Rec open water ascents, trim and the team

[TSandM]

Having been clobbered on the head by a boat (admittedly on entry, not on ascent), I have no desire at all to repeat the experience. The one thing I do know is that my eyes are IN my head, and therefore if I'm looking up and see nothing, likely nothing is going to land on me. Although my buddies are my spare gas and my teammates, I can't guarantee that they will be able to spend as much time checking for a free path to the surface for my head that I can. And, as I said before, all the arguments for horizontal position on ascent begin to weaken substantially above ten feet. The only one that seems to hold is that it is probably faster to kick down than to sink, and I WOULD rather have the boat hit my feet than my head

 

[Mike Edmonston]

Well..

What I used to do was horizontal trim all the way up, listening for props / motors, and buddy checking my 6.

Then one day, right off West Palm beach, We got our @sses run over by a sailboat! This guy literally used our dive flag as a racing circuit bouy! By the time I reached the surface, He was maybe 20 yards away, and at full sail. I dumped all my air, wing, drysuit, lungs, @ss, everything! I got to about 5 or 6 feet down when the keel whacked me in the wrist (holding my inflator wide open!)

Since that day, I do a regular horizontal trim ascent until I finish my 10 ft stop. I then go up with my buddy WHILE DUMPING AIR! when I reach the surface, I am quite negative. The entire team does an "Up periscope" and 360 degree sweep before we inflate our wings, etc. If we ever have to "redive", we'll be down really quickly!

Might not be the DIR answer, but it's a real world "OH S**T" situation, that I would rather not go through again.

Also, when I'm teaching, at the 10 ft stop, I will generally keep my trim at a 45 degree up angle, so that I can keep a good lookout on everyone. More than once I have given the signal for "Jellyfish above you"

safe diving

 

[dumpsterDiver]

Well..
....Since that day, I do a regular horizontal trim ascent until I finish my 10 ft stop. I then go up with my buddy WHILE DUMPING AIR! when I reach the surface, I am quite negative. The entire team does an "Up periscope" and 360 degree sweep before we inflate our wings, etc. If we ever have to "redive", we'll be down really quickly!

Might not be the DIR answer, but it's a real world "OH S**T" situation, that I would rather not go through again.

Also, when I'm teaching, at the 10 ft stop, I will generally keep my trim at a 45 degree up angle, so that I can keep a good lookout on everyone. More than once I have given the signal for "Jellyfish above you"

safe diving

Exactly! Much safer to be negative for the final ascent (and also on the surface for a few moments) then doing a horizontal (BOUYANT) ascent.

 

[jupitermermaid]

It's amazing how everyone has different ways to ascend. I don't remember a particular way I was taught to ascend in OW, but most of my first dives were springs and shore diving, so we always ascended in a horizontal position without thought due to the type of diving we were doing. When I ditched my prior buddy and started drift diving I kept the horizontal position out of habit, I guess, then was told by a boat captain to ascend vertically with one hand raised in case of contact with a boat or other obstacle. I started to maintain horizontal position until several feet below surface, then raise my hand and go vertical for the last few feet because I think it's better to lose a hand than a head. Sorry, I'm not DIR trained, so maybe I have no business replying to this thread, but I found it interesting, and am interested in turning my training into DIR related skills to improve my ability to dive and be a safer buddy for others.