Last week off Comox BC

[jtivat]

I don't see how that really solves anything honestly. There was a modest amount of current nothing you couldn't swim against if you had to. But keeping the anchor line in view along with 2 buddies is a pita. A Jonline would allow one person (the one with the longest line) to see the others but what about the guy in front? Or we all have the same length line and bang into each other. There's no way to put 3 people at the same stop depth & looking at roughly each other and an upline in current unless you drift the deco which removes the whole current issue. Then you can position like spokes of a wheel or diagonal-ish to see each other, show each other the MODs on your deco gas etc and keep track of the line at the same time.

The whole "hanging on the line" isn't DIR jazz is not so much because grabbing a line is <that> bad. Its because if you have to grab the line to hold on, seeing your buddies at the same time becomes exponentially more difficult - esp one that maybe forced to hang on above you. And forget about checking each other's 70ft switch hanging on a line.

Scootering the deco is better since you can stop, drift for a sec, show the cylinder you're switching to, switch, then scooter back to the line. Its still annoying for 45+mins though, esp. at the 20ft stop where we do a backgas break so there are 4 or more switches from 30ft up.

So how do you handle a current that you can't swim?

 

[Rainer]

I've had to do a few switches in strong current and poor vis. These were all dives in high boat traffic areas (a couple just outside America's busiest port). Drifting the deco wasn't the primary plan. Trying to do the switches on the scooter would have meant losing the line. We did them holding on to the anchor line. In a team of two, this was quite doable (including the bottle verification procedure). We just did one teammate a few feet above the other. Worked well.

The whole "hanging on the line" isn't DIR jazz is not so much because grabbing a line is <that> bad. Its because if you have to grab the line to hold on, seeing your buddies at the same time becomes exponentially more difficult - esp one that maybe forced to hang on above you. And forget about checking each other's 70ft switch hanging on a line.

Scootering the deco is better since you can stop, drift for a sec, show the cylinder you're switching to, switch, then scooter back to the line. Its still annoying for 45+mins though, esp. at the 20ft stop where we do a backgas break so there are 4 or more switches from 30ft up.

 

[rjack321]

So how do you handle a current that you can't swim?

For any substantive deco (>20mins) I would personally drift, but this ain't the Doria. For instance this site is within the VTS area, the skipper/charter host can get permission from the Coast Guard to route ferries and other traffic around. I suspect but I'm not positive, that most vessel traffic would prefer this known and predictable approach vs being hailed by some previously unknown and non-reporting vessel (most craft <65ft not towing) and told they need to alter course to avoid divers unintentionally drifting - which is always a possible risk anyway.

 

[rjack321]

I've had to do a few switches in strong current and poor vis. These were all dives in high boat traffic areas (a couple just outside America's busiest port). Drifting the deco wasn't the primary plan. Trying to do the switches on the scooter would have meant losing the line. We did them holding on to the anchor line. In a team of two, this was quite doable (including the bottle verification procedure). We just did one teammate a few feet above the other. Worked well.

Did this charter have permission to "block" those shipping lanes? Anchored or not around here you can't be in those lanes restricted in ability to manuver without permission.

Unless you've done more courses I'm guessing this was <30mins of deco to deal with and only a few switches too? I'm not totally adverse to holding onto a line, its just increasingly "suboptimal" the greater the current and the more switches you're faced with. At some point it starts to suck, that point arrives sooner when there are viable alternatives like simply drifting (not all the way to Japan thank you)

 

[Rainer]

We were anchored just on the edge of the shipping lane, but the currents would have brought us into it. We were willing to live with the possibility of having to drift the deco, but we certainly weren't going to plan to make that option one.

The North East stuff had the added issue of potential floating gill nets. Coupled with being off-shore in an area where sea state can change quickly, a nice anchor line directly to the boat isn't so bad. You learn to make the switches without violating procedures.

Yup, those dives were all <30 minutes deco only.

When possible, sure, I'd prefer to scooter or kick. I certainly, though, don't think other methods can't work. How you're going to rotate bottles hanging on, though, is well past by experience level!

Did this charter have permission to "block" those shipping lanes? Anchored or not around here you can't be in those lanes restricted in ability to manuver without permission.

 

[ucfdiver]

Personally I would love more "we did this or we did that" discussion about real dives. I think most of this community would/could learn from that - even from recreational reports - way moreso than they would get out of another class report, boltsnap, or accident discussion (the top 3 SB topics).

This dive and UCF's cave report are not "perfect" dives. I don't think there is such a thing anyway so you might as well appreciate the hiccups (small ones, big hiccups suck).

Richard,

Posted another one on the t2t section. It's a bit nerve racking to post a dive report that doesn't go perfect...since everyone else is perfect online

I talked to Adam (pfcaj) and we're going to start trying to post more dive reports. I think the tech area of the forum makes us seem like the diving equivalent of a brain bowl nerd, all skills and no fun. Hopefully we can change that. I'm diving a new cave Monday, and then the following weekend I'll be diving 2-3 new caves, so i should have interesting reports. Between AJ, Brian, Myself, Marchand, Rob, and Matt, we're probly doing 500-600 dives a year....and only about 10 dive reports seem to go online, I'll try to talk everyone into posting more

 

[limeyx]

Trying to do the switches on the scooter would have meant losing the line. We did them holding on to the anchor line. In a team of two, this was quite doable (including the bottle verification procedure). We just did one teammate a few feet above the other. Worked well.

Same here, including bottle rotations. Messy but can be done.

 

[rjack321]

Same here, including bottle rotations. Messy but can be done.

You say "messy", I say "suboptimal"

 

[limeyx]

You say "messy", I say "suboptimal"

We had about 70 mins of deco to do, and really didn't want to be drifting too far away from the line with 18 divers on the boat (yes, now you are probably going to say that's suboptimal in itself

We put a gentle two-fingers on the line for maybe 20 mins, and the current disappeared at 50 feet or so. easy.

If the chain had been leaping up and down 3 feet, and we were all flapping around like flags, then yes it would have been obvious we needed to drift.In this case, we all made the decision to stick to the line at the same time, so went with it

 

[jtivat]

For any substantive deco (>20mins) I would personally drift, but this ain't the Doria. For instance this site is within the VTS area, the skipper/charter host can get permission from the Coast Guard to route ferries and other traffic around. I suspect but I'm not positive, that most vessel traffic would prefer this known and predictable approach vs being hailed by some previously unknown and non-reporting vessel (most craft <65ft not towing) and told they need to alter course to avoid divers unintentionally drifting - which is always a possible risk anyway.

I did the drift deco thing when I went to FL but I have never seen it done in the Great Lakes not really sure why??