Give up my primary regulator???

[Steve_C]

Had one diver needing air. They had equipment issue. Gave me the OOA sign. I passed them my spare. All good. We sorted out the issue with equipment. Was their first past cert, in ocean dive. Done another air share with guide who was running low but that was not any sort of emergency.

I do only rec dives. Max depth about 105 or so. Usually 95 and above.

I use the give alternate approach for several reasons.

1. My reg has a sea cure mouthpiece which fits my particular mouth. Not sure an OOA diver would like it. It is very hard to get out of my mouth much less into theirs. It is very secure in my mouth.
2. I like the idea that I always have air and I can focus on them. (note number 3)
3. In the remote chance that some one grabs my mouthpiece and is able to get it out of my mouth, I would grab the reg off the slung pony which is 6 inches from my mouth on the left side and then swap to my alternate if the situation permits.
4. It does not guarantee anything but I always go over air sources before every dive.

 

[Waterwulf]

Well, I've read thru all of the responses a couple of times and it seems that the consensus is that there's no consensus! I do know for absolutely sure that if I was using a "spare air type octo" that's part of my BCD, I'd use that one and give up my primary since I want to the one in control of my BCD. In my case, I have an actual spare secondary that's attached with a pop off clip to my BCD on my right chest where I can see it and find it. This is the one that I will give to the other person. That's the way I was trained so I think I'll stick to that. Of course, that will be discussed pre-dive. If that person is going to fight me for the one in my mouth, they can have it and I'll use the extra. Truthfully though, in all of my years of diving, I have never been involved on a dive where somebody ran out of air and needed to borrow some. But I did see the results of several panicked divers.

Must have been about 1976 or so. I think it was Morrison Springs in North Florida. It was my very first cave dive. My partner was experienced so I was going to follow his lead unless he wanted to go past the STOP sign. We're carrying our gear out to the end of the little dock as the ambulance guys are wheeling three body bags off of the dock. The guy running the place is putting his gear away and asks us to bring back any loose gear that we find laying around in the cave. I'm thinking "Whoa baby. Do I really want to do this?"

We do the dive and it's boring!!!! Nothing to see but dark tunnels, brown rock and little eels with no eyeballs. The current was fierce. We get back to the surface and I ask the manager guy what happened to the three dead guys. He tells us that as near as he can figure it out, they were using ski rope as their guide rope. It floats and drifts around a lot in the current. One of the guys must have gotten tangled in it, panicked and strangled himself in the rope. The second guy saw that, panicked, dropped his regulator and couldn't find it. He went after the third guy's regulator who also panicked. They're fighting for the regulator. The number three gut got stabbed several times. Number two guy never did find his regulator and drowned. None of them had any kind of spare air or octos. The moral of the story is that you fight like you train. If you don't train or only do it very little, your fight to live will be short.

The NAUI course that I took in 1974 was brutal. Part of that training was "Hell Day". They took us out to the pool one by one and kept us all separate so we couldn't tell each other what was going to happen. We had to carry all of our gear plus an extra heavy weight belt to the diving board, then jump off. When we hit bottom, we had to put all of our gear on correctly while sitting on the bottom of the pool. Step one was to lay the weight belt across your legs so you were stable. Step two was to get some air going. etc. etc. Did I mention that you couldn't see anything? Your mask was blacked out with tin foil but you had to put it on anyway. The Hell part of that day was what the instructors did. Yank on your fins so you'd flip upside down. Yank your regulator out of your mouth. Turn off your air. Grab you by the tank valve and drag you away. Turn your reserve to on. If you didn't check it, you failed. Grab your fin and flip you upside down while somebody else has turned off your air. Tickle you. (Oh yeah? Let somebody tickle you while you're on your next dive! You'll almost drown!) I should have known that this is what would happen when the instructors are all SpecOps warriors. But the training was excellent and I'm glad that I took it. I'm even more glad that I survived!!! Bunch of sadistic so and so's!

 

[Centrals]

I test my alternative which is hanging just below my chin regularly(rec or tec).

 

[AdivingBel]

IMHO, go with your training. I have read multiple threads with lots of posts from divers I respect that make compelling cases for long hose primary 2nd, bungeed octos, and ponys for basic rec dives. I just can't get past the vision of 20 vacation divers on a rec boat that can't stay off each others fins, sit on each others 2nds, and are digging in their bags during the dive brief looking for the stuff they forgot and imagining them all with those configs. OMG, what a bloody rodeo.

Again all IMHO, there are a handle full of basic rules for diving beyond that it becomes very situational. When folks (even very knowledgeable, with the best intentions) start talking about the best way, only way, wrong not do it my way (I'm not quoting anybody), they are losing track of the global audience and diversity of situations that is SB. To me that diversity and the sharing of those ideas are SBs strengths, but there is a big ocean out there.

So again to the OP, IMHO, go with your training or get the training/mentoring localized to the diving you are doing and go with that. Safe diving.

 

[DanBMW]

My training started at the YMCA in 1964 and it resembled a lot of the above comments as far as what was supposed to happen when either your buddy or another diver runs out of air. In the real world, in most cases, as has been stated above, there are no rules. They will go for whatever source is available and discuss it later. YOU need to have your own plan for breathing when someone take either regulator from you unannounced and quickly. To me, that is my safe second.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

I just can't get past the vision of 20 vacation divers on a rec boat that can't stay off each others fins, sit on each others 2nds, and are digging in their bags during the dive brief looking for the stuff they forgot and imagining them all with those configs. OMG, what a bloody rodeo.

 

[azstinger11]

Stepping on fins DIR style!

 

[WantSomeScuba?]

Well, I've read thru all of the responses a couple of times and it seems that the consensus is that there's no consensus!

There's definitely a consensus amongst the tech community.

 

[Doby45]

There's definitely a consensus amongst the tech community.

Spoken for truth..

 

[Neilwood]

Since there seems to be no single standard for how to handle out-of-air situations, making it a specific thing to address with your dive buddy, during your dive plan, makes the most sense to me (as @Neilwood posted).

With all of the folks I dive with, we address the location of all our air supplies and how they're attached but, I don't recall ever specifically addressing who would do what in an out-of-air situation. I guess I've always assumed that my dive buddy would do exactly what I was trained to do. And, as none of my dive buddies have ever raised the question, they were most likely making the same assumption. I realize now that this assumption is only correct if they were trained the same way I was trained. So, going forward, when I do my pre-dive check with my dive buddy, I'll be making sure that we discuss specifics regarding out-of-air situations and who donates or takes and exactly who will be using what air supply when the dust settles. Thanks for all of the inputs. Very helpful.

I think that, with most rec divers having the "traditional primary & octo" set up without long hoses, the assumption would always be traditional secondary donate unless specifically discussed.

If I happen to dive with someone with a long hose set up, I would expect them to fully explain the set up and do a dry run on land and possibly do a drill underwater to demonstrate how the set up works.