One-handed scuba signals - for numbers - do you use?

[jagfish]

One-handed scuba signals - for numbers. I use, curious how many do...
Simple video, yes, I agree...but I get a lot of Qs, so decided to put out a short vid.

Going to start mid-week drops when I have short vids. This one is short, for sure and I put about as much energy into the Thumbnail as the vid. Bonus story and blooper at the end for diehards

 

[wnissen]

The only one-handed air I've see was one DM who spent time in the Puget Sound area. They used repeated fists to represent "5", and then the last fist has the number modulo 5. So "13" would be two fists and then three held up. The rationale was that even if visibility is poor and you can't necessarily see the fingers, you at least know the minimum based on the number of fists. Similar to what you have in the video.

Two things I see in your video that I've never seen on dives (admittedly never outside the U.S. territories and possessions) are the shaka sign to ask for an air check, and more than two significant digits. Whether it's bar or psi, I've always seen either one or two digits. Always a good idea to agree on the signs, because if you flashed the shaka at me I would turn around and look for something cool behind me!

 

[jagfish]

The only one-handed air I've see was one DM who spent time in the Puget Sound area. They used repeated fists to represent "5", and then the last fist has the number modulo 5. So "13" would be two fists and then three held up. The rationale was that even if visibility is poor and you can't necessarily see the fingers, you at least know the minimum based on the number of fists. Similar to what you have in the video.

Two things I see in your video that I've never seen on dives (admittedly never outside the U.S. territories and possessions) are the shaka sign to ask for an air check, and more than two significant digits. Whether it's bar or psi, I've always seen either one or two digits. Always a good idea to agree on the signs, because if you flashed the shaka at me I would turn around and look for something cool behind me!

Oh, interesting...I've not heard of that system. Thanks for passing on!

 

[Julius SCHMIDT]

You are very impressive jagfish

 

[NothingClever]

Just what we’ve been missing....a shaka thread.

 

[DiveClimbRide]

We use those signals. Additional if I need to signal 5 bar for something I would signal 05 so that they don't think 50 (because in two hands 5 fingers is 50 bar) . Oh and shaka means cool/awesome and I won't hear otherwise.

 

[rick00001967]

always like to see how others do things

 

[kelemvor]

Used hand signals a lot when I first started diving and was using rental gear. Then for a long time my wife and I had hoseless air integration (galileo luna dive computers) so we could look at our own computer and see pressures of both divers. Last year I was using a different computer, so we moved to just showing each other the screen. If you've got a screen with a big readable display, that's a pretty reasonable thing to do. You're within a foot of two of your buddy anyway, so why not take advantage of the situation?

It's probably been 4 or 5 years now since I really used hand signals beyond the thumb and okay. Obviously lots of signals during cave class, but I mean used outside of an educational dive.

 

[martincohn]

Cover it during prebrief and go from there.

 

[nolatom]

I do it the "wrong" way but it's worked okay. Say I want to signal 1500 psi.

In left hand I hold my pressure gauge, turn its face it towards buddy and when he sees me, I tap on the gauge once or twice with right hand finger(s) to get him/her looking. Then I signal air the way I told (and showed) buddy on the boat. 1500 psi left? All five fingers, wide open three times from a fist inbetween flashes. 1100? two flashes of five fingers, then one finger. 700? One five-finger flash, then two fingers.

Blood simple. Probably "wrong". But if Buddy agrees on the boat that's how I do it, and he says fine, it's always been fine.

Get confused? Hasn't happened. When in doubt I just show him the gauge, he shows me his. You're supposed to stay close enough that it's simple to do, and see.
We both looked at these signals on the boat, so we know what each others' gauge face looks like. Part of the buddy check, along with how weights and second stage are configured.