Gloves from now on!

[DandyDon]

I think at the least - even with the most restrictive rules in some areas, one could carry the light weight gloves in a BC pocket and don them at 1,000# psi. Certainly good on mooring lines that grow baracles etc, anchor chains, and ladders. :14:

 

[rjchandler]

Grand Cayman Law

For good reasons the Cayman Islands Government has banded the use of gloves while scuba diving on coral reefs. Although some experienced divers can wear gloves responsibly, many can not. It has been studied that divers wearing gloves are far more likely to touch a coral or a fish - Touching can remove their mucus membrane and cause infection and even cause corals to die. Please help us follow this new law, otherwise it can lead to 6 months in jail, confiscation of vessel and a $500,000 fine.

OUCH!

I think a lot of those cold dead hands are going to have the gloves pried off.

 

[Doc]

I think at the least - even with the most restrictive rules in some areas, one could carry the light weight gloves in a BC pocket and don them at 1,000# psi. Certainly good on mooring lines that grow baracles etc, anchor chains, and ladders. :14:

Never an argument from me- but here's something better....

http://www.tridentdive.com/page116.htm

item DF-99, second from bottom on left.

Or here: http://www.leisurepro.com/Catalog.aspx?op=ItemDisplay&ProductID=OMSALH

http://www.scuba.com/shop/product.asp?category=117&fromsearch=1&hashvalue=030129

This is how to manage any mooring line.
Pictured here:
vvvv

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

When I was in Roatan I saw only one diver with gloves ... they've been illegal there for several years.

He was using them to pull himself along the deck of the wreck in front of CocoView ... grabbing gorgonians and whatever else he could hang onto.

Betchya he wouldn't have been doing that if he had no gloves on ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[DandyDon]

<excerpting....>

This is how to manage any mooring line.
Pictured here:
vvvv

Then the operators should supply those lines, like they do web belts.

When I was in Roatan I saw only one diver with gloves ... they've been illegal there for several years.

He was using them to pull himself along the deck of the wreck in front of CocoView ... grabbing gorgonians and whatever else he could hang onto.

Betchya he wouldn't have been doing that if he had no gloves on ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Yes, bums like that give us all a bad name. He probably kicked coral with his fins, too. Did you write him a note on your slate asking him to stop? Education is preferably to rules.

 

[saf_25]

That's interesting (about the diver at CCV). When we were there a few months ago, they made the speech at the beginning asking us not to wear gloves, but it wasn't enforced. There were a number of people on my boat who chose to wear 1 glove, on their non-dominant hand. That way, it was there if needed, but since it wasn't on the dominant hand, they still had to think about it before they reached out for something. No one seemed to touch anything that I noticed, but they were useful for some of the more scratchy lines.
Frankly, I'm all for the "keep a glove stowed in your pocket" approach. In Hawaii, my hand got really torn up from barnacles going up a line, having a glove handy would have been nice. Of course, that's in warm water. Here in CA, if anyone tells me to leave my gloves off, I'll tell them where they can shove it! In 60 degree water, my gloves are staying on.

 

[Hawk]

It is really simple in my opinion. When the rule is put in place to not wear gloves, don't wear gloves. Some cases may require the use of them, strong currents near the line, etc. In that case if something else is not available, or if you cannot bring something yourself, bring them and put one on when you need to hold the line. In most cases, however, unless it is cold water they are not needed.

Last spring while at CoCoView, I took a side trip to another resort and saw a video they had of some of their "divers" that had been made to show how great it was. I shook my head at these "divers" and vowed to never go anywhere near these people in the water. They were standing on the deck of a wreck put in the water near there waving for the picture. They had the obligatory pictures of themselves standing and kneeling on the bottom again vaving and tumbling around. Do any of these people have a clue? This is the kind of garbage that is shown to them as an example of what to do by piss poor instructors. These are the kind of people who are affectionately known as "rototillers" by those who actually know how to dive correctly. These are also the kind of "divers" that I would expect to put their gloves on as soon as they get into the water, reguardless of the rules, because they need them.

As I see it, a little self discipline, a little respect. and a little bit of practice controlling one's own body in the water will overcome the "need" to have gloves on in warm water. The rule is there for a reason, to protect the environment. If it hurts when you touch something, good! I am glad that it does!

Later, Hawk.

 

[getwet2]

It is really simple in my opinion. When the rule is put in place to not wear gloves, don't wear gloves. Some cases may require the use of them, strong currents near the line, etc. In that case if something else is not available, or if you cannot bring something yourself, bring them and put one on when you need to hold the line. In most cases, however, unless it is cold water they are not needed.

Last spring while at CoCoView, I took a side trip to another resort and saw a video they had of some of their "divers" that had been made to show how great it was. I shook my head at these "divers" and vowed to never go anywhere near these people in the water. They were standing on the deck of a wreck put in the water near there waving for the picture. They had the obligatory pictures of themselves standing and kneeling on the bottom again vaving and tumbling around. Do any of these people have a clue? This is the kind of garbage that is shown to them as an example of what to do by piss poor instructors. These are the kind of people who are affectionately known as "rototillers" by those who actually know how to dive correctly. These are also the kind of "divers" that I would expect to put their gloves on as soon as they get into the water, reguardless of the rules, because they need them.

