Question Practicing Out Of Air ascent: good idea, or bad idea ?

[happy-diver]

I certainly do not have the energy to prepare and practice for, dumb, scenarios
nor subscribe to the Gareth Lock cult of all people are stupid until he saves you

But when once surfacing and hovering at seven metres with a dozen or so other divers at various depths
between 10 metres and on the surface dsmbs deployed as the captain driving the boat and sitting in the
middle of the divers had decided that it was too dangerous to raise his anchor in case he hooked a diver
he instead decided to trawl, through the group of divers, with his large anchor deployed at seven metres

Heading straight for me and my buddy, which we were able to see just in time and swim quickly to avoid

Believe it or not, I still don't, but the answer to this was just one of many, I do have in my infinite toolbox


Without practising for these stupidities, otherwise there would be no time left, during the dive for diving
and if you dive more enough of these absurd unknown stupidities happen so there is nothing to practise

 

[TMHeimer]

In recreational diving we are ostensibly supposed to RELY on a buddy; so in order to be "good", apparently not only am I supposed to be perfect, but so is my buddy? Seems like a pretty narrow stance.

Is a corollary to this concept the fact that "No good divers get bent" ?

The whole idea of denouncing others as "not good" has very little utility anyway, we are all sinners and everyone has a bad day, now and then.

I agree with this. Of course there are also solo divers as we all know.

 

[GiraffeMarineSalvage]

I agree with this. Of course there are also solo divers as we all know.

It's not purely an issue of solo diving vs buddy pair diving, there is a reason first responders are emphatically trained to not rashly jeopardize their own safety: no point having an additional casualty needing assistance... Emphasizing being a safe and reliable buddy is great and totally different from emphasizing over relying on your buddy (especially for the less experienced and doubly so for those that extremely confident due to a lack of issues with extremely reliable dive gear as opposed to confidence due to training and experience on "what if's"). Miscommunications happen easy enough as it is, relying on a buddy is a pretty big assumption which dramatically increases the consequences of someone else's miscommunication or mistake, whether large or small...
Crystal clear warm water being the worst culprit on misplaced confidence in my opinion (everything's fine if I can see my buddy, oops 15' ended up being 70' away and I/they need help?!?), but cold low-vis water is pretty easy to lose sight of a buddy a few feet away as it is and I'll say its best to have "I can't see my buddy" not shift into a full-on panic attack mode CESA.. (yes, proper dive briefing and being a good buddy should prevent my hypotheticals).

 

[sabbe]

Deeper dives may warrant redundant air, sidestepping the whole CESA issue. This is part of @Marie13 's suggestion.

With poor planning or poor decision making redundant air does NOT sidestep CESA. My wife had a classmate empty three tanks on their tech dives.

 

[sabbe]

Think it’s a waste of time. Repeatedly doing it in the same dive is a good way to jack up your ears, besides whatever else you could do to yourself even doing it once.

Going OOA is a Very Bad Thing. You shouldn’t prepare for it to happen. I’m cave trained. Running out of breathing gas in a cave means you’ve effed up in a major way. That mentality seems to be lacking among some recreational divers.

Beyond just jacking up ears, practicing OOAs put you at higher risk for DCS. The dive profile OW instructors do is horrible. DCS is not an exact science so you may take an "unearned hit" practicing OOA instead of doing a normal safe ascent. You may get by 99 times ok but when the stars align or the swiss cheese aligns in the risk model diagrams, and accident will happen.

IMO teaching OOA is just to remind the students the air is up there as last resort so they don't try to swim their buddy down 60' away when the surface is only 30' away.

Sam

 

[VikingDives]

My wife had a classmate empty three tanks on their tech dives.

In a just world, that instructor would lose his ability to teach and that student would lose the ability to access a first stage for the remainder of his life.

 

[TMHeimer]

Beyond just jacking up ears, practicing OOAs put you at higher risk for DCS. The dive profile OW instructors do is horrible. DCS is not an exact science so you may take an "unearned hit" practicing OOA instead of doing a normal safe ascent. You may get by 99 times ok but when the stars align or the swiss cheese aligns in the risk model diagrams, and accident will happen.

IMO teaching OOA is just to remind the students the air is up there as last resort so they don't try to swim their buddy down 60' away when the surface is only 30' away.

Sam

Agree. That's why I practice CESA from 30 (or 20) feet depth. One reason is that's my normal deepest depth (chances of DCS negligible), the other is that practicing it from that depth at least insures that if I'm at 60 feet or deeper and need to CESA I at least am thoroughly familiar with the procedure. I do not advise practicing it from deeper than 30 feet for the reason you mention. But I do advise practicing it. There's no point in it being taught in OW Course unless you wind up being able to do it. If you don't practice it, you can at least read over the procedure a lot, which is at least something. Otherwise we do what some do suggest, eliminate it from the course.

 

[Robert H. Diver]

I did it in my OW class and in my rescue class…that’s it…I’ll never practice it again…it’s unnecessary.

 

[dmaziuk]

There's two kinds of OW divers: those who know they can swim 40 metres on a single breath, and those who don't.

 

[boulderjohn]

There's two kinds of OW divers: those who know they can swim 40 metres on a single breath, and those who don't.

Here's another such division: those who understand that the ability to hold your breath has nothing to do with an out of air ascent and those who don't.