How long do you wait for a buddy?

[SnakeRiverPirate]

Yesterday, I was given an instabuddy as I was in proximity to an OW class that was finishing up and it was now time for "fun dives". The fellow I was asked to take seemed very nice. I am a recent OW grad and was there to accrue dives towards my AOW rating. So, I am not a greatly experienced diver by any stretch of the imagination.

Visibility was, at best, poor, 5-7 feet. This was In a a thermal lake on the Utah/Nevada border. Since an OW class had been going on the bottom was fairly riled. The floor of the lake has a series of objects that you can go to and they are set up on a series of hand lines from platforms. We went from a platform @21 feet working our way down to a sunken boat at 51 feet. I was in the lead. When we went back up the line. I waited for him to appear. I found out that he was not a particularly strong swimmer. I waited about a minute and a half for him to appear, but it started me thinking what would I do if he never showed?

I put him in the lead to the other items on the dive so that I could keep him in sight better. But I also want to have a better plan in place for such situations in low viz.

I'd appreciate your suggestions.

 

[bfisher]

Who's mistake it was is irrelevent now, but in poor viz you should keep in closer contact. Probably in this case, his fault as you were in the lead. What you should have done was discussed a plan of action prior to making the dive so you both knew exactly what to expect from each other.

It sounds, though that you got separated under water and you surfaced. Am I correct? If so you did the right thing. Now your question about how long to wait. Wait for what? Wait for him to appear or wait to get help? Tough call sometimes. How long was it before he surfaced, because apparently you got back together.

In any case, if you're asking how long to wait before YOU go looking for him, I'd say that's out of the question. In your open water class it was probably discussed that in such a situation you hunt for your buddy at depth for about a minute or two. If you don't hook up then you surface and wait for each other. In no case should you surface, then go back down looking in such conditions. There is no reason to put yourself at risk, whether you are a new or seasoned veteran. In fact, the more experience you get the more you learn to adhere to the predive plan for the safety of all concerned.

I wouldn't lose any sleep over it. You both came out alright with no harm. Just hope you learned from it.

I had a similar situation last year myself. Three of us in only 25' of water. Viz was about 5' or so. Just one of the reasons I don't dive here at home in Pa. Anyway, my firend Jim, a divemaster was in the lead. Being fairly level headed I broguht up the rear with the least experienced diver between us. Well, being inexperienced he was carrying too much weight low on his torso which had his fins tearing up the bottom. I tried as best as I could to stay just above his fins, but keep them in sight. At one point I lost them.

Now to figure out where they went. On the way out I had taken a compass heading back to our starting point and that was the direction we were going. So I just grabbed the trusty old compass and followed the right heading. At times like this it's easy to lose one's composure and that's when accidents can happen. I never do lose it. I always keep in my head that I can't get lost. There is always UP, and we were only down about 21' at this point. So I just continued on my course and low and behold I finally got kicked in the head by a fin---found them.

As I said, the best thing to do in many of these circumstances is keep your head and don't react quickly. Slow down or stop and think!!!! Then act according to your training and best judgement.

Sad to say, in your case, you are both certified divers and have gone through the same training. You learned the basic rules. You are not personally responsible for what your buddy does in such circumstances. That doesn't make you feel any better though does it?

 

[lamont]

Generally, you want to search/wait underwater for a couple of minutes, then surface, then stay on the surface.

I know of a few incidents where divers have searched for a lost buddy underwater for a long time, or have continued a dive solo, and the other buddy has surfaced and wound up calling 9-1-1.

An edge condition of this is probably when you need to swim to your exit and the surface is less attractive due to fighting currents or boating traffic, etc. In that case though you still need to turn the dive and exit and not spend a lot of time searching without making progress towards the exit. You should then all surface within a few minutes of each other at the exit if all of you follow this plan.

 

[SnakeRiverPirate]

Actually I was at the platform at 21 feet. I knew that he was on the line and coming. It was more just the creepy feeling of waiting and what if something went wrong. The whole incident could not have taken a minute and a half and was probably closer to 45 seconds. The viz was just really poor. Thanks for the help.

 

[jefffalcone]

It's a lot easire to stay with a buddy if you dive side by side, instead on one behind the other.

 

[SnakeRiverPirate]

I guess that we could have picked sides of the line to work in the dive plan.

 

[spectrum]

Being with a new buddy in poor visibility is a challenge. As part of your pre-dive you want to set some ground rules such as having the follower stay in sight and to the side of you not much more than 1/2 a diver length back. If he keeps you in sight then you should also be able to see him with a slight look back. If it was murky running alight would really help.

You mentioned it was a lake and he was not a strong swimmer. It sounds like you could stand to be going slower from that. Unless in a current going slow to where swimming ability is almost trivial is the nicest ride.

Once separated I would turn on my day light if it wasn't already on and start making sweeps. The beam can pierce the murk and let you be located from a further distance. Likewise for the buddy. Using your known travel direction you can sweep back 180 degrees and don't forget above and below yourself.

After a minute or so make a controlled ascent and start sweeping 360 degrees. Make sure that's in the pre-dive too, it's pretty standard but not at all universal or remembered. This can be a stressful time so control, yourself. A got separated form a buddy a few weeks ago on a night dive and had to come up. The other diver got distracted and the lack of visibility soon soon had us split up. It was a while longer before the other diver realized the separation and finally surfaced. It made for what seemed like a few anxious minutes even in the otherwise benign conditions.

Even as a new diver remember to wear your "mentor hat" when guiding newer divers.

Pete

 

[Mark Vlahos]

Actually I was at the platform at 21 feet. I knew that he was on the line and coming. It was more just the creepy feeling of waiting and what if something went wrong. The whole incident could not have taken a minute and a half and was probably closer to 45 seconds. The viz was just really poor. Thanks for the help.

Actually there is one very important point to consider, right in the second sentence of this post. You did not actually KNOW that he was on the line and coming. You ASSUMED that he was on the line and coming. Even if the line was moving, it could have been other divers doing the tugging.

When you make an assumption underwater it might have consequences.

Mark Vlahos

 

[SnakeRiverPirate]

I really didn't know that he was not a strong swimmer until his arriving at the platform. I then let he be in the lead as I knew I could keep up with him. It seemed that letting the slower swimmer set the pace was a good idea.

I am seeing that our pre-dive chat needed to be far more inclusive. I did not go out there expecting to be a leader. I thought that I would be diving with a DIVECON following the class. Shows me what I get for thinking.

 

[spectrum]

Another option on a deeper dive, and 50 feet qwould qualify it as follows.

Designate one diver to sit still and the other, probably more experienced to search. You can set a time like 5 minutes on this method before surfacing solo. It provides the chance to salvage a dive where you may not want to yo yo back to a significant depth.

Pete