Is Solo diving a category of Technical diving?

[fisherdvm]

Being the only one in my family who dives, I have had to find diving buddies who were not very safe divers. I have to think that being a prepared solo diver is better than diving with a wreckless uncaring buddy. I feel that I am my buddies safety net, but he is not mine.

I have had 2 bad experiences with unsafe diving buddies, so I feel that a lone diver joining a diving excursion really need to have the mindset of a solo diver. One can not always interview and chose your buddy before these dives.

In the same way, once my son is old enough to be certified, I am not sure if he will be a good diving buddy until he is more mature. I would find it difficult to depend on a teenager to be a good diving buddy.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

Okay, there are a number of points I'd like to make after reading all the entries since mine recently. A lot of this discussion has been around the sorry state of instruction right now. Some above stated that solo diving is "NEW" to diving. And there is a discussion concerning how this relates to solo flying.

Now, let me give you some more of my history. I started diving in 1959, and bought my first scuba after picking strawberries and beans in Oregon's farms during the summer (a 38 cubic foot tank, and Healthways SCUBA double hose regulator). I read The Silent World three times between 1959 and 1963. In about 1961 I helped form the Salem Junior Aqua Club, associated with the Salem Aqua Club, for high school divers. In 1962 I got my first wet suit (yes, I was diving in Oregon in the summers without a wet suit for awhile). We went to the same trips that the SAC went to, and enjoyed the diving. It wasn't until 1963 that I had my first course in scuba diving, by LA County. By that time, I had been actively diving for 3 years.

How could that happen and I am still around to tell about it? What about my solo diving during that time (and all the years since). Well, let me say that first, all the people at that time who took up scuba were excellent swimmers. Most of us were out of the age-group swim teams. We could swim, and snorkel. I had been snorkeling since about age 9 (that's about 50 years now). We were completely at home in the water. Most of us had passed a YMCA Lifesaving course before being scuba divers, and many of us were Red Cross Water Safety Instructors (WSI). We had spent literally hours and hours in the water, becoming exhausted, learning how to keep water out of places that it shouldn't go (throat, nose, etc.) way before trying scuba. We swam the 400 yard Individual Medley, for instance, and for time in a swim meet. We, in short, knew water. The magic we yearned for was to be able to breath underwater, to stay there and relax, without needing to go to the surface. So before I ever got into scuba between the ages of 7 and 11, I had spent probably 800-1000 hours in swim team practices. By today, that number is measured in the thousands of hours.

Now let's talk about instruction. I took the LA County Scuba Course, and while I don't remember the number of hours, I do remember that we had many pool sessions, and at least two open water dives. I remember one of our pool tests was having a fishing net dropped over myself and my buddy, and us having to untangle ourselves form the net and helping each other. This reinforced the buddy system, and the need to be self-sufficient too. You cannot help your buddy if you also cannot cope with the environment around you.

I went from that course to the US Navy School for Underwater Swimmers, which was three weeks long, and a long three weeks at that. That was in 1967. I went on to go through the two month long USAF Pararescue Transition School, where we had to not only qualify in scuba again, but also make parascuba jumps. Have you ever tried to make a "buddy jump"? It cannot happen. We were on our own until picked up by the recovery boat.

After that, I became a NAUI Instructor. In my BASIC SCUBA DIVING COURSE STANDARDS, here are the standards for August 1975:

The terms Basic Scuba Diver and Qualified Scuba Diver are used interchangeably in the NAUI standards and on NAUI materials. They refer to the same certification course.

1. Minimum age for certification is 15.

2. Minimum course duration is 27 hours. Of this time, 16 hours or more are to be in-water activities, and the remainder is to be spent in classroom/lecture activities. Of the time spent in water activities, at least 2 hours are to be in open water; the balance of nthe water time may be in open water or pool.

3. The Basic Scuba Course is a combined skin and scuba diving course. Therefore, skin diving is to be taught where it will best enhance the total learning outcome of the course.

4. A minimum of three (3) open water dives are required. One of these is to be a skin dive and two (2) are to be scuba dives. No more than two (2) dives per day can be counted toward this requirement. At least one (1) of these open water training experiences is to take place to a depth of 20 feet. Exposures in excess of 40 feet are not recommended.

5. The required curriculum subject areas which are to be covered in a Basic Scuba Course are:

a) Applied Sciences...
b) Diving Equipment...
c) Diving Safety...
d) Diving Environment...
e) Diving Activities...

