Exactly how deep is "Deep Air?"

[UCFKnightDiver]

What I read ... consistently ... in AJ's comments is his belief that deep air should not be taught ... and that if it were not taught, then when the old divers all died off people wouldn't do it.

As someone who has always tried teaching to higher than normal standards, I can tell you that there are ... and probably will always be ... a certain percentage of people who will go off and do things whether they are taught or not.

So the question becomes one of whether it's better to teach them something that may not be optimal, or "just say no" and live with the fact that some will go off and do it anyway ... only without any training.
Which do you believe would be less safe?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Maybe I missed this too but... this begs the question again of: What training? To be honest I still haven't seen a post that entails what narcosis management training is, what exactly can you do to train for this? It's one thing to teach(take) someone deep for their training but what exactly are you teaching, what methods to mitigate/deal with narcosis?

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

This begs the question again of: What training? To be honest I still haven't seen a post that entails what narcosis management training consists of, what exactly can you do to train for this?

I'm fairly certain that was covered in one of the previous deep air threads ... but honestly, there've been so many I can't keep track anymore ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[UCFKnightDiver]

I'm fairly certain that was covered in one of the previous deep air threads ... but honestly, there've been so many I can't keep track anymore ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I seem to remember a dope on a rope class that someone mentioned where they went down a line and then came back up doing stops along the way. That's all that is coming to mind, and if that's the training well...

On a tangent, there was a death recently (a few weeks or a month ago maybe?) where a student was taking a PADI DSAT Tec Deep class at Oronogo a quarry in the mid west I believe. His computer showed he had been at 179 during the class, I believe it was said that when he was seen on the surface that he was tangled in line from a lift bag deployment, of course we can't know for sure if deep air played a factor in that... but one only wonders. This at a place that's known for people diving deep air (one of which clearly doesn't know how to even plan rock bottom gas as evidenced in another recent thread, and he's diving to depths of ~180 ). His instructor came up bent.

Another fatality in Eagles Nest not too long ago, where the END on the gas they were diving was CONSIDERABLY deep.

 

[Cave Diver]

What I read ... consistently ... in AJ's comments is his belief that deep air should not be taught ... and that if it were not taught, then when the old divers all died off people wouldn't do it.

As someone who has always tried teaching to higher than normal standards, I can tell you that there are ... and probably will always be ... a certain percentage of people who will go off and do things whether they are taught or not ... often despite being shown a better way.

So the question becomes one of whether it's better to teach them something that may not be optimal, or "just say no" and live with the fact that some will go off and do it anyway ... only without any training.

Which do you believe would be less safe?

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Ok, so lets shift direction a little bit here. The poll results indicate that there are a lot of different ideas on what constitutes "deep."

With that in mind, what is the max depth that training should occur/certify someone on with air? (maybe I should make another poll)

Of course that doesn't stop them from diving deeper on their own anyway, but one step at a time.

(Questions not specifically directed to Bob, his post just made for convenient quoting)

 

[PfcAJ]

I would be content if you would just let other people exercise their own judgement and refrain from dictating to them how they should elect to dive.



Deep air (you may also insert cave diving, wreck diving, ice diving, decompression diving) is smart when the diver properly plans the dive and ascertains through his/her training & experience that they can complete the dive in a safe manner. What that depth is may be 30' or 200'; the depth isn't a concern if it falls within that individual's safe diving envelope.

You seem to be hung-up on "air." I've known Trimix divers who have gone deeper than their safety envelope. Wake-up and smell the coffee. It's not how deep you go; it's how deep are you properly prepared to go through training, experience and the application of good judgement.

PfcAJ: "...there isn't a good reason to dive deep air (END greater than 100')."

This is but one example. All you have to do is read his historic posts saying the same thing.

The main difference between our views is that I support his right to not dive past an END of 100'. Hell he has the right to not dive at all. Where I have a problem is where a non-instructor with limited experience gets off by telling all instructors that teach Deep Air in accordance with their agency policies that they are irresponsible for doing so. That's bull****!