As I see it, a little self discipline, a little respect. and a little bit of practice controlling one's own body in the water will overcome the "need" to have gloves on in warm water. The rule is there for a reason, to protect the environment. If it hurts when you touch something, good! I am glad that it does!

Later, Hawk.

Hawk,

I agree with most of what you say but rules are usually made because of the actions of a few people, in this case it's the poor diving ability of some divers and the lack of environmental education of those same divers. The divers that are the cause of this rule will still be kicking the corals or standing on them, how do they stop that, no fins allowed when diving.

No matter what rules are made you just can't stop stupid people from doing stupid things, they always, always think of something else to do that's just as stupid or worse. What's that saying... "Never argue with an idiot, they will only bring you down to their level and beat you with experience."

On my last trip I observed one diver actually touching an anenome with her bare hands, just to see what it felt like, I got her attention and shook my head and finger at her, as well as mentioning it when back on the boat. Will she touch them again, probably but just not the pretty white and purple ones next time. This same woman and her husband were all over the place during their dives, kicking things and stirring up the bottom every where they went. Their dive profile pretty much resembled a roller coaster, I stayed as far away from them as I could. Luckily I was only on the same boat with them once.

I should have showed her the Scorpionfish, maybe she would have liked to pet it too!

 

[LavaSurfer]

I should have showed her the Scorpionfish, maybe she would have liked to pet it too!

 

[Laurence Stein DDS]

Larry, you'll know me when you see me, I am the guy with thousands of warm water dives not wearing any gloves. All ten fingers still attached! (technically)

Hi RoatanMan,

I was going to respond yesterday but I was busy...buying more gloves.

For the record, I too have logged thousands of dives and I'm sure you like myself have learned many valuable lessons from our boating environment.

Since we are trading barbs, I wasn't quite sure if your "terminally clumsy" was referring to me or you. I can assure you that the ladder was not in any disrepair. We returned to the boat to discover that the seas had gone from calm to nearly constant 6 foot "rollers". There was nothing wrong with the ladder. Like many ladders, it is hinged at the base (this is a 25 foot pleasure boat with a small platform rather than a commercial dive boat). The surge was so great that one had to time planting the feet on the first rung of the ladder before the next swell. Unfortunately, once I planted my foot the stern surged upwards causing my gloved hands to slip down the polished tube of the ladder. Then as the stern then plunged downwards, the hand slipped upwards into the built in ladder hinge where it connects to the platform. At the same time the ladder did as it was designed to do...it swung out and up...opening the gap in the hinge and my hand was now between the top of the ladder tube and the platform. The next surge of the stern upwards caused the ladder to swing back to its fully extended position except that my fingertip was clamped in between. My full weight and the added momentum of the the upward surge was applied to my fingertip. Kind of like hitting your finger with a sledge hammer. It only took about once second.

The thickness of the glove actually saved my finger tip. As the glove material was compressed, it pushed my finger ever so slightly away from being completely crushed by the ladder tube.

So much for teminally clumsy and not inspecting the ladder...that is simply more BS to support your perhaps misguided opinion that one should wear gloves.

For the record, I DO believe that divers wearing gloves are more likely to touch something...they feel protected. I won't argue with this. MY POINT is not one of reef protection but one of personal protection. You wear sunglasses and a hat for protection on the boat taking you to your dive site (where you might engage in uninvited touching). You wear a dive skin, or a wetsuit or perhaps only a tee shirt for protection from stings and bites while diving. Would it not be logical to also argue that sun glasses, hats, dive skins, wetsuits or tee shirts all contribute to reef damage because they all aid divers in protecting themselves and thereby allowing them to dive more safely and more comfortably?

BTW, I do NOT routinely dive with a skin or wetsuit (warm water diver). I started diving when I was 7 years old as a skin diver with my father. I have continued to skindive for all these years. I learned at a very young age what fire coral was and to simply never let my unprotected body touch it. Everytime I did touch it I got a lesson for the teminally clumsy.

I would suggest that learning to scuba dive with no skin protection at all in warm water would make all divers very careful about their bouyancy and unplanned reef contact. Of course that must sound downright silly as a training exercise...who would knowingly expose themselves to all these nasty stings bites and cuts. So....let's blame the gloves...that really logical!

Finally, I know it sounds silly but I even wear gloves when treating people...it's true...they have some rather nasty germs and contain blood. Gloves are considered a form of human protection from injury and disease. Logical, resonable humans will consider protection a good thing. It is one of the reasons we have succeeded as a species. I can only hope that some form of "Natural Selection" will take hold and eliminate the non-gloved divers from the oceans of the world before they multiply.

Zing....again.

Talk later. Gotta buy booties.


Laurence Stein, DDS