"I refuse to dive with him!"

[tjmills]

I understand some of you guys wouldn’t want to dive with me… at least not until I’m more experienced. Yet I don’t think lack of experience is the only reason we newsby become «dangerous» under water. Proper planning, briefing and confidence matter. Perharps even more so for those of us who know we don’t know.

OK, here’s my (long) story :
A month ago, I went to Hurghada, Egypt, to dive the Red Sea. I’m only OW, 15 dives in my log-book, and since I live in Paris, France, I hadn’t been diving for 11 months. Upon arrival, I asked the dive op that worked with my hotel to follow some advanced ow courses (especially buyancy) but they hadn’t scheduled any. So I asked for a refreshing course before actually going on a «real» dive but they told me not to worry, all dives are led by certified DMs and instructors, and we always do a briefing during the 1-hr boat ride and so on…

So I book for 6 dives, rent the equipment (surprise : I get a BCD filled with salt water… that’s reassuring) and get on the boat with 30 other people. There were 2 briefings :
1- Take off your shoes and don’t get inside the boat while wet.
2- OK, reef’s in front of you, go this way, at this depth, turn around when tank is half empty, you, you, you and you, come with me. Get your suits on and let’s go.

I’m not kidding : there were no review of signals, no mentionning the 10 other boats surrounding us, no talking about ascend procedures, no checking our equipment and no buddy assignment!

Next thing I know, everyone is in the water but me, as I’m frantically checking my gear for the 4th time. Oh, and I also have the hardest time putting on my socks and fins, as the ones they gave me are not my size…

By the time I get into the water (while the DM keeps on urging me to hurry up and stop stressing), I’m actually quite stressed out. I descend slowly, partly because my BCD has trouble emptying itself (yes, I had taken the water out of it before hand), partly because my mask has a small leak and I have to empty it regularily.

When I reach the DM’s depth, I’m already lagging behind the group and feeling a bit nervous. I have trouble staying buyant and since I’m tiny, my jacket doesn’t quite fit and the tank keeps rolling left to right on my back. I use my arms a lot to keep my balance and keep up with the others. OK, you might ask : why didn’t you tell them to slow down or signal you were having problems? Well, I didn’t think I was doing that bad, I didn’t want to spoil the others’dive with what I thought were minor problems, I felt ashamed, and, most importantly, I had totally forgotten what I had been taught about overexhaution. So everytime the DM turned around and signaled are you OK, I fingered OK back to him…
Until I had trouble breathing and started to panic and think : I’m f*ing gonna die!!!!!!!!

Eventually, I managed to reach the DM and grab his fin and he calmed me down, held my hand thru the rest of the dive and it was OK.

I have another horror story (same place, different DM) to tell but enough for today.
Anyway, my point for both stories is the same :

we «unstadivers» need reassurance. At least I do. When I was learning and diving with my instructor in Mexico, I knew I was just a beginner, yet I always felt safe. Knew that he wouldn’t let anything bad happen to me or anyone else under his responsability. Therefore not only could I enjoy the dive, I was also able to concentrate on improving my skills, and felt confident enough to let him know if anything seemed wrong without fear of beeing mocked at.

I’ll do my homework and take classes and improve my skills. And please, for those of you who don’t like to babysit : feel free to refuse to go under with us. You wouldn’t have fun with us, and we wouldn’t feel comfortable diving with you.

Cheers
Annlaur

Let me be the first to say....if we ever end up on a boat together please feel free to buddy with me. I would be glad to help you however I can and answer any questions you might have. The only stupid question is the one you don't ask in my opinion. I will gladly pass along what little bit of knowledge I can and would be glad to help you into this wonderful world of diving into the underworld. You will get better and you will find better Operators who are much more patient and understanding. We welcome you to join us anytime.

 

[tparrent]

Annlaur,

I think the key to dealing with inexperience is clear communication. If you tell people you are new and would like to either buddy up with someone who will stick close and help you, that leaves the decision up to them. Some will say "no thanks" and head off on their own. Many will say "sure - I'd love to help you".

You just want to find out who is in which camp before you step off the boat.

I know I would always being willing to help a less experienced diver - except that there are NO less experienced divers than I! Once I gain the experience, I love to teach and assist (I do that a lot with sailing where I *am* experienced) and I've met a lot of divers who feel the same.