6. The required water skills which are to be covered during a Basic Course are:

a) Swimming Skills (No Equipment)

1) Distance swim of 220 yards, nonstop any stroke.
2) Survival swim for 10 minutes, treading, bobbing, floating, drownproofing, etc.
3) Underwater swim of 20 yards.

b) Skin Diving Skills (Mask, Snorkel, Fins)

1) Distance swim of 440 yards, nonstop, using no hands.
2) Complete rescue of another diver in deep water.
3) Practice and perform without stress, proper techniques including: water entires/exits, surface dives, swimming with fins, clearing the snorkel, ditching the weight belt, buoyancy control with the personal floatation vest, underwater swimming and surfacing.

c) Scuba Diving Skills (Skin and Scuba Equipment)

1) Repeat all listed skin diving skills while using scuba.
2) Tow another fully equipped scuba diver 100 yards.
3) Practice and perform without stress, proper techniques including: mask and mouthpiece clearing, buddy breathing, emergency swimming ascents, alternating between snorkel and scuba.

d) Open Water Skin and Scuba Divnig

1) Perform without stress: water entries/exits, surface dives, buoyancy control and surfacing techniques that are required to do surface, underwater and survival swimming with both skin and scuba equipment.
2) Make a complete rescue of a buddy diver.
3) With scuba equipment: clear mask and mouthpiece, buddy breathe, alternate between snorkel and scuba and make a controlled emergency swimimng ascent.

This was the basic scuba course, by NAUI, in 1975. Apparently, today's standards have slipped a bit. When I was with NAUI in the 1970s antd 1980s, the standard for passing either a student or a potential instructor was "Would you want this person diving with (or instructing) your loved one?" If the answer was "No," that person was not passed for scuba (or instructor) certification.

In the late 1980s, I applied this criterion to a Boy Scout Troop. We were at a summer campout, and I was evaluating a number of scouts for their lifesaving merit badge. Several of the boys had problems completing the swimming requirements, and I recommended that they become better swimmers before again trying the lifesaving merit badge. I was concerned that if they tried to save someone, it would result in a double-drowning. When the parents of these boys heard this, they were upset that I had not simply passed them, which was their expectation.

By the standand of "would you want your loved one diving with or being instructed by this person," I can see what troubles Mike Ferrara when he says:

Divers on the other hand are often given a card after a very minimal course that barely adequate to get them by on a vacation dive with a DM to supervise them. They are given their card after demonstrating a few simple skills while kneeling on the bottom. They often aren't even required to demenstrate that they can plan and conduct a dive with a buddy (never mind alone). They just have to show that they can follow the instructor.

It would trouble me too if someone like this, whom I would not consider competant to dive with my loved one as a buddy, would want to dive solo. But then, would you want them as a buddy either? A workmate took a diving class, with his daughter, and wanted me to dive with him. But he had more mouth than skills, from his description of what was happening, and I did now want to trust my life into his hands. I would rather dive solo, which is what I usually do.

SeaRat

 

[Nemrod]

John, I think you were refering to my remark that solo diving was "new". What I meant by that was that it is fairly recent that concerted efforts have been made to develop cert programs for it and establish some type of base line performance requirements if only as a suggested guide. Solo diving is certainly not new. I have been doing it since I can remember, at least circa 1970. I got my Naui cert in the late 60s. I am a WSI and I was a competive swimmer and distance swimmer. I swim like a fish. Yes, I agree that having good water skills go a long ways toward drown/accident proofing. Yes, I agree, the various agencies are routinely turning out divers, even advanced divers who simply cannot swim by any reasonable definition. I don't think that people need to be super swimmers or super fit to dive safely, even solo, but having decent fitness and decent swimming skills is in my opinion. What is "decent" in my opinion? Well--going out on a limb perhaps but an individual should be able to swim a mile or more in under one hour (not very fast at all). They should be competent in a variety of strokes and in drownproofing and should display "at ease" in the water. This is for solo, for recreational buddy diving, especially with a dive master on hand I don't think such capibilty is needed but we are talking solo and that is a different undertaking. Yes, I agree with you on all that--(I am not an old coot --yet!--lol). Two weak divers/swimmers buddied up are just two accidents waiting to happen. N

 

[Nomaster]

Serious question, Mike. Can you be more specific? What aren't solo divers thinking through? What don't they know that they don't know?
You're right, there is more talk about the best way to sling a pony than actual skills. When this forum first began, I started a thread called, "Skills - keeping in shape for solo diving", where I asked solo divers to list skills that needed to be honed for solo diving. There were 4 replies, and then the thread quickly slipped away to page 2.
As of this post, the four threads below this one are:
Negligent Instructor?
My Dive Plans
Spare Air & Pony Tank
Sidemount

In this thread, http://www.scubaboard.com/t69684-my-dive-plans.html , you responded to Dorsetboy with some very valid questions, which everyone, including Dorseteboy, ignored.

