How to descend while staying together with your buddy?

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sadn3sss

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I usually descend by dumping all my air and sinking. I would stay vertical and fin up to slow my descend. When the waves or current or finning would rotate me or bring me further from my buddy, I would just swim closer to my buddy. Doing this allowed me to descend and keep visual contact with my buddy.

Then I found out that this was all wrong and the "correct" way of descending was in a horizontal position and using breathing to control descend rates.

After two tries, I didn't have much success. I was able to descend as much as 5 ft but found myself being tossed around by the waves and current. When trying to establish visual contact with my buddy, the swimming would just bring me back up to the surface. Rinse and repeat.

So what is the correct way? Do you descend independently to a certain depth (say 15 ft), hover and wait/reconnect with your buddy then descend together?
 
you shouldn't get out of arms reach of your buddy, especially on initial descent. Vertical until you get out of the surf to minimize getting tossed around, usually 15-20ft or so, and then flatten out to make the rest of the descent. Much more controlled manner being horizontal as you are fighting water resistance to get down.

Controlling with breathing isn't really good because you can't compensate for all of the depth, so you have to be controlling it with a combination of your breathing for fine control, and the wing for rough control. I.e. figure out how much you have to add and how often to maintain a good descent rate, but still be able to arrest that descent with your breathing at any time
 
Practice practice practice practice.

It takes time, keep working on it.
 
Practice for sure and when you throw more variables in there, practice some more. My buddy and I descend like we are skydiving and we are face to face. We have gotten pretty good at that and then we just threw in drysuits, so that also requires practice. Before we would just drop as fast as we wanted while bumping a bit of air in the wing to compensate. Now we both are bumping a bit of air in the suit to hold off squeeze and then also managing the wing for actual buoyancy. All that is not impossible by any stretch, but it takes practice.
 
So what is the correct way?

sadn3ess,

This is the Basic forum, so I'm assuming a wetsuit-ed diver wearing a single "reasonable" tank. Here's one approach: Either face your buddy or get shoulder-to-shoulder. Empty the little bit of air that's in your BC. (There shouldn't be much in there since you're at the surface, correct?) Exchange the "let's-ascend-okay" signs. Together, you and your buddy execute a nice surface dive to get a few feet beneath the surface. If the surface dive was a feet-first dive, then rotate to be in a heads-down orientation. Remain shoulder-to-shoulder with your buddy. Both of you gently kick down, heads-down, remaining shoulder-to-shoulder. Add air to your BC in short bursts so that you never become too negative, won't descend too fast. Stay shoulder-to-shoulder with your buddy. Don't forget to clear your ears—often, from the moment you first get beneath the surface.

As you near your target depth, orient yourself so that you're horizontal. Stay shoulder-to-shoulder with your buddy. Your descent will slow just from this horizontal orientation. Add a bit of air to your BC so that you've arrested your descent and you've become neutrally buoyant. Cinch-up your weight belt if it's not a self-adjusting type. Trade "okay" signs.

Now you and your buddy are ready to go exploring!

Safe Diving,

rx7diver
 
If you are in the water vertically and then flatten out horizontally as soon as you start to descend, there is a good chance you will not get all the air out of your BCD that you need to descend. I will bet that is your problem. That is especially true if you are using your inflator hose to dump all the air. Once you are under water and horizontal, you need to use your rear dump.

As for whether descending horizontally or vertically is "the correct way," there really is no answer. The overwhelming majority of people descend vertically. I used to do that, but I descend horizontally now. I was taught to do that in my first technical diving training, but for most diving, I don't see that it matters. When I am teaching new students, I teach them to do it vertically, because it is easier for them to maintain control, and it is easier to clear the ears.
 
I usually descend by dumping all my air and sinking.

That's your mistake right there.

How I teach this in my OW course is as follows.

1) after preparing to descend, (sign, checking instruments, etc. etc. ) then we initially start the decent in a vertical position while facing each other. We start venting air until our head is completely covered by water and then STOP venting air from the BCD and breathe out.

