Priority of skills to master for new divers

[wetb4igetinthewater]

I disagree on buoyancy as being the critical skill.

The basic safety skills, mask removal and clearing, replacing lost regulator, emergency assent, buddy breathing skills etc are more critical. You can survive a dive with poor buoyancy control, you might not survive if you lose your regulator and cannot find it, replace it, purge it and resume breathing.

Then all four pillars of diving are important, buoyancy, trim, propulsion and breathing. However once you get buoyancy under control the other three are much easier.

On every dive I am cognizant of and am practicing these skills, often in combination. If I see some trash on the reef, a couple metres lower than me and ahead off to the side, I practice everything to be able to descend in a nice arc that ends with my picking up the trash at the bottom of my arc. Buoyancy is important to be able to go down, and just be starting up at the right time, trim is important to be in the right position to grab it, propulsion is important to get to the trash and breathing is important because that is how I am controlling my buoyancy.

I also practice what I have heard called the fifth pillar of diving: organization. I have all my gear ready, checked before I leave the house, all batteries charged, housings checked and silicone as necessary, I recheck when I assemble, I take up as small a foot print as possible on the boat or at the shop, final checks before splashing, post dive all gear kept tidy on the boat, gear cleaned and made ready before hanging to dry etc.

Not too long ago, there was a death during a PADI deep diver course at Whytecliff Park, outside Vancouver BC. The student didn’t connect his dry suit hose connected and as he descended, he focused on that rather that his buoyancy. Ultimately he went down to 160’feet where his buddy panicked and left him. A friend of mine was the one who retrieved the body.

when in the water column and you have a problem establishing neutral buoyancy may be the difference between life and death. Let’s not forget the Dr. Mitchell’s recommended maximum gas density of 5.2 g/L. Let’s also not forget the narcotic effect of CO2 and how someone struggling with something physically (or simply stressed) is going to generate a lot more of it.

so I see regulator recovery above establishing buoyancy but not clearing a mask. There is a reason why open water courses include swimming without a mask (well mine didn’t but that’s another topic).

 

[Scuba-74]

I agree with everyone who said buoyancy control, which in my opinion goes hand in hand with proper weighting and trim is priority #1.

I would say understanding of everything related to gas consumption is #2: that includes pretty clear idea of NDL - depending on the depth are you going to hit your NDL or deplete your gas first? Can you afford exceeding your NDL - will you and your buddy have enough gas left for a deco stop? It’s not trivial even on air, Nitrox makes it much more complex.

#3 would be becoming intimately familiar with what each piece of your gear does: how and when you use dump valves on your BC, how and where you attach all your hoses, a light, knife, SMB, compass, etc

#4: once you are done with other three, I would say underwater navigation using a compass.

 

[DiveToFeelAlive]

You guys are all awesome, thanks for all the replies!

I've heard about backplate BC making it easier to break the surface than a jacket style.

I plan to dive mostly within Ontario Canada since that's where I live, so eventually I'll likely need a dry suit which is an added cost.

I know one post tried to clarify what I was asking and some replies focused on safety (reg recocery) etc, but the replies were spot on in understanding what I was asking, and super eye opening to be honest because I never thought about it all being so inter-connected. Makes so much sense reading through the replies.

The OW course didnt really allow me to focus on the process of descending. It really felt like bombing down to the platform, hopefully you remember to equalize and that's it. Everyone was over weighted. So all of the responses are super helpful!

I guess the next step is to just practice as much as I can to continue improving, and find dive buddies that can coach me and point out things I should focus on.

 

[GJC]

All the above are good to know and will make your dives more enjoyable, but I think that the skills most important for new divers to master first are the ones that prevent you from running out of air and dying. Ideally this is learned and ingrained during your open water course, but unfortunately, they are not always mastered.

Checking tank pressure before a dive and ensuring the valve is fully open.
Checking that your regulators and BCD work and knowing how to recognize potential problems.
Checking that your buddy's gear works.
Constantly monitoring your air pressure during the dive.
Maintaining access to your secondary air source during the dive (buddy proximity).

DAN research showed that a lot of problems are prevented by using a written pre-dive checklist. So my vote for the single most important skill for a new diver to master is to use a pre-dive checklist correctly for every dive.

