dropping weights could save life

[MikeFerrara]

Diving overweighted is bad...bad...bad. Don't do it.

Diving without being prificient in basic skills is bad...bad...bad. Don't do it.

This isn't an arguement for droping weights at depth. It's an arguement against diving without knowing what you're doing.

the time for this diver to drop weight was before he got in the water.

 

[jbd]

It seems as though P*** tried to ditch weights and couldn't.
If the weight belt was caught on the crotch strap then something wasn't put together properly to effectively ditch the belt. Even had he sucessfully ditched the belt, he may well have reached the surface with injuries that could have been mortal or fatal, compliments of the rocket ride to the surface.

 

[Rick Murchison]

If the weight belt was caught on the crotch strap then something wasn't put together properly to effectively ditch the belt.

You're gonna be surpised at the accomplished divers who'll tell you the weight belt should be worn under the crotch strap to prevent accidental loss. I don't happen to be one of them but there are many with far more experience than I who make the case for the extra ditching step.
Rick

 

[Rick Murchison]

the time for this diver to drop weight was before he got in the water.

I second that. In spades.
Rick

 

[String]

If i HAD a crotch strap id gladly use it to stop any chance of my weight belt falling off !

 

[Don Burke]

Ten kilos overweighted is twenty-two pounds for the metric impaired.

The dive was in cold water.

The diver didn't know how to get his weight belt out or didn't know how to arange his harness and weight belt, which is roughly the same thing.

I have to agree with Mike. This CF should have been called while dry at 1atm.

 

[cdiver2]

If i HAD a crotch strap id gladly use it to stop any chance of my weight belt falling off !

I was BSAC trained 1971 and was taught that the belt must be over all other straps, has this changed within the BSAC ?.
In over 30 years of diving I have never had or seen a weight belt come of accidentally.

 

[jbd]

You're gonna be surpised at the accomplished divers who'll tell you the weight belt should be worn under the crotch strap to prevent accidental loss. I don't happen to be one of them but there are many with far more experience than I who make the case for the extra ditching step.
Rick

Can't disagree with you on this, however these are most likely the same people who insist on diving in a horizontal attitude. I have yet to have an unbuckled weight belt fall off when I'm horizontal. Yes I have been in situations where the belt was unbuckled both intentionally and unintentionally. IMHO weights should be easily ditchable---at least some portion.

I agree that this dive should have never happened.

 

[grahamsp]

And mine is that there are many cases every year where divers get themselves in trouble on the surface where some ditchable weight could prevent an injury or death.
I am particularly fond of ditchable weight on "the other guy" when I approach him/her when he/she's in trouble on the surface.
Don't be sorry Curt... I ain't. And I doubt we'll ever see eye-to-eye on this particular issue - what with being old and set in our ways & all...
Rick

Got in one, Rick.

How can it be argued that there will never be a situation where weights are best ditched? There will always be scenarios where dropping weights gives the diver ways to better manage a problem and shutting off the diver's options by the use of arbitrary rules doesn't make much sense. The example quoted above is perhaps the obvious one but there will be others, I'm sure.

But, as always, it does in the end come down to having the right mental attitude built on a strong foundation of good training and enough experience to plan for and cope with the dramas that diving will inevitably throw at you. If that's the sort of diver you are, then you can make the decision to ditch or not and it will be the right one under the circumstances. If you are not that sort of diver, well . . . .

 

[MikeFerrara]

I was BSAC trained 1971 and was taught that the belt must be over all other straps, has this changed within the BSAC ?.
In over 30 years of diving I have never had or seen a weight belt come of accidentally.

I can't even count the number of weight belsts and weight pouches that I''ve seen lost.

Especially divers with heavy weight belts diving heavy wet suits who don't have any hips lose them.