You're a little upset that I think you're irresponsible, aren't you? I guess that instructor who killed that guy 2 weeks (or so) ago was acting responsibly? By teaching antiquated practices in a very unforgiving environment? How about the guy that got paralyzed on the Speigel. Rec limit is 130 on air, right? Diving deep is dangerous enough without adding excessive narcosis to it. Why make something inherently unsafe MORE unsafe? it boils down time and time again to nickel rocketry or (my fav) machoism. There isn't a good reason to do it. Air isn't the best gas to deco from, its dense at depth, and is very narcotic. What advantage does it have again? Oh yea, its cheap and the tough guys can handle it.

I still have yet to see any explanation at all as to why there are almost zero deaths on dives past 100' with an END of less than 100'.

Like I said, if you want to do it, go for it. I'll still think you're irresponsible, but thats just my opinion. If you want to teach it, then thats a different ballgame. Now you're not only a danger to yourself, but to others. The sad part is that the others often don't know any better, and you're doing them a disservice by taking their money in exchange for sub-optimal diving practices that have a body count on them.

Go ahead and find a body count for the methods I advocate. I'll be leaving the country on the 1st, so you've got until then. Give me a list of names of people who died that were cave trained and followed the rules. Once again, I'll be waiting. And btw, I don't suggest that a diver partake in deep diving, cave diving, wreck diving, etc. I advocate that if they want do it, they do it in the safest manner possible (which includes not being narcd).

 

[ianr33]

I still have yet to see any explanation at all as to why there are almost zero deaths on dives past 100' with an END of less than 100'.

One POSSIBLE explanation would be that hardly anyone is using helium.Unless you know the numbers of dives done with END <100 and the number with END> 100 the number of deaths is pretty meaningless statistically speaking.

Before Trimix was first used, 100% of deaths below 100 feet had END>100.
Now that % is less than 100. So has trimix made deep air safer ?

 

[BDSC]

Give me a list of names of people who died that were cave trained and followed the rules.

Would it even be possible to do that? I'm sure there have been a number of people who have died while cave diving. If someone could make a list of all those people and present them now, wouldn't it be easy to just say, "Well, they must not have followed the rules. If they had, they wouldn't have died."

But then again, couldn't that be said for most diving fatalities?

 

[PfcAJ]

One POSSIBLE explanation would be that hardly anyone is using helium.unless you know the numbers of dives done with END <100 and the number with END> 100 the number of deaths is pretty meaningless statistically speaking.

Before Trimix was first used, 100% of deaths below 100 feet had END>100.
Now that % is less than 100. So has trimix made deep air safer ?

Numbers of total dives made vs deaths vs helium used would be nice, but it would be nearly impossible to collect that data. Still, if there are very few (any? still waiting) deaths that have occured when diving past 100' with an END < 100'. By now, at least someone should have bit it if it was as dangerous as diving a high END.

Trimix is independent of deep air (if the END is low enough), so it hasn't had an effect on deep air. Was that what you were asking?

Would it even be possible to do that? I'm sure there have been a number of people who have died while cave diving. If someone could make a list of all those people and present them now, wouldn't it be easy to just say, "Well, they must not have followed the rules. If they had, they wouldn't have died."

But then again, couldn't that be said for most diving fatalities?

Check out the IUCRR and accident reports on various forums (including this one). Grab a snickers though, its going to take a while before you find one where someone died while following the rules (esp with cave diving). A while back I went through a year of fatalities, and all of them had one thing in common: Diver death on a deep dive ALWAYS had an END >100. If you're ambitious (I hope someone is) then they will try to find examples.

If a diver does unwise things (even if some 'instructor' thinks its ok) in these harsh environments, they could not make it home. Deep air is one of those things (there are others, but thats for a different thread).

 

[Teamcasa]

... exactly what "Deep Air" is.

Edit: for clarification, I'm interested in answers based on your personal assessment of narcosis and the point where you feel it adversely affects your ability to safely manage it.

For me, Narcosis starts rearing its ugly head below 110 or so. I can manage it pretty well down to 135'-140', any deeper and I know I need to go up.

However, I so rarely go below 110' that it's not really an issue for me any longer.

 

[UCFKnightDiver]

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