A little diving goes a long way too in terms of establishing comfort. I was a newbie before my first trip. After eight dives in four days I am an almost not quite newbie . I do feel a LOT more comfortable though.

Tom

 

[Phil TK]

I’ll do my homework and take classes and improve my skills. And please, for those of you who don’t like to babysit : feel free to refuse to go under with us. You wouldn’t have fun with us, and we wouldn’t feel comfortable diving with you.

Cheers
Annlaur

Why not join a local dive club Annlaur? Then the chances are your next dive holiday will be with a group of people who will help and encourage you. That will sort you out.
I reckon I could have a good guess at which dive op you went with in Hurghhada, I don't like to name and shame ops on the board, oh alright -it's Emperor Divers isn't it?
I'll never forget them either, it's the op that thinks it's ok to wash their gear ONCE a week! I wasn't having that, so I had to take my gear off their boat every day and wash it in a camel trough! (no, I'm not joking). Also in the middle of our trip a french guy had his rental BCD explode around him. Quite how this happened they wouldn't say but luckily he was only at about 5 metres and 3 minutes in at the time. I havn't got time to go through all my dive clubs theories on this but we did laugh a lot anyway -but shouldn't have I suppose, because he didn't like it much. ****, I'm laughing at it again now. Sorry mate.
So Annlaur, I hope the above gives you a slightly rosier perspective, I hope you enjoy your future diving and don't let the incompetence of others get you down.
Phil TK

 

[IXΘYΣ]

Whoaaa! Just found this thread.
Why in the world would anyone refuse to dive?
I mean, as long as conditions are ok - I'll go with anybody who wants to go.
We'll brief it, we'll dive it, we'll enjoy it.
IXΘYΣ

 

[Cacia]

Nemrod, that was great! I dive with most anybody. I think diving with weaker divers helps me as much as stronger divers. Just keep a safe distance and do not go in overhead environments with them.

 

[Zoomer]

You guys are making me nervious.... I guess I'll just stick with the three other divers I feel comfortable with (wife and two friends).... and if I go out on my boat I guess I won't have to worry about being paired up with someone that I would feel uncomfortable with....

New Diver Dave

 

[SharkRider]

Does this sound like you? Have you ever found yourself being teamed up with some stranger on a dive boat that upon knowing his background, you refused to dive with him? Or did it reluctantly?
I've read advice here stating that its good to seek out someone in the group who is a good match for you. If everyone on the boat did this, would that mean that two "professionals" would be diving together, and two "inexperienced divers" would be entering together but perhaps not returning?

I think that if a dive op were to team people up that way, there might be an increase in fatalities because teaming up bumb and dumber together would decrease their chances of getting safely out of a bad situation. So if I had a dive op, what would I do to make sure I have a successfully safe dive trip? One guide per "questionable diver?

I sure as hell understand why I too wouldn't want to be teamed up with a Costello.

Not knocking anyone...I've only got 29 dives myself and don't fall into either catagory...

Diving into the unknown... it's part of the adventure of diving itself. Everytime you jump off of a perfectly good boat into a perfectly vast ocean you have no idea what will happen to you or those around you. While a point could be made that diving with strangers is a bad idea... and strangers that look or act like idiots on the boat before you jump into the water could be an even worse idea, the reality is that you can't always judge a book by it's cover. I take the attitude that being buddied up with someone is an unknown similar to all the other unknowns I may encounter in the water.

Here are two fine examples of what I mean.

I was diving in Roatan and there was this guy who had come onboard alone. My wife decided she wasn't diving that day, so he and I both were buddiless. My first impression of this guy was - well not a postive one. He showed up to the boat just as we were pushing off, he weighed more than 300 flabby lbs, his butt crack was showing from the top of his swim shorts, he was shaking (noticeably) as he was rushing to put his gear together and he needed to borrow a mask because he left his in his room. This is exactly the type of person most people would go - NO WAY am I diving with him.

Second story is from Australia. On a liveaboard for the week, people were constantly buddying up with someone different as their regular buddy would choose to sit one out. I got teamed up with a super experienced diver from the Netherlands who I had observed all week with his wife shooting photography and video. They seemed very comfortable in the water and his wife was sunning for this dive. He asked if he could buddy up with me and I had no problem with it.

Which one do you think was a problem buddy?

It turns out that 300 lb guy stuck to my side (not in the way) through the whole dive and enjoyed seeing all the things I found along the way. He couldn't thank me enough after the dive and told me that I was able to show him more than the DM's had in his previous days of diving there. He was a really nice guy who was a fairly new diver.

