Light deco?

[ScoobaChef]

I’d like to propose the following as a potential standard definition for light deco.

Light Deco - A decompression obligation that can be fulfilled using only backgas while maintaining sufficient reserves to share gas for the full decompression obligation.

Have at it guys.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

We live in the "Too Much Information Age."

 

[arew+4]

Look, to me it's the difference between a little tipsy, and S-faced drunk. either way in the eyes of the law you are intoxicated and must sober up before driving. In the first case a couple of hours drinking water will suffice, in the later it's a much longer process and will likely include some serious discomfort.

 

[dmaziuk]

I don't have any plans for doing any "light deco". To me, the term sounds similar to the concept of being "half-pregnant".

Then don't dive.

Ther's perfectly good definition of light deco, BTW: the one where you can proceed directly to the surface with only a very very low risk of clinical DCS.

 

[ScoobaChef]

Then don't dive.

Ther's perfectly good definition of light deco, BTW: the one where you can proceed directly to the surface with only a very very low risk of clinical DCS.

Just playing devils advocate, but wouldn’t being able to directly ascend invalidate the point of having a deco obligation? Or are you meaning when your computer shows a couple minutes of deco that will clear during a normal ascent?

 

[Bierstadt]

I am not (yet) a tec diver, but my diving mentality is that all dives are deco dives. Some can be executed so as to clear one's ongassing without stopping in midwater (NDL, aka Recreational diving), but any time your dive ascent plan is more complicated than "ascend at 30 ftm + optional safety stop" what does it matter if it is light deco or full deco or godzilla deco or whatever else one might care to call it? You are doing your stops unless something happens that makes accepting getting bent preferable to staying down. Perhaps the distinction is one that comes with a great deal of experience in deco diving but I don't really see it.

 

[npole]

Just playing devils advocate, but wouldn’t being able to directly ascend invalidate the point of having a deco obligation? Or are you meaning when your computer shows a couple minutes of deco that will clear during a normal ascent?

The deco obligation isn't a mathematical calculation, it is based on studies and statistics, it has a large margin of error and it depends on the algorithm. So skipping 2 minutes of obligatory deco doesn't mean that you gonna get bent, nor the opposite. On the other side.. if you get 1 hour of deco and you go to the surface, the outcome would be pretty different.

 

[Billy Northrup]

Whatever I can do on my hyperoxic back gas... Sometimes I dive my doubles and don't bring any deco, so I keep it "lite"

 

[ScoobaChef]

The deco obligation isn't a mathematical calculation, it is based on studies and statistics, it has a large margin of error and it depends on the algorithm. So skipping 2 minutes of obligatory deco doesn't mean that you gonna get bent, nor the opposite. On the other side.. if you get 1 hour of deco and you go to the surface, the outcome would be pretty different.

Agreed. I was questioning the validity of a rule that has no precise definition and is not exactly the the smartest approach to deco diving. I stand by my original statement. All factors being equal, if you can do a direct ascent, it wasn’t a deco dive.

 

[uncfnp]

Agreed. I was questioning the validity of a rule that has no precise definition and is not exactly the the smartest approach to deco diving. I stand by my original statement. All factors being equal, if you can do a direct ascent, it wasn’t a deco dive.

Since one can obviously do a direct ascent from any dive without a hard overhead I don’t see the validity in your definition. Its the wisedom (or not) of doing so that is key.