The original purpose of this thread seems to have run its course, and I thought I might give some observations I made about beliefs about OOA situations I have observed during my 13 years on ScubaBoard. I will first describe two such beliefs I used to see expressed frequently and then comment upon them.
Belief #1: Whether you donate the primary or the alternate, you will be dealing with a completely berserk, panicked diver who will maul you in the process. That panic will not go away after the regulator has been secured, so be ready for a panicked, clawing drive for the surface. You are at great risk as the donor.
Belief #2: Agencies made a huge mistake when they dropped buddy breathing (taking turns breathing from one regulator) from the OW curriculum. Research indicating buddy breathing skills were too hard to learn and maintain are wrong. It is easy to learn, and the skills don't go away in time. Buddy breathers can take turns, taking two breaths while the buddy exhales and then passing the regulator back, as they swim gently all the way to the surface. One such buddy breathing advocate frequently compared it to the CESA, which he said was hopelessly dangerous and should have been dropped instead. People should learn buddy breathing rather than the CESA, he argued frequently.
Comment #1: Believe it or not, as I pointed out several times in those past threads, people who held belief #2 usually also held belief #1. I asked how that worked on a real dive. I imagined a berserk, panicked out of air diver approaching another diver like a complete maniac, preparing to do whatever it took to wrestle one of that diver's regulators away from him, not caring what harm he brought to that diver. At the last second he realizes that the other diver does not have an alternate air source at all. The OOA diver immediately feels a sense of pure relief flood over him. "Phew!" he thinks. "For a while I was afraid I was going to have to use an alternate air source. Now that I see he does not have one, that means we can buddy breathe! Great! I was really worried there for a minute!"
Comment #2: On several occasions, I responded to the person who said divers should be taught to use buddy breathing rather than the CESA. The CESA is recommended when the OOA diver is not close enough to another diver to use an alternate air source. I asked if rather than use the CESA to get to the surface, the OOA diver should instead swim around at depth, searching for a diver with no alternate air source so they could buddy breathe. He never answered that question, but he did repeat the same assertion at other times in other threads.
