DIR and/or Hog not for the Atlantic?

[rjack321]

Is that sarcasm or are you serious?

In the real world, I agree with you. I think most DIR oriented divers with experience to season the training and indoctrination will assess the conditions and the particular dive and then configure accordingly.

On-line I can't say that I've observed that to be true. Try suggesting that a diver use a John line for mid atlantic or NE wreck diving and see what happens. Last time I tried, the response was pretty negative with the suggestion that a spool works just as well - by people who have apparently never tried it in a 2 kt current with an encrusted anchor line jumping in 6 ft waves. Then when you suggest the line is going to break you get more DIR compliant suggestions like (my personal favorite) scootering the deco. If you suggest something really out there, like a Jersey upline may make sense in some conditions, some of the truly faithful will have a siezure.

We scooter deco (up the shot line) sometimes. Trigger on, then off, works great, no stress.
When we aren't scootering we shoot a SMB and drift.
We can't anchor on our "big" wrecks. There's no way we could "have a mate" tie in with a chain and stay for a couple days etc like might happen on the Doria or similar. Otherwise our vis, temps, and currents are comparable (or worse) to the NE Atlantic areas I have been (Maine mostly).

I would say that the primary impediment to DIR diving in the NE Atlantic is having large boats (and needing to fill them), a partial requirement of the distances off-shore, and human resistance to doing something different. There's quite a large DIR contingent over in the UK for instance, ditto in Seattle, British Columbia, the SanFran/Monterey Bay area, and even the Netherlands and Baltic countries. Suggesting that NE Atlantic circumstances are singularly unique and "will just never work" for DIR diving is mostly just a testimony to the limited experience of the author.

I don't really care how someone else decides to dive although I do find some (relicit) practices pretty funny