2) as soon as we are under water and breathing out we lay forward and get into the diving position. Since we were facing each other the laying forward causes us to get closer, not farther away, during this step.

3) Once we're a couple of metres under water we breathe in again to STOP the descent and we PAUSE.

4) during the pause we just hover briefly, give OK signs to each other and then continue diving (assuming there are no problems, of course). We actually dive down the rest of our descent after the pause. That means that we get side by side and swim down together at the same tempo and direction.

5) As we change depth the slowest diver determines the tempo for both buddies. The rest of the descent is done at a tempo at which you can arrest your descent at any point by either just breathing in or breathing in and giving a short burst of air into your BCD.

So this is the way I teach this. I start practicing this way of descending on day 1 so that by the time we get outside it's starting to get automated. We need to do this or the divers would lose track of their buddy during every descent in the visibility we have.

I'm very particular about teaching new divers to descend in this way because the descent is the most common time to lose track of your buddy. Moreover, if you have trouble with anything, like ears, then it's absolutely paramount that you can stop the descent quickly and easily, for example, by simply breathing in and giving your BCD a quick shot of air.

I would stay vertical and fin up to slow my descend. When the waves or current or finning would rotate me or bring me further from my buddy, I would just swim closer to my buddy. Doing this allowed me to descend and keep visual contact with my buddy.

Getting closer to your buddy isn't a problem. Just reach out an put a hand on their shoulder so you don't bump into them.

Then I found out that this was all wrong and the "correct" way of descending was in a horizontal position and using breathing to control descend rates.

After two tries, I didn't have much success. I was able to descend as much as 5 ft but found myself being tossed around by the waves and current. When trying to establish visual contact with my buddy, the swimming would just bring me back up to the surface. Rinse and repeat.

If the swimming is bringing you back to the surface then you are not in a diving position. You're still too vertical. You really need to lay down flat and keep your feet still if you want to descent horizontally and just use breathing. The way I described above is more forgiving than what you've been told because you don't have to be completely still. You can still swim as long as you swim together with your buddy.

R..
 
Once you are under water and horizontal, you need to use your rear dump.

Or you need to tilt to the right and hold the inflator hose straight (arm stretched out so there is no bend in the hose) and up above your head.

As for whether descending horizontally or vertically is "the correct way," there really is no answer. The overwhelming majority of people descend vertically. I used to do that, but I descend horizontally now. I was taught to do that in my first technical diving training, but for most diving, I don't see that it matters. When I am teaching new students, I teach them to do it vertically, because it is easier for them to maintain control, and it is easier to clear the ears.

I don't like vertical at all for newbies because it's pretty much the hardest position you can be in for communication with your buddy and control of the descent. Maybe it's different when you're using aluminium tanks but with the gear we use students have to put a lot of effort into staying vertical and not being pulled over backwards by the steel tanks. I reached the point where I thought, "if they have to lay forward to counter balance the steel tank then they might as well lay ALL the way forward and just dive". The first time I tried it, it worked perfectly and I've never looked back.

As for clearing ears. The speed of the descent has a much bigger impact on the ability to clear ears than being horizontal or vertical. If the divers can clear as they're diving (horizontal) during the other 99% of the dive then they can clear their ears while horizontal in the first 1% of the dive too. I know PADI gives this as a reason to justify the vertical descent but they're just ... well... dead wrong about it.

R..
 
I would guess it would depend on who was more experienced and and had easier time equalizing. Both should agree to descend while facing each other but the one who has the most experience and is better at equalizing should be more inclined to keep an eye and stay close to the other diver. IMO

Frank G
 
A lot of good replies, many from those more experienced than me (especially with most of my diving now solo). I've always descended vertically. Start REALLY close, especially if poor viz, but even if not. If you're close enough to touch you shouldn't separate. Wish that always happened for me thinking back.
 

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