed, but nowhere does it say to stop using your brain.

I cannot understand where you get the idea that a well-trained diver would be unable to take care of themselves in an emergency, as though being trained in team diving somehow erases one's ability to work and solve problems on one's own. We do not lack "individual competency" as you say, or plan to rely on each other for survival, but we are there for each other if and when we can be of use to each other. Team diving does not replace one's ability to avoid or solve problems but rather supplements their ability and at the same time enables them to help others should the need arise.

You gave the example of a lost buddy, which I believe is your response to my request for a specific example of what you were talking about. In the rec diving context, a buddy with "team diving" training is likely to handle a lost buddy situation exactly the same way as I believe most or all of the agencies teach: search for a minute or two, then surface if you can't find your buddy. (Of course, the buddy team could agree beforehand on some other amount of time or procedure.) In the cave diving context, the "lost buddy" procedures are very much the same no matter which agency teaches it. You might be surprised how much of the procedures and equipment are actually very similar across all cave training agencies (thanks, I suppose, to Exley). Now, in the rec realm, it has been argued that some of the things borrowed from cave and tech DIR have been shoehorned into rec, with results that do not please everybody, and I won't attempt to rebut that. We are all free to dive whichever way we wish.

 

[flymolo]

This conversation is absolutely bonkers

30 pages ago i was said team diving wasn’t about relying on others for your safety

 

[VikingDives]

When Pot meets Kettle. . .

 

[nadwidny]

So I will bow out from posting on this thread and let individuals make their individual choices without imparting my views. Diving for me is freedom and it has been a magic carpet ride that has no end in sight. Enjoy!

So that's the second time you said you are done with this thread. History says that typically people stick around for at least three "I'm done. I'm out". You got one more.

 

[Nick_Radov]

Standardizations to the degree outlined in the "The Fundamentals of Better Diving", Global Underwater Explorers, established what I assumed was the framework and context for this thread.

That's not a valid assumption. "The Fundamentals of Better Diving" (2021 edition) is a short, entry-level textbook. It's an excellent resource as far as that goes and we could all learn something by reading it, but it presents things in a simplified manner to avoid confusing students. DIR as a general approach to diving goes beyond that. And GUE no longer even uses the "DIR" term because it's not precisely defined (as we've seen from the interminable thread).

May not be what you subscribe to and therefore not your approach, a false assumption on my part. Interesting read, but did not note any flexibility in the training or mandates.

What sort of flexibility are you looking for specifically? The level of flexibility increases at higher levels with certain core elements remaining fixed. The goal is to produce thinking divers, not automatons.

For good reasons the pioneers of what is not call tech diving took their dives to extremes as 'solo divers'; yes, with a support network but in the end it always came down to them only returning alive it they could sort out life threatening events by themselves. Evidence Exley or Gilliam; one survived one did not.

Those were not "good" reasons. The pioneers of tech diving did solo dives out of necessity due to a lack of qualified teammates and because the optimal protocols hadn't been developed yet. Now we know better. To be clear I am not criticizing the early explorers and pioneers; I have the greatest respect for their accomplishments. Although some of the stunts that Brett Gilliam pulled were just outright stupid and pointless, even by the standards of the time.

Look, comparing the recreational/sport diving instructional and educational system to DIR/GRU's programs and standards does not wash.

GRU? I hope we're not being compared to Russian military intelligence now.
DIR works great for recreational diving. I've yet to see anyone describe a valid problem. All sport divers could benefit from DIR but DIR is not for all divers, and that's fine.

"Buddy diving" is not in the same context or scale as the DIR team concept as best as I can tell; buddy diving was and is fallacious since once divers submerge it falls apart. Your dive buddy is not your rescuer but rather your dive companion. All divers have at some point lost contact with their dive buddy. Why is it in the curriculum of diving organizations? For beginning divers it gives them something akin to Dumbo's Feather, a sense of security. Not a bad idea, like training wheels on a bike, but at some point the diver needs to assume full responsibility for their own survival. In our "law suit happy society" [again reflecting current, "not my responsibility, but yours" mindset] climate the buddy system gives a modicum of protection for the certifying organizations from law suits by transferring the accountability to the dive buddy. "Them not me".

This is simply nonsense, and reflects a complete misunderstanding of training agency motivations and the US legal system. Promotion of the buddy system doesn't offer training agencies any effective liability shield.

I encourage self-reliance before dependency during dives and can only beat that drum for so long.

You present a false choice, and I don't think you actually understand what we're doing. Integrated team diving doesn't equate to dependency.
Put your drum away and listen instead. You might learn something.

 

[Bingo13]

IMO…from a military background I understand and am comfortable with having SOP’s. It’s one less thing to think about when/if something goes wrong. I also like to get information and training from multiple sources to figure out what works for me and what will make me a better diver and dive partner. As for people telling others they’re doing it wrong…meh those people exist in any and every ‘circle’. To each their own. As long as you aren’t preaching/teaching anything that will get someone hurt and you’re genuinely trying to help people, more power to you.