 

[Rickk]

....


The things I think I need to focus on, and know I need to get better at:
- initiating my descent from the surface while on breath hold with empty lungs.. feels unnatural not breathing for enough time to start descending, I was told breaking the surface is the toughest part until the air volume starts to shrink, and your gear begins to compress
....

If you are properly weighted you should have no trouble descending with normal air volume in your lungs.

With an 11 l tank you will lose 2 kg mass of air going from 200 to 50 bar. If you are neutral for your safety stop at 50 bar you will be 2 kg heavy at the start of the dive, that is sufficient to start your decent unless you have a thick cold water wet suit or a dry suit that is too large and has to much air in it initially. But even then you should be able to initiate decent with some air in your lungs, just not a full breath.

 

[Rickk]

Not too long ago, there was a death during a PADI deep diver course at Whytecliff Park, outside Vancouver BC. The student didn’t connect his dry suit hose connected and as he descended, he focused on that rather that his buoyancy. Ultimately he went down to 160’feet where his buddy panicked and left him. A friend of mine was the one who retrieved the body.

.....

The missing skill here was not buoyancy control but doing the basic pre-dive checks. He should have tested his suit infiltrator, that would have caught the problem. Had the infiltrator come off in the water, he could have used his BCD to provide sufficient lift to surface, if his BCD was undersized for the dive, he could have dumped weights.

These are all the critical basic skills and should be mastered before going in the water without an instructor.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

The missing skill here was not buoyancy control but doing the basic pre-dive checks. He should have tested his suit infiltrator, that would have caught the problem. Had the infiltrator come off in the water, he could have used his BCD to provide sufficient lift to surface, if his BCD was undersized for the dive, he could have dumped weights.

These are all the critical basic skills and should be mastered before going in the water without an instructor.

Twice, I've had my dry suit hose inexplicably popped off, after the predive check which includes tugging on it. What pushed the quick detach back, no idea. Some fabric of my dry suit that wasn't apparent when we did our checks?

If you want to talk about "should", then we should talk about the system in which this occurred, a la Human Factors in Diving. But then we'll still come to the point where while fairly secure, it is still possible for an inflator hose to pop off. Had the person been properly weighted (to not drop so fast) and they focused first on stopping their descent, then the diver would still be alive. Maybe he did do a check. He's dead, so no way to ask.

 

[TMHeimer]

Twice, I've had my dry suit hose inexplicably popped off, after the predive check which includes tugging on it. What pushed the quick detach back, no idea. Some fabric of my dry suit that wasn't apparent when we did our checks?

If you want to talk about "should", then we should talk about the system in which this occurred, a la Human Factors in Diving. But then we'll still come to the point where while fairly secure, it is still possible for an inflator hose to pop off. Had the person been properly weighted (to not drop so fast) and they focused first on stopping their descent, then the diver would still be alive. Maybe he did do a check. He's dead, so no way to ask.

I've had my LPI detach twice. Same BCD-- over a 15 year period--maybe 10 years apart. It "clicks" on securely, so it wasn't my error. Who knows?

 

[rob.mwpropane]

My experience was that I left OW class rented a few tanks and went to the bottom of the pool. I laid completely still. Nothing to do that day but practice buoyancy.

I had weights in small clip on pouches and would move them around. I would see what each breath did in and out. For hours I did this moving around the pool practicing skills. In a lot of ways I think I gained more from that than the entire OW class.

I just closed my eyes and felt what was going on. No fidgeting or flailing. If I rolled I moved a weight. No time limit, just me and the water.

Good luck, the more diving you do the better you'll get.

 

[ginti]

Twice, I've had my dry suit hose inexplicably popped off, after the predive check which includes tugging on it.

Happened to my buddy during the cave1 course. He had good buoyancy, so he stopped, asked me to fix it, and we went away. Pre-check dive was done and everything was ok, so yes, it just happens.

However, I do not understand why you guys are making a kind of ranking about the number #1, #2 etc.

I guess there many skills that are absolutely required to dive safely, all are mentioned here, and all part of a (good) OW course. Unfortunately, often not enough emphasis on buoyancy, trim and weighting...

Also, it is not thinkable that divers fresh of OW course can master them, but they must be able to maintain a decent control on everything.