Is Deep Air / Light Deco (bounce?) Discussible on ScubaBoard?

[MauiScubaSteve]

To be blunt, the For-Deep-Air crew isn't looking too good right now. Too many personal attacks, too many snide remarks, too much name calling.

NWGD has asked some pointed questions, and you guys are evading them.

Here I am, an AN/DP trained diver, and in this entire thread, haven't heard one reason why I should ever go below ~150 on air. You guys are not making your argument.

Up until post 88 (and 97, and 101), things were going fairly well; Bob does have a tendency to get kind of emotional and off topic.

Discounting those three, I think the score is something like 9 - 1 (maybe 2) ????

So, I'm simply exercising my freedom of speech to roundly criticize the activity as being entirely stupid and pointless, and I don't see the point of debating it or treating it like I'm debating someone making rational choices.

That still gives someone the freedom to go out there and dive that way. Nobody can stop you. But you don't have the freedom to dive that way *and* talk about it in public *and* not have me call you out as an idiot.

(post 2)

After the thread was reopened ...

As for France... well, it's just France. French people live there. Adhering or recognising any form of international consensus seems to be an anathema to their national culture

(post 20)

The internet seems to promote a race to the bottom of stupidity everywhere else, so why not here?

(post 29)

Now there's me and halemano with almost a combined 100
years of life, with probably NINETY YEARS IN THE OCEAN

... of course, doing the same stupid things for 50 years doesn't make them any less stupid ...

Some people just learn quicker than others ...

(post 48, calling "knowone" stupid? )

I mean, Halemano has been diving since Moses was around, right?

(post 52, ouch)

On the other hand, I doubt I could ever learn anything from Halemano. He's too angry ... angry people scare me.

(post 53, gigglingly angry, you lie!)

As I said..."In France...."

(post 57)

As an adult, I'd recognise such divers as immature. Spank them. Send them to their rooms. I'd chuckle a little to myself... knowing they'd learn the folly of their ways when they grew up.

(post 90)

vs

Ten years diving, having started at fifty and only sharing
you biased information if people ask you nicely or pay you

...

I know, I'll start diving and teaching as a menopausal gift to myself
in a swamp

Joke yes!

(post 49)

Bob, I know you get it.

Do you get that pigeonholing the masses in your quest, with bullying
feeds the stupid divers doing stupid fire and keeps these threads alive

(post 94)

As for post 88 (and 97, and 101), Bob's contribution up to that point was not bad, with exception of calling "knowone" stupid

Perhaps it hasn't been obvious, but the "conceptual continuity" of all my post "Opal" deep air posting has been a progression from initial shocked "you shouldn't talk about it", as you, Jax, should remember because you quote/flamed me as the first response (iirc), to now perhaps deep air curious. I don't get where anyone thinks I am giving advice on deep air. Over and over I post my 3 deeper than 130' dives, to show that I am the one asking, kind of from the same standpoint as "joe vast majority", who could internet search my email and ask me to ask questions they don't want to get flamed over. Then I make more posts / ask questions not dissimilar from those "joe vast majority" might post/ask, if they weren't afraid of the flames.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

What, then, is the purpose of the discussion?

Perhaps the atmospheric pressure of ScubaBoard is easing from it's tragedy, enough to non-narcosically function in the post "Opal" cyber-ocean?

Did only 3 participants actually OP participate "in like manner" (sic) ???

DumpsterDiver gets a pass from that by being a really valuble participant.

DevonDiver excelled at both, and pretty much compensated for his boo boos above.

Perhaps the purpose for this discussion has both already happened and is yet to happen ...

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I don't consider anything above 1.4 a death sentence. First of all, even conservative agencies with a 1.2 standard argue for 1.6 on deco--the workload/CO2 makes a difference. But aside from that, my point was that someone who routinely dives to 1.8 on the working part of a dive should be very careful making public recommendations without making it very clear the level of risk they find acceptable. It's a clear quantification of the degree to which their risk tolerance is very different from the general public. If halemano said to the average vacation diver--here, do this, it will double or triple your risk but the absolute level of risk is still pretty low...about as low as skydiving (1 per 100,000 jumps)--most would not choose to dive to such a high ppO2 (or END, or whatever he's recommending). I don't have a problem with *him* doing so, but I do have a problem with him recommending things without making very clear the level of risk he's asking others to take on.

AFAIK, all the IANTD and TDI EAN certs 2001 and earlier were more aggressive than 1.4/1.6. When a Technical diver types 1.4/1.6, is that not "working/deco"? When a recreational diver types 1.4/1.6, is that not "working/contingency"? We don't "deco"! Since I typed 1.6/1.8, why would you then type the above talking about "recommending" "1.8" "working" and "me"? Perhaps I expected I would have to explain, even if I explained up front, so I merely waited to be asked to explain. I did differentiate with "my Nitrox training" ...



OK so that is my path forward tomorrow; to go back and look at some previous posts that kind of got unjustly ignored ...

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Lets say that you are at 40.5m and you have accumulated 7 mins of backgas deco and are getting ready to call the dive. Lets also say that you are diving with a buddy which some (but not all) of us tend to do. Your buddy, at that moment, goes out of gas and comes to you for help. How much time will it take to help your buddy? (Gas donation, handing over your pony, etc.) Optimistically, it will take 1 minute. Most likely, a lot more. How much deco obligation did that extra minute add?

