Should I go solo?

[dtownsend2000]

Solo? I'm surprised this didn't turn into a 30 page long debate already! Long story short: Undertake proper training, carry redundant air supply, and don't dive outside of your personal limits.

 

[w ripley]

I agree with the above posts. You don't need permission with anyone but yourself.

However, very cold water (assume you're talking some ice-covered stuff) is probably not a great place to be alone. That doesn't mean in the water with you, but on the surface to help. You can crawl out of warmer waters and rest, but probably not so easily if it's below freezing.

 

[scubadada]

I am really tired of finding "buddies" for every dive that I do. I am interested in diving extremely cold water environments and it has been very hard for me to find buddies. Dive shops say they can not market cold places like Maine, puget Sound and Northern Canada just like they can market Bonaire and tropical destinations. Would it be totally unacceptable within the diving community if I start going solo on shore dives? This would give me the freedom to dive when I want to dive and where. Since I am based in DC area and have been wanting to dive northern Atlantic, solo diving from shores would open up a lot of territory for me. Let me know your thoughts.

Need help in convincing yourself, this is a personal decision.

 

[AfterDark]

My pat answer is.."if you have to ask you're not ready".

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I used to solo dive a lot in Maine. If you are experienced and know how to read the waves, the current, the tides, the rocks etc. It is fun diving. I would never take a dive flag because there are so damn many lobster traps, you will constantly be getting caught. Lobstermen do not like to see you, so try to keep it on the down low. With tidal ranges of 9 to 20 feet, tidal currents can be a killer. Also, you can eneter off a shelf and come back when the tide has dropped and be looking at a vertical wall that will preclude your exit. If you should become disabled, tired, cramps, ill etc. that cold water will not be forgiving. A few hour swim along shore in an attempt to fins an exit, could disable you with hypothermia.

I recommend solo freediving in the high energy environments, until you really understand what is going on. It is much, much easier to scramble up a slippery rock without a tank. Also, the hazard of slipping and falling with a tank on is much higher than freediving and you could easily be really hurt. Solo freediving is not really recommended as safe, but it is a safer way to recon a dive site.

It really is essential to have local knowledge to be doing solo diving in the high energry, cold water environments. I taught a few buddies to dive (they were never certified) and they were good divers and would go with me often. One day they went to a new place and headed out on their own. they got a little lost on the dive and ascended to figure which way shore was... they had no compass. The arose to find dense, impenetrable fog that is so common in Maine.. it rolls in from no where... They could see nothing and just shot back to the bottom and did their best guess and made shore. None knew they were diving, it was calm, they would have died of hypothermia if they made a wrong turn that day.

You better be good at scuba tank removal and replacement solo, there are a lot of horizontal ropes from one trap to another that you can get hung up on. When the water is clear there, I think that is the best shore diving I have done on the east coast...but you gotta have your stuff together to do it solo... 25-50 dives of experience... I would doubt it.. 25 or 50 dives in that local environment.. MAYBE if you are strong and smart.

Also, I never took a pony bottle. my dives were normally less than 50 feet and I was confident i could make the surface, especially with a heavy belt to ditch. Carrying any extra weight like a pony bottle increases the danger on the rocks, so you need to balance the reduction in safety of carrying a pony bottle in and out of the water over rocks, versus the benefit underwater.

There are tidal creeks and sheltered areas to get in and out, but these are often not the best dives. Large dramatic boulders and lots of relief above water often continues below and makes for good dives.

 

[drrich2]

At the least, I recommend picking up a copy of SDI's solo diver manual for a read to see whether there are some potential issues you haven't considered well, and to see how it's recommended one deal with them (particularly equipment redundancy).

The course itself can be worthwhile to see how you react to situations like primary air source failure and redundant air source deployment. There's how you think you'll react, then there's how you actually react. Not always the same thing. Good to find that out with a seasoned instructor helping you through it.

Richard.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

 

[fire_diver]

Nobody can tell you when you are ready to solo. You should follow several guidelines to be safe about; you should have a fully redundant air source, you should be diving in gear you are fully comfortable with and you should be diving at locations and depths you are already familiar with. It is generally recomended that you have AT LEAST 100 dives under your belt before considering it.

Lastly, if you are still asking yourself "am I ready to solo?" you aren't ready yet.

 

[DevonDiver]

There's how you think you'll react, then there's how you actually react. Not always the same thing.

Absolutely.

Incorrect self-assessment of capability is a leading factor in many diving accidents, solo or otherwise. It's particularly pertinent to solo diving though, as there'll be nobody around to save you when the flawed assumption presents itself.

Intermediate level divers tend to have a false confidence in their ability. That false confidence tends to establish itself as a result of increasing experience that is limited to 'best case scenario' outcomes. i.e. they do a lot of dives, but nothing goes wrong. Thus, any self-assessment is based upon a notion that "I've done XXX dives and never had a problem, I must be good". That is a flawed assessment of ability.

The situation is confounded by the focus of basic scuba courses - where training is deliberately made easy, simple, convenient and low stress for the student. Most novice divers are unaware of how undemanding that training is, compared to the reality of a 'real' incident response. The training aims to make them 'feel' confident in their abilities - and it succeeds. It is then reinforced on subsequent dives, because nothing happens to go wrong - those weak skills are not put to the test. The only safeguard against this confidence vs. capability miss-match is the imposition of a defined set of 'recommendations' which limit the challenges and risks of their diving. In this case, the reliance on the buddy system for safety.

Those divers with a substantial amount of experience (enough experience to have encountered a few 'worst-case scenarios'), or those who have taken advanced/technical level training courses, will have been exposed to a more realistic focus of training. Divers, at this level, aren't encouraged or pampered - they are tested and challenged. Very few, if any, intermediate to advanced level divers come away from such training, or incidents, with a perception that they are 'good' divers. It is typically a humbling experience.

A well-run Solo Diving course fits the definition of 'challenging'.

So, having been coaxed and encouraged through a kindergarten-like scuba training syllabus...and having done a bunch of undemanding, incident-free dives, is a diver really positioned to make a decision that they are now capable of shrugging off their one true safeguard against the potentially lethal consequences of making an error, or not being able to deal with problems that may arise?

Harking back to my first post in this thread, I see that there's already a host of divers who somehow feel qualified and competent to encourage an unknown internet stranger to disregard the safety advice linked to their qualification and experience. That's a bold step - and I am still at a complete loss in figuring out how these people can give such advice without ever having met the diver concerned, or seen them perform on a dive and in response to a problem.

Suitability for safe solo diving is an individual, unique issue. The competency of the individual, their physical and psychological make-up, their performance under stress, their problem solving ability, their reaction to panic... are all factors that need to be considered before encouragement to abandon the life-line buddy system is advised.

 

[Tigerman]

...
Doing a solo shore dive at a strange site is foolish unless you have some expert advice from a trusted local source. It's too easy to run into unexpected problems even in an apparently benign environment.

To put this in a very clear example..
Saultstraumen in the northern part of Norway is a very popular dive site. If you do it at the right time with the right precautions its supposed to be amazing.
If you do it at the wrong time and dont take the right precautions you WILL be sucked down to 70 meters or so and you wont be able to make your way back up untill the tidal current dies down.

Now, I dont live up there and Im not familiar with what said precautions and times are and therefore I would NOT go solo diving there if it was the last chance Id ever have to dive for the rest of my life.

And then comes the big, bad problem with diving solo somewhere unknown - what if I was not aware of this current and what happens if I get caught in it?
Thats one of many serious dangers of diving solo - Granted it CAN be a problem if you DONT dive solo as well, but solo diving you wont even have the possibility that your buddy are aware of dangers you are not..