Mr. Expert from the Netherlands on the other hand was a different story. The day dive was OK... but we hooked up for the night dive as well. So we're swimming around and I motion to him that it's time to turn around and head back to the boat. He gives the OK sign and swims off in the other direction. Not to leave my buddy alone, I swim after him and eventually grab his fins. (I know where the boat is - apparently he thought he knew where the boat was.) So after a few minutes of arguing, I gave up and let him lead the way into the abyss. When we surfaced with him shaking his head in disgust (where is the boat - he asked,) I told him politely that the boat was the other way. He swore it should be where he went (they must have moved - he said) I was not going to argue with Mr. Perefect - I know how to Navigate. Just then we located the boat about 50 yards (150 feet) away. I had a signaling device, but I asked him if he had one to signal the boat to come pick us up. Of course he didn't. So I signaled the boat and the tender came and got us. The whole ride back he kept asking the poor DM if they had moved the boat. It was so anal it became funny. When we got back to the boat his wife starts laughing... you followed him? He gets lost all the time - she said. He didn't think that was funny and berated his wife.

Lessons Learned... dont be judgemental. Just be prepared for the unknown!

 

[Cacia]

Ahhh, Dave----live a little!

 

[nyprrthd]

These threads seem to crop up all the time. Experienced divers who don't want to dive with fumble-butts. Macho divers who can ruin anyone's dive. So, let this newbie relate his latest experiences:

My wife and I just took a cruise, and met four other divers online before the trip. One couple has over 150 dives each, and the other couple have 50-60 dives under their belts. One of them is a serious photographer on her dives. We dove with them in 3 of our 4 ports, because they went on their own in one port, while we did the ship's excursion.

On our first day, the DM said that when the first person in a buddy team got to 700#, they had to go do their safety stop, and the boat would pick them up when they surfaced. The rest of the group would continue until x minutes elapsed. Naturally, my poor wife had to surface with me after I sucked my air too quickly. Everyone was very helpful, and we discussed things that would help me use less air, and get more out of my dives.

The second day brought a new twist. The DM told us that when the first diver got to 700#, the entire group had to surface. Now, the pressure was on!! I didn't want to ruin the dive for the folks who don't breath underwater. I concentrated on all of the "pointers" and surfaced WITH the group after the max time in the dive plan! The rest of the week was a success, and I managed to get the max alloted time out of each dive.

The best parts:
1. The DM on day 1 looked at the number of logged dives in our books, and his eyes opened wide. He said that for the number of dives we had done, we were doing extremely well.

2. The other divers we dove with said that they never would have guessed how inexperienced we were, and would be happy to dive with us anytime, anywhere.

3. On the day that we took the ship's excursion without our new found buddies, we had an extremely experienced diver on our boat of 6 (we lucked out, because the other folks from the ship were on a boat of 20). He has over 500 dives, and is an instructor with NASA, teaching diving skills to astronauts. Talk about bouyancy control! He just "hung in the air" under water. He also said that we were doing fine, and gave us some buoyancy tips. The next dive was our last, and my bouyancy skills took a giant leap forward.

So, as I've said in other threads like this: If you want to dive with better divers, it's up to you to help us get there. However, there are those who are hopeless (like the moron that "rode" a turtle), and Iwouldn't want to dive with them either. One of the divers did read him the riot act.

Official dive trip report to follow in a few days, or so.

 

[Darnold9999]

Annlaur

The joys of diving cattle boats.:05: i.e. boats that are devoted to tourist diving and pushing the most people through at the least trouble for those in charge.

If it happens again - and it will if you vacation dive. Slow down, take a deep breath and remember who paid for the dive. Make sure YOU are comfortable before getting in the water and that you are truly OK before giving the OK after descending.

Made the same mistakes many times, I try not to repeat them but even now can get into sheep mode pretty quickly on an unfamiliar boat. As a new diver it is even harder to say stop, wait for me to get comfortable, but it is worth it for all concerned. Your air will last longer (so all but the DM who is trying to burn your air to have a short dive will thank you.) and all concerned will have a more enjoyable time.

Will dive with anyone once, new divers can be fun to dive with. Won't dive a second time if you are a danger to me or yourself and won't listen. Haven't yet run into someone I wouldn't dive with a second time - but there is always a first time for everything.