So seriously, Mike, help us out here. What, exactly, aren't solo divers thinking through? What don't they know that they don't know?

It seems that with all the conversation about the skill and equipment needs of a solo diver, a decent list could be made by wandering through the threads and creating a specific list on a sticky.
Maybe there is an easier way, but each one that I think of comes up another tangled thread of much information and experience.
Once upon a was, when I last dove solo, it was because of necessity, I needed to dive and I couldn't find a partner, now we're in the recent quaternary and I find I have the same problem. Only now, I need to find an air source that doesn't require me to hire a baby sitter.
A solo card is one I'd happily pay for to get the air cops off my back.
Would the insurance companies allow an LDS to sell air and rent equipment to person internationally certified to dive all by his lonesome self? If they would, would LDSs continue to pressure solo divers to rent a baby sitter?
The baby sitter isn't to say I don't respect dive masters, only to say that I want to choose when I have one, say during orientation dives or whatever other reason I might make such a choice.
The word, "choice."

Tom

 

[Nomaster]

Why would it possibly matter?

"Technical diving" is a poor term at best. There's absolutely no reason for the designation. If you have appropriate training in cave, wreck, deep - whatever subcategory of "technical" diving, that is what is important. It does not matter if you are considered a "technical diver" or not. Are you a cave diver? If you are, you're qualified to dive caves. Are you a wreck diver? If you are, you're qualified to dive wrecks. Are you a trimix diver? If you are, you're qualified to dive with trimix. Are you a technical diver? If you are, I have no idea what you might be qualified to dive, it imparts no useful information.

Walter,
I tend to agree with most of what I've read of your views covering the term of technical diver, but... politics is politics. I figure if a term like technical diver on a c-card can get me air in a strange place, I''l accept it.
So, if the term is going to create that slice of reality for me, definitions come into play, a tight concise definition of what make a specialty technical might go a long way toward allowing the freedom that experience, personal choice, and acceptance of responsibility for our own safety should give us anyway.
So, level of experience, special equipment, special safety concerns, specialty training, all this and maybe more should probably go into the term "technical"; and then as has been said, the various levels of technical need to be considered to make the people who wish to control our choices happy.

Tom

 

[Nomaster]

. . .
To the rest of the board...

How many recreational divers will take the solo plunge without adequate preparation, if the industry continues to consider solo diving a recreational activity? Think about this...how many recreational divers dive wrecks without wreck training? or go deeper than 60 feet without advanced training? or go deeper than 100 feet without deep training? There are at least a dozen forms of diving that can be considered "advanced" that recreational divers will attempt without training, simply because they consider it within the realm of the recreational. Yet most of these same divers wouldn't consider attempting activities termed "technical", because they clearly understand the distinction.

There are always going to be people who foolishly place themselves beyond their abilities, and no matter what we name it, this will not change. . . .

Treat every dive as if it was a solo dive, and they will minimize the risks to themselves and their buddies.

It may seem ironic that as a regularly solo technical diver, I never recommend or advocate solo diving to anyone. This certainly isn't because I'm against the practice, obviously.
***It is simply because I know that those who really should be solo divng, will not need to ask other's opinions.***

Dive Safe,
Adam

Asterisks are mine.
Quotes weren't enough.
Best argument for the term "Tech" so far.
Comes with the question, what term will we use when the word "tech" becomes more watered down?

Tom

 

[Nomaster]

I would consider soloing to be tech-diving in about the same sense as caving and I suspect that instruction will evolve much as it did for caving -- from a dark art to open, regulated instruction to stop more avoidable tragedy. To me, the main difficulty is that soloing is not just about measurable/quantifiable physical ability or intelligence or watermanship or equipment knowledge, it's also about intangibles such as character and abilities under intense stress.

Which reminds me of what my instructor told me about tech diving, before I began courses with his crew we talked at length about all the new stuff that's happened since I left, and when he thought I'd be ready for it.
Top on his list was time and experience.
Specifically when I asked him about tri-mix and deep tech wrecks, he said that we could talk about in in about two years after I had a couple hundred fairly stressful dives under my belt. He said only then would he consider a time frame. Maybe I'd be ready then, maybe not, but then he'd have an idea who he was working with.
That's when I knew he had a new student.

