deco buddy

[wedivebc]

I am curious how others would react in this situation so I post this hypothetical scenario for your consideration:
You are doing a deco dive that is planned with less than 1/2 hr deco using one deco gas. Shortly into your deco stop your buddy runs out of deco gas for whatever reason so you finish your deco, hand off your deco cylinder. Now I see you have 3 options, 1. you go back to back gas and stay with your buddy while he completes his now extended deco 2. You exit the water secure some more deco gas just in case and return to your buddy or 3. exit the water and have lunch knowing your buddy is only in 20ft and the water is clear so you can see him anyway.
Just to add one more wrinkle, how do you react when what was expected to be 10-15 minutes of extra deco turns into 25 minutes for some reason?

 

[JeffG]

1

 

[MSilvia]

If my buddy ran out of deco gas shortly into a stop, he'd be sharing mine. We'd finish up the deco at the same time, and have lunch together.

Why on earth would he have an extended deco obligation because of it? If for some reason my deco gas wasn't available either, or buddy breathing seemed like an unbearable pain in the butt, I'd go to my lost gas contingency schedule, and we'd both do deco on the next best gas available. Either way, we finish together.

There'd be no "I'll finish my accelerated deco while you use back gas, and I'll see you on the boat." That's B.S., and if my buddy pulled that I'd be tempted to hand him an ice-cold can of whupass to go with his sandwich.

My reaction to having to do more deco is simple... I do it.

 

[wedivebc]

If my buddy ran out of deco gas shortly into a stop, he'd be sharing mine. We'd finish up the deco at the same time, and have lunch together.

Why on earth would he have an extended deco obligation because of it? If for some reason my deco gas wasn't available either, or buddy breathing seemed like an unbearable pain in the butt, I'd go to my lost gas contingency schedule, and we'd both do deco on the next best gas available. Either way, we finish together.

One could argue that extending the deco by 50% or so is less stressful and task loading than buddy breathing for 1/2hr at at time.

I'd be tempted to hand him an ice-cold can of whupass to go with his sandwich.

My reaction to having to do more deco is simple... I do it.

In Canada we serve our whupass at room temperature

 

[JeffG]

One could argue that extending the deco by 50% or so is less stressful and task loading than buddy breathing for 1/2hr at at time.

You could split the difference and skip the buddy breathing.

One guy deco's on BG, the other on the Deco Gas. and then the one dive gives the deco gas to the other diver.

That way you could get out of the water a bit quicker or if you did the time as if it was backgas, could be a bit safer.

I would make the call based on water temp and comfort.

 

[Soggy]

If Diver A runs out of deco gas, it'll likely be either at the very end of deco or right at the beginning (lost gas scenario). In this case, Diver A would either do their time at that stop and hand off the bottle to Diver B or do their time and wait for diver B to finish their extended backgas deco at that stop before moving to the next stop. Eventually you will both run out of deco gas and the remaining stops will need to be done on backgas.

 

[Doc Intrepid]

May be able to send a note up on a slate requesting a safety diver bring down another deco bottle, we typically have more on the boat than we need, but same as the others, regardless of the solution chosen we stay together and execute it together.

 

[MSilvia]

One could argue that extending the deco by 50% or so is less stressful and task loading than buddy breathing for 1/2hr at at time.

One could indeed, which is why I put in the bit about "or buddy breathing seemed like an unbearable pain in the butt". At the same time though, I've been on dives that were cold to the point that I'd rather buddy breathe than stay in the water "relaxing" for an extra 15 minutes, and I'd want to make that call depending on the conditions.

Since he said "less than 1/2 hour of deco", I'd think the stops would begin in fairly shallow water, and the deco gas in an AL40 should last 2 divers. In any case, going to back gas instead is definately an option... exiting the water without a buddy is less so.

 

[Diver0001]

I am curious how others would react in this situation so I post this hypothetical scenario for your consideration:
You are doing a deco dive that is planned with less than 1/2 hr deco using one deco gas. Shortly into your deco stop your buddy runs out of deco gas for whatever reason so you finish your deco, hand off your deco cylinder. Now I see you have 3 options, 1. you go back to back gas and stay with your buddy while he completes his now extended deco 2. You exit the water secure some more deco gas just in case and return to your buddy or 3. exit the water and have lunch knowing your buddy is only in 20ft and the water is clear so you can see him anyway.
Just to add one more wrinkle, how do you react when what was expected to be 10-15 minutes of extra deco turns into 25 minutes for some reason?

Glad it's hypothetical, Dave. What prompted you to start this thread?

#1 seems like the obvious solution to me.

#2 seems a little unrealistic. With 20-25 odd minutes of deco you can easily bring a single gas with 50% reserve and then you still have your 1/3rds on the back-gas (could be up to another hour or so of reserve assuming both divers have AL-80's). So I'd say that running out of gas to deco is unlikely in this scenaro. Moreover, you've planned for this happening and you have your contingeny plan clear before you dive. You're not making these kinds of decision on the fly.

#3 is totally unrealistic. Deco doesn't just grow for no reason. I suppose you could have made a screw up that was so monumental that you have 50% extra deco but then Darwin 's your daddy and you should have followed the diveplan.

R..

 

[wedivebc]

Glad it's hypothetical, Dave. What prompted you to start this thread?

.

I was a casual observer of this scenario recently. I was part of a different team doing a completely different dive.
The extended deco was the result of the diver not being able to make gas switches on his VR3 so he did the deco for backgas.

given that....

You could split the difference and skip the buddy breathing.

One guy deco's on BG, the other on the Deco Gas. and then the one dive gives the deco gas to the other diver.

That way you could get out of the water a bit quicker or if you did the time as if it was backgas, could be a bit safer.

I would make the call based on water temp and comfort.

How long would you extend the deco for intermittent backgas switches?. Would you treat it like air breaks?