Buddy lines are ok if the buddies know how to use them. With many OW divers today they would be considered leashes and the DM or guide would just take people for walkies underwater.
Bahamas: Missing Female Diver
- Thread starter danclem
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ScubaSteve
Wow.....what a DB
I would like to see the DM bag this up during a walkie:
DO NOT OPEN THE NEXT SPOILER
Do you really NOT know what is coming?
OK well it is your own fault because you refused to listen
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Hard to say what her state of mind may have been, narced or not. In recreational sport diving rescue courses, we are taught to not create a second victim. Buddy lines are possibile but I've never seen one used. Her actions were too much of a surprise.
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Do you realize how handicapped sport divers are concerning communication and staying together. We have no voice comm system, and rely upon hand signals. We have no means of calling for a retrieval, a danger signal, if you will. We do not maintain physical contact with our "buddy," and yet insist that we are "buddy diving" when in many cases it is actually solo diving. Just some thoughts on the state of the diving art that came to mind as I read the above comments on my buddy line.
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Yes, well John, I don't think we're going to see sport divers tying up in pairs or acquiring and using voice comm devices. We do indeed train to be somewhat independent divers who should stay in close proximity and communication with respective buddies in case of failure or other need. I try to work at good buddy protocols, skills, and communication, but I carry a 19 cf pony as I just don't trust that much.
Your profile says you have more than 10 times as many dives as I. What are you surprised about?
Your profile says you have more than 10 times as many dives as I. What are you surprised about?
DD,
I just got off the exercise bike, and I was thinking about that...your question that is. But I thought about it in a different way. I started scuba diving in 1959, and on the bike I mentally added that up. I've been diving 52 years or so since I started with a 38 cubic foot bottle and a Healthways Scuba double hose regulator as a kid of 14. Guess how much our underwater communications skills and equipment for most sport divers has progressed in that time--zilch (which in my youth used to mean zero growth). We had whistles then, and still do. We had floats then, and we are now getting back to surface floats. We didn't have BCs then, but tell me, why are you using BCs in the tropics? I helped develop BC concepts in the 1970s, and they really have not progressed much since then. Our regulators are better now than in the 1950s and 1960s (but haven't progressed much since about the mid-1970s), but we still have people with SPGs running out of air--why???
When I was a smokejumper in 1971, I told a bunch of Athabascan Indians that I was fighting fire with (we were dry-mopping the fire area) that I was going to use the money to make or buy an underwater communication system. I had ideas for that, but was a student and that money went to my college fund.
So now we still have the same basic problems I saw in the 1960s through now...a buddy can simply start swimming down and no one can either talk her back, or have a real means of alerting either her or others in the water of her troubles. It is really disappointing that while in that time we have gone literally to the moon (I know, as I was part of the Apollo 13 recovery team--wrong ocean though and they had such good communications that they came down beside a US Navy ship). We have talked to people on the moon; we cannot talk underwater.
Alternate Scenario
Let me give you an alternate scenario, and alternate perspective to this thread. What if in the 1970s the Diving Equipment Manufacturer's Association had stayed that way, and not become the Diving Equipment and Marketing Association? What if, instead of marketing as an emphasis, they had become a standard-setting association like SEMI. What if DEMA had decided that they would fund research into lightweight, cheap underwater communications for divers, and that they would then pressure the dive instructor organizations, such as NAUI, PADI, SSI, NASDS, etc. to adopt standards for sport scuba diving which required full-face masks and underwater communications gear? Diving without these would still be allowed, but as specialty dive courses such as solo, snorkeling, etc.
If this had happened, and in some tropical paradise a young woman started swimming too deep and too far away from her buddy, he could simply call to her to come back. If she replied in a confused way, and kept swimming down, he could instantly notify the boat that there was a diver in trouble, give her location, start after her and request backup from the boat. Rather than taking 15 to 20 minutes to organize a "rescue" dive, they with be rescuing her within the living margine of 2-6 minutes.
I am very surprised, looking back, that we have come so far in some ways, and not so far in others.
SeaRat
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Interesting ideas, John...
When a buddy tells me that he has an underwater rattle or inline horn that quakes underwater, I state that I hope he is not going to use it unless really needed as I enjoy the quiet - so I would avoid the chatter of a group dive on underwater CB radios like the 70s. Yeah, it'd be a good idea for newbies maybe. It does go back to marketing and cost tho. I often encourage newbies to hire a private DM the first day of ocean diving, but if we told them they could hire one with underwater communications for only $25 more on top of the private DM - as much as sport diving and travel already cost, I don't see much hope.
And as a air hog, the idea of using a full face mask that uses more air so I can hollar "Breaker Breaker!" is not especially encouraging.
Why do I use a BC in the tropics? I have an inflatable collar and it would be interesting to dive old style. I saw an old coot diving Looe Key once with a collar and a backplate made from plyboard, carried accessories in a bucket made from a 2.5 gallon jug. Very interesting, and he just did not use air really. We had after dive plans to go to Key West for the afternoon and now I wished we'd canceled to spend more time with him. But I travel with a 44# life BC so that I have plenty of places to stow and clip everything I take on a dive plus enough lift to bring myself and anyone else up and stay afloat if caca hits fan. I do think it is safer.
Really, there are so few deaths and injuries in sport diving and the ones that do happen generally go back to training shortfalls, poor self training, and/or poor discipline and choices. Solving the problems of buddies who just don't bother to descend and ascend together and panicked divers who fail to orally inflate or drop weights on the surface would cut that down to hardly any overall, aside from a under examined look at gas quality that everyone probly knows I'm riding. I'd like to see better OW training, but the industry* doesn't think it can make it with the old fashioned, more thorough training, then after that - how do you get divers to self train better?
