Maskless ascents

[alexxred]

A diver I know wears them and has never had any problems with contacts comming out when dealing with a flooded mask or mask off and eyes open.

 

[Gombessa]

From the perspective of a very anxious maskless diver, I'll say that holding my HAND and giving signals (thumb up for ascend, thumb down for descend, hand back and forth for hold station) is MUCH easier to understand than anything done to my elbow.

Gotta agree with this...the whole "one pinch for x, 2 pinches for y" seems a bit more counterintuitive than holding on to a diver's hand and making the thumbs-up/down signal for them. For one, the latter uses known "signs" - up, down, level off, etc. The pull/pinch method requires that both divers know a whole "new" vocabulary for common commands.

 

[Ben_ca]

The pinch, pull thing is more for finning with the maskless diver....

 

[tceylan]

Regarding contacts, you can open your eyes if you are using contacts. The trick is don't open them wide. Close your eyelids slightly to keep the contacts in place. And don't move your head sideways or fast to look around, otherwise the moving water might take away the contact.

 

[MonkSeal]

Leader: hold on to maskless divers elbow with thumb and forefinger. 2 tugs down mean go down. One tug up means go up. 2 squeezes means stop. push on back of elbow means go forward. push hand to the left means go left, right means go right. That is the way it was taught to me recently to the best of my memory.

Taught by whom? In which class?

 

[PfcAJ]

Yeah, I've never heard of this push pull squeeze thing for up and down. Now for horizontal movement, its push for go, pull for stop and squeeze for hold, but we aren't discussing that.

 

[KMD]

Shooting a bag and putting the maskless diver on the line can really help as well. The maskless diver can splay his fingers of his right hand and run the line over/under the fingers. This way even with thick gloves he can feel if the line is moving up or down and adjust his bouyancy accordingly. It also can allow you to temporarily divert your attention else where if needed and the maskless diver will stay put.

You can either tie off the bag at the bottom, or just let it hang freefloating in the open water. For extra weight on the light you can clip off a backup light to the spool.

 

[shellbackdiver1]

Taught by whom? In which class?

Sorry I stand corrected. It is for finning as previously stated. Was trying to sum it up as it could be confusing no matter what the signals are and the best procedure in my opinion would be to don the back up mask.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I've seen GUE instructors demo this but I have to admit that I really don't get the hand holding thing. I can't read underwater without a mask but I can dive maskless without holding anybones hand.

 

[Naram]

Keep your eyes OPEN!!!!

Well, not exactly, IMHO.

If you are for real, you should, of course. I'd use anything to have the situation evolve smoothly.

But if you are practicing you shouldn't.
Because the maskless exercises are not just to help in case you break your mask (BTW, there should be always a backup, at minimum one for all the team, no?).
With good visibility and no mask, getting out of trouble is not a big deal with your buddies' help.
Anecdote a bit OT: you can read your BT without mask if you trap some air with the other hand placed just above one eye - I tried it once out of curiosity and it actually worked, more or less. I felt very stupid, though ...

But, to me, maskless exercises are useful also for other reasons:
- to help build the understanding of your body reactions without visual references
- to help build confidence in your team
- to prepare to possible silt out situations, where you do not see your own BT even with your mask on. It has happened to me a few times. Not nice.

So I play the blind when doing these exercises...