. . .
. . .There is a term for this kind of learning--"experience." With experience we gain insight into problems that beginners don't perceive. This is why solo diving should be a part of the diving discussion. Pilots "solo" as a part of their training. If they cannot solo, they cannot receive their pilot's license. That should be considered by our scuba training organizations.

SeaRat

Tom

 

[Nomaster]

. . .The DIR folks are dead against Solo it seems but they have some excellent ideas and seem to enforce a fairly rigid set of rules concerning equipment and philosophy.

I think what Solo diving needs to become accepted is something similar, a guru like Hogarthianism/DIR have who is beyond reproach and who sets some guidelines.

No one lives alone and without social interaction. If Solo divers had a recognizeable philosophy and we began to adhere to a set of --dare I say rules---but some type of code I think it would lead to greater safety. . .N

If we can't get the groups on board, we can at least borrow/steel ideas shamelessly from them. And we do seem to have some well trained "renegades" on this forum who can advise us of their practices.
I think even though some DIR types (haven't read as much from the strong silent Hog's yet, maybe I need to read more profiles) might be kicking and screaming, shouting FIE to those who would dive solo, they would not want us to kill ourselves and would deign offer their wisdom to aide in the transmutation of this "renegade" sport into something safer, or at least standardized therefore somewhat more acceptable.

Tom

Just talking to myself here, feel free to listen in.

 

[Nemrod]

It seems like we have to keep justifying solo diving. Here is the thing, having a buddy who is a weak swimmer and a weak or new diver really leaves the stronger diver in a pickle. The weak diver depends on the stronger, who does the stronger depend upon? I would and will and do dive with beginning divers and weaker divers (skills and fitness and knowledge) but there are definitly times when I feel safer when alone or loosely paired with another skilled diver. If the cert agencies turned out well trained divers all the time the buddy system would be more sensable but since they routinely cert people who cannot swim then frankly when I do the types of diving I like best I feel best depending on myself with no other person depending on me to get them out of the trouble they have brought upon themselves. It is so nice diving without getting my regulator kicked out of my mouth, my mask knocked off, untangling my "buddy" from his snorkel, having half the ocean bottom kicked up in my face, keeping people off the coral, dodging spears from K-mart spear guns, having my "buddy" suddenly shoot to the surface from 80 feet for no apparent reason and then having to drag him back to the boat or shore or the best one is to have my " buddy" dutifully inflate his/her BC like taught in class and go overboard in a strong current only to be swept far from the boat--guess who has to go get them!
And while on that subject, why does a certain agency insist that the diver fully inflate his/her BC before getting in the water? What is with that anyways?
True story, out of Destin, I went out alone on a charter with the rest of the boat occupied by a dive club and some were taking their Advanced cert from that particular well known agency. The skipper refused to allow me to go solo so their divemaster made up a triple team with one of his guys. I said, sure, OK. We get out and the skipper warns of a strong surface current. The divers--ALLLL of them---dang near fully inflate their huge jacket BC units, don snorkels and tons of gear. I am just looking at them. The divemaster insists I snorkel up and also inflate my wing. I told him NO. Meanwhile the group began to go over and immediantly the divemaster forgot all about me cuz his whole bunch was now several hundred yards downstream past the trailing line and dissappearing over the horizon. (some exaggeration for effect--lol)Well, I had paid to dive so whilst they were distracted yelling and screaming at each other I rolled over--had a great dive--surfaced about 200 yds upstream of the boat, drifted back to the boat. None of them ever made it to the bottom. In fact the skipper and divemaster yelled at me for diving and said if I did that again they would leave me. I said fine, it is only 5 miles to shore. The older I get the dumber I realize I am but one thing for sure--inflating your BC and jumping into a current is not a smart plan in my opinion. (Jet fins only jet if you actually kick them, having a snorkel jammed in one's mouth while dog paddling like crazy with one's balloon vest fully inflated is dumb.) The proper technique (my opinion--it worked for me) deflate wing or vest. Put reg in mouth, roll over, submerge immediantly, in fact do not surface at all, swim for the anchor line or drop immediantly while swimming for anchor line. The current is often just the top 10 or so feet. Once below the current and waves it is smooth sailing. N

 

[John C. Ratliff]

Nemrod,

I can see where the divemaster got after you for actually doing your dive, that you paid good money to do. He messed up greatly, and had a bunch of divers floating on the surface away from him. But he also had one diver who knew what he was doing, and was completing his dive. He basically had to wait for you to surface to go after the stray divers. So he had compounded his own error, and potentially put either the people on the surface, or you, at risk. He obviously chose the surface people to put at risk, as they were not at risk of a diving accident, only getting a bit cold or run over by a boat.

SeaRat