Q1: Why did the lady diver take the plunge? Narc does a lot of things to minds, but not that I don't think. One has to be on the edge to fall for a narc push that bad, I think?
Q2: Why did the DM assigned as her buddy not grab the tank valve and win the battle from behind as any Rescue course student learns? I just don't know? Maybe she didn't have what it takes for the job; maybe she left?
When a buddy tells me that he has an underwater rattle or inline horn that quakes underwater, I state that I hope he is not going to use it unless really needed as I enjoy the quiet - so I would avoid the chatter of a group dive on underwater CB radios like the 70s. Yeah, it'd be a good idea for newbies maybe. It does go back to marketing and cost tho. I often encourage newbies to hire a private DM the first day of ocean diving, but if we told them they could hire one with underwater communications for only $25 more on top of the private DM - as much as sport diving and travel already cost, I don't see much hope.
And as a air hog, the idea of using a full face mask that uses more air so I can hollar "Breaker Breaker!" is not especially encouraging.
Why do I use a BC in the tropics? I have an inflatable collar and it would be interesting to dive old style. I saw an old coot diving Looe Key once with a collar and a backplate made from plyboard, carried accessories in a bucket made from a 2.5 gallon jug. Very interesting, and he just did not use air really. We had after dive plans to go to Key West for the afternoon and now I wished we'd canceled to spend more time with him. But I travel with a 44# life BC so that I have plenty of places to stow and clip everything I take on a dive plus enough lift to bring myself and anyone else up and stay afloat if caca hits fan. I do think it is safer.
Really, there are so few deaths and injuries in sport diving and the ones that do happen generally go back to training shortfalls, poor self training, and/or poor discipline and choices. Solving the problems of buddies who just don't bother to descend and ascend together and panicked divers who fail to orally inflate or drop weights on the surface would cut that down to hardly any overall, aside from a under examined look at gas quality that everyone probly knows I'm riding. I'd like to see better OW training, but the industry* doesn't think it can make it with the old fashioned, more thorough training, then after that - how do you get divers to self train better?
* By industry, I am referencing all of the agencies, all of the manufacturers, all of the retailers local and online, all of the destination operators and resorts, big brother DAN and all the rest - as they all depend on a steady flow of new divers encouraged with the pitch that it doesn't take much to become a diver. None of them can afford better standards, IMO - at least in their minds, with a few exceptions.
Now going back to this particular accident?Q1: Why did the lady diver take the plunge? Narc does a lot of things to minds, but not that I don't think. One has to be on the edge to fall for a narc push that bad, I think?
Q2: Why did the DM assigned as her buddy not grab the tank valve and win the battle from behind as any Rescue course student learns? I just don't know? Maybe she didn't have what it takes for the job; maybe she left?
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My wife and I dove with Stewart Cove in '03 and were assigned to a non DM photographer who did not wait for us in a strong current, and we had no idea where she went. I had some trouble with my fin and had to go back. I was soo upset because I was all alone with no one to help me. On the boat this flaky woman freaked and had a total melt down, as if she was the one who was in danger. Never dive with them, they are nuts and totally unprofessional!
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I saw your other post about Micronesia in 2001, so you were not new in 2003. I'm curious about some of your comments...?
Did you expect the non-DM photographer to lead the dive, or act as a care taker? How much diving have you done; how much year to year? I don't expect much from a DM really after the dive briefing other than to lead if I care to follow closely.
So if your wife was diving as your buddy, why did you two not descend and ascend together?
Were you diving your gear or rental? Was the problem something that could have been prevented with better gear checking?
I don't guess the flaky woman was anyone's responsibility but what set her off anyway?
The purpose of this forum is to learn from discussion. Hope you don't mind my questions?
I'm with DD on this. I have been in this thread since the beginning and I don't think a buddy line would have accomplished anything. I can't imagine that this diver would have tolerated it or responded to it based on what has been posted about the event and descriptions from people who knew her.
I have no experience with buddy lines. I have dived with buddies and threesomes in really bad viz and not lost my buddy. There have been 3 times I have experienced buddy separation and the lost buddy procedures has been followed successfully.
This lady fought off the DM.. She swam down.. having the DM tied to her may have saved her or or may have killed the DM!
The sad truth is.. Mrs Wood got into the water an adult making decisions for herself.. she continued her dive making her own decisions. The DM had a right to decide how far she would go in effecting a rescue. I have a pretty strong suspicion that an audio system would not have been any more effective in getting Mrs Wood to comply!
Sad that Mr Wood was lost but it would have been sadder still to have two lost. My condolences to the others impacted by this event. Perhaps she was Narked, perhaps she had another stroke, perhaps it was deliberate but we will never know.
What do we learn from this... that is what this thread and forum are all about since we can't bring anyone back.. we can only hope to reassure/support those who survive and prevent further incidents.
I have no experience with buddy lines. I have dived with buddies and threesomes in really bad viz and not lost my buddy. There have been 3 times I have experienced buddy separation and the lost buddy procedures has been followed successfully.
This lady fought off the DM.. She swam down.. having the DM tied to her may have saved her or or may have killed the DM!
The sad truth is.. Mrs Wood got into the water an adult making decisions for herself.. she continued her dive making her own decisions. The DM had a right to decide how far she would go in effecting a rescue. I have a pretty strong suspicion that an audio system would not have been any more effective in getting Mrs Wood to comply!
Sad that Mr Wood was lost but it would have been sadder still to have two lost. My condolences to the others impacted by this event. Perhaps she was Narked, perhaps she had another stroke, perhaps it was deliberate but we will never know.
What do we learn from this... that is what this thread and forum are all about since we can't bring anyone back.. we can only hope to reassure/support those who survive and prevent further incidents.
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