man_water
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During a dive, if you float to the surface, should you end the dive or go back down? Does the ascent speed matter? Does the depth matter? I'm assuming you aren't going back down deeper than you were.
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uncommon for many new divers to float to the surface and then descend again, especially in reduced viz dive locations. Usually the better the viz the better most divers will do at staying at their intended depth.
Rate of ascent does matter especially when correlated to depth and the time at depth.
With more experience(or some would say with better training) most divers are able to descend to a given depth and pretty much remain there for the planned duration of the dive and then slowly ascend to the surface.
Rate of ascent does matter especially when correlated to depth and the time at depth.
With more experience(or some would say with better training) most divers are able to descend to a given depth and pretty much remain there for the planned duration of the dive and then slowly ascend to the surface.
This is a joke, right?
DD
SueMermaid
Guest
It does if you want to stay alive. Are you a certified diver?
The Iceni
Medical Moderator
Hello Man_water,
I think King Nepune and Lady Diver might have a word or two with the children later! I think I speak for the majority in stating that any question is welcome here and we will try answer them honestly, as JBD did.
None of us knows it all and each of us had to start from the very beginning knowing absolutely nothing. There is a great deal to learn before one becomes a competent diver and hopefully with a good instructor your should be taught all the the dos and don'ts of safe and very enjoyable diving.
Keep asking!
I think King Nepune and Lady Diver might have a word or two with the children later! I think I speak for the majority in stating that any question is welcome here and we will try answer them honestly, as JBD did.
None of us knows it all and each of us had to start from the very beginning knowing absolutely nothing. There is a great deal to learn before one becomes a competent diver and hopefully with a good instructor your should be taught all the the dos and don'ts of safe and very enjoyable diving.
Keep asking!
Soggy
Contributor
How's it feel living under the bridge?
colonelchuck
Contributor
As with any course of instruction, it is possible to pass all the tests and still have some pretty basic questions. This board has proved a great place to learn stuff and we need to keep it a friendly place to ask even simple questions.
As a pretty new diver, I thought I knew the answer to the question, but it was great to get what I thought I knew reinforced.
As a pretty new diver, I thought I knew the answer to the question, but it was great to get what I thought I knew reinforced.
Dr Deco
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Dear man water:
On The Surface
There is nothing wrong with coming directly to the surface for any reason as long as you have not exceeded the no-decompression limit. If you surface near the decompression limit, then you are under the control of the repetitive dive rules.
One would probably suggest that multiple descents and ascents would not be good, although I have heard of commercial divers doing just that daily for several years without encountering any DCS problems.
Dr Deco :doctor:
On The Surface
There is nothing wrong with coming directly to the surface for any reason as long as you have not exceeded the no-decompression limit. If you surface near the decompression limit, then you are under the control of the repetitive dive rules.
One would probably suggest that multiple descents and ascents would not be good, although I have heard of commercial divers doing just that daily for several years without encountering any DCS problems.
Dr Deco :doctor:
Paul... one post, no details in the profile, and a question that has some rather large holes in its logic... come on!
By the way, you didn't really answer Man_water did you.
OK here goes... Hook firmly in cheek
Man_water: your questions raise some interesting points that several of the members here will doubtless want to answer in their own way. But in the meanwhile, let's look at each of them and try to give you some simple answers. I expect you're doing a school project, correct? OK, here goes.
Firstly, floating to the surface. This is considered "Bad Form" in the world of diving. It simply isn't done... at least not by properly trained and equipped divers. Occasionally, circumstances such as strong and unexpected currents or the loss of a weight belt or getting tangled in anchor chain being winched to the surface, will result in an unexpected surfacing. At this point, generally speaking, it would be most prudent to stay on the surface and postpone any further diving for a period of 24 hours or longer.
Of course, the speed of this ascent during this float to the surface is a critical factor in determining just how long, "longer" may be. It may be days , weeks or months or eternity that one has to stay out of the water.
You see, fast trips to the surface from depth -- and surprisingly, not much depth -- can result in something called Barotrauma. There's some information about this at http://www.emedicine.com/emerg/topic53.htm but in case you haven't the time to follow that link, barotrauma covers such things as burst lungs, broken eardrums, and bubbles of gas forming in the blood and causing all kinds of complications. All rather inconvenient things to suffer through, as you can imagine. This is one reason why floating up is simply not considered an option by divers.
Now finally, you mentioned depth and asked: "Does it matter?" Well of course it does. You see, the deeper one goes underwater, the more complicated things like staying safe become. In fact, at some depths, it's impossible to stay safe at all. For example, imagine a coral reef that comes all the way to within 20 feet (6 meters) of the surface on one side but that drops off to 3000 feet (980 meters) on the other. Well, diving on the shallow side is a lot easier to plan for than diving on the deep side.
But what you probably meant was that if I float up from say 30 meters, would it be OK to dive back down to 20 meters? The answer is No! This would likely not be a sage or safe thing to attempt. (See above.)
You know, a great deal of this stuff is covered in a basic openwater diver class, but that's not much help to a non-diver is it. Something that may help you in your project is to visit with your chemistry teacher and ask them about the Gas Laws. Ask them specifically about a man called Boyle and his work describing gas volume and its relationship with pressure. Mr. Boyles work describes very neatly why this floating up thing is such a bad idea.
Hope this helps
Captain Neptune (I'm a republican... no kings in my world)
P.S.
Dr Deco mentioned in his post about commercial divers bouncing around (YOYO diving) without injury... this brings up the topic of crushing Bubble Nuclei which is a pretty advanced topic that we should probably steer away from, but it does show that this topic is an interesting and complex one.
The Iceni
Medical Moderator
No, Doppler. I thought JBD had done a pretty good job. What I did was subtly point man_water towards proper training. I do not think this board is the place to undertake that particular task.
Well man_water, a little more info on your profile, perhaps?
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