So, for you and your buddy, is a direct ascent to the surface now an option? Lets say it took you 3 minutes to sort out the emergency, what is your deco obligation now? Are your risks significantly increased if you decide to do a direct ascent now? If so, do you and your buddy have enough gas to complete whatever deco you are obligated to do?

I'm gonna guess that most of the masses who only have "recreational" training don't have the knowledge on how to deal with this situation and as such, are likely not only ill equipped but also unaware of their best options for minimizing the severity of the outcome.

Personally, I consider any dive that can go outside of the boundaries of what is taught in "recreational" dive training to be, not recreational. And in the U.S., PADI, NAUI and SSI seem to be pretty close when it comes to defining what the boundaries of their recreational training programs are.

And why not a Deep air in this forum?

First off, I'll agree with you that if we're going to have these discussions, a Deep Air forum is desireable. The question would then be how to prevent it from becoming a perpetual trainwreck?

OK, so this space is where I will continue to go forward by going backwards, but not until tomorrow.

:sleeping2:

 

[DevonDiver]

I appreciate the performance feedback I get when I contribute to one of Halemano's threads.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Couldn't sleep past this ...

Headed home tomorrow after a week of solo rebreather diving in FL. The chilly mornings were great for doning my drysuit and the warm afternoons were ideal for getting my gear dry for the next day. Dives averaged 4+ hours on my Hammerhead. Flow in Ginnie was still there, so glad my SS was running well. My last day I dove the Main Land tunnel, which has to be one of my favorites. Didn't see too many people later in the week, but earlier people who came to DEMA were diving, and several sites were crowded.

Suggested this afternoon, at the NACD annual conference in Lake City, that the NACD get behind an effort to allow solo diving at all FL state parks. Since NACD doesn't have a position one way or the other on solo diving, another group will probably be needed to spearhead such an effort. At least they said the suggestion would be reviewed. Maybe it's also time for NACD to review its position on solo diving?

 

[Ste Wart]

I didn't bother to read through most of the 14 pages.

I imagine there were many mention of the words 'risk' and 'fatality'. I guess a certain crowd held up helium as the greatest gas ever known to man. Further still they were probably many who said that you shouldn't even think about going below 40m without a twinset and 20 yrs training.

Life is a series of decisions. It is my decision if I make a bounce dive to 50. If I want to throw on a dress at the weekend and call myself Mrs Haberdasher, again my decision. I doubt that anybody's opinion on the internet will stop me from doing these things.

 

[DevonDiver]

I imagine there were many mention of the words 'risk' and 'fatality'. I guess a certain crowd held up helium as the greatest gas ever known to man. Further still they were probably many who said that you shouldn't even think about going below 40m without a twinset and 20 yrs training.

Surprisingly, there hasn't been.

 

[gsk3]

AFAIK, all the IANTD and TDI EAN certs 2001 and earlier were more aggressive than 1.4/1.6. When a Technical diver types 1.4/1.6, is that not "working/deco"? When a recreational diver types 1.4/1.6, is that not "working/contingency"? We don't "deco"! Since I typed 1.6/1.8, why would you then type the above talking about "recommending" "1.8" "working" and "me"? Perhaps I expected I would have to explain, even if I explained up front, so I merely waited to be asked to explain. I did differentiate with "my Nitrox training" ...

You're right that I failed to perceive you were talking about working/deco ppO2s in a tread about light or no deco dives. Can I take your umbrage to indicate that a difference of .2 (the 1.8 I thought you meant by working vs the 1.6 you actually meant) is a big deal? Because no agency I know of has taught 1.6 working ppO2 for a decade or more, nor 1.8 on deco. So you're off by at least 0.2, due to either training you took a while ago and never bothered to learn more about, or due to much higher risk tolerance. There's nothing wrong with a high risk tolerance for your own dives, but deriding others who choose to lower their risk in ways with very little cost (a few minutes deco, if that), and misleading those without the training/experience to know better by implying that those who choose to dive lower ppO2s, or add He, or do anything else among the array of options that have been developed to make dives outside the recreational depth ranges safer, those people are just lawyer-driven or profit-driven worrywarts.

 

[Tigerman]

...
For Starters: I'm requesting that each respondent make their first response without looking at the other responses; just respond based on this First Post. I'm most interested in each of your response to the underlined portion of Bob's quote above - "it's that they end up promoting the notion that this type of diving is somehow a "shortcut" to proper training and experience."

Do you think the many deep air / light deco (bounce?) threads are promoting deep air / light deco (bounce?) diving?

some members of this board seem to use the threads about deep air and "bounce diving" to promote it as "the thing to do" and that its "not a big deal" yes. Worse, they do it in the "recreational" forums rather than where it should belong - here in the tech section.

Do you think it would be helpful to an adult discussion to have working definitions about what we are discussing; like perhaps a definition of a deep air / light deco (bounce?) dive?

Yes. A clear definition would help, but you would have to make everyone in the threads agree on that definition, which is unlikely to happen.
To me deep air is anything above recreational depths, which is by most standard 40m and bounce dives (to me) is single-tank, short bottom time, no-deco dives.
Once its planned decompression procedures and redundancy involved, to me, youre in a different realm regardless of your bottom time.

So, if you are really going to participate in like manor to others who participate in like manor, just hit the "reply w/ quote" button at the bottom right of this OP and make your first reply just to this post. (I encourage then deleting the quote of the OP before hitting your post button)

I wont require any "regulation" of either, but I wont sit by while people tell "everyone who reads" to "just whing it and go bounce diving just because you can" either as it DOES require more than just jumping in with your AL80 and go deep and come back up..