Should I wear a snorkel or not

[formernuke]

someone asked me if I was going to make a hole in the ice for the snorkel.

Did you say yup, that's why I also brought a c4 shaped charge.

 

[Julius SCHMIDT]

The only indicator anyone has of my tank pressures, having never been checked for final air in Queensland, is that my J valve is still up

 

[Scubagolf]

We are warm water vacation divers. I carry a never-actually-used pocket snorkel in a BC pocket. I have used my standard rigid snorkel if there was likely to be a lengthy swim to or from the dive site. Which is almost never.

 

[Martin SIQ]

@marsh9077 summed it up pretty well, that it is very much a case of just asking divers to respect the regulations that are in place. We run a dive operation in Port Douglas, so we are familiar with the Queensland Code of Practice, which outlines the procedures expected of dive businesses.

Either way, it's fairly easy to navigate the snorkel issue, and we use the roll-up type for anyone who prefers not to wear it attached to their mask.

 

[kmf1006]

Boat diving usually no. Shore diving I usually use one depending of how far of a surface swim I think I may have.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

This thread is a few years old but…
Yes I use a snorkel when I shore dive in Northern California. Historically, a snorkel was always used by California divers to surface swim and navigate kelp. Swimming on your back only invites your tank valve to get completely wrapped up in giant kelp, bull kelp, and feather boa kelp. Plus you cant easily see where you’re going, you have to constantly crane your neck to try and navigate many times swimming right into another patch of kelp. Many divers have had to remove their BC’s on the surface to unwind all the kelp and free themselves.
By surface swimming on your belly you can choose your path through the kelp and push it aside if needed. Some of our surface swims are lengthy so using tank air doesn’t make a lot of sense when you have free air with a snorkel.
I use a straight J tube style freediving snorkel with no purge valves or big bulbous things on the end. You get used to them being there just like any gear, you learn to manage it. I also don’t use a wrap around long hose because we don’t need to go single file out of caves, so a 40” primary under the right arm with a 90 degree swivel on the second stage works fine.
My buddy and I did a shore dive once and he forgot his snorkel. You talk about a miserable time. I had to unwind him from kelp several times. Finally he just surface swam face down and held his breath, turning his head once in a while to breathe. He swore he’d never do that again!
You will hear a lot of negativity about snorkels here, but those people are probably tech divers or are too cool to be seen with one and think they aren’t useful for anything, stupid, or they are just general a-holes who like to argue and put people down to make themselves feel superior to those who use snorkels. Yeah, whatever.
I can tell you they are very useful for the right circumstances, very very useful!
Don’t ever let anyone shame you into not considering one!, especially if the diving conditions warrant it’s use.

 

[BoltSnap]

This thread is a few years old but…
Yes I use a snorkel when I shore dive in Northern California. Historically, a snorkel was always used by California divers to surface swim and navigate kelp. Swimming on your back only invites your tank valve to get completely wrapped up in giant kelp, bull kelp, and feather boa kelp. Plus you cant easily see where you’re going, you have to constantly crane your neck to try and navigate many times swimming right into another patch of kelp. Many divers have had to remove their BC’s on the surface to unwind all the kelp and free themselves.
By surface swimming on your belly you can choose your path through the kelp and push it aside if needed. Some of our surface swims are lengthy so using tank air doesn’t make a lot of sense when you have free air with a snorkel.
I use a straight J tube style freediving snorkel with no purge valves or big bulbous things on the end. You get used to them being there just like any gear, you learn to manage it. I also don’t use a wrap around long hose because we don’t need to go single file out of caves, so a 40” primary under the right arm with a 90 degree swivel on the second stage works fine.
My buddy and I did a shore dive once and he forgot his snorkel. You talk about a miserable time. I had to unwind him from kelp several times. Finally he just surface swam face down and held his breath, turning his head once in a while to breathe. He swore he’d never do that again!
You will hear a lot of negativity about snorkels here, but those people are probably tech divers or are too cool to be seen with one and think they aren’t useful for anything, stupid, or they are just general a-holes who like to argue and put people down to make themselves feel superior to those who use snorkels. Yeah, whatever.
I can tell you they are very useful for the right circumstances, very very useful!
Don’t ever let anyone shame you into not considering one!, especially if the diving conditions warrant it’s use.

Well said, I couldn't have said it better myself.

 

[happy-diver]

 

[Barnaby'sDad]

This thread is a few years old but…
Yes I use a snorkel when I shore dive in Northern California. Historically, a snorkel was always used by California divers to surface swim and navigate kelp. Swimming on your back only invites your tank valve to get completely wrapped up in giant kelp, bull kelp, and feather boa kelp. Plus you cant easily see where you’re going, you have to constantly crane your neck to try and navigate many times swimming right into another patch of kelp. Many divers have had to remove their BC’s on the surface to unwind all the kelp and free themselves.
By surface swimming on your belly you can choose your path through the kelp and push it aside if needed. Some of our surface swims are lengthy so using tank air doesn’t make a lot of sense when you have free air with a snorkel.
I use a straight J tube style freediving snorkel with no purge valves or big bulbous things on the end. You get used to them being there just like any gear, you learn to manage it. I also don’t use a wrap around long hose because we don’t need to go single file out of caves, so a 40” primary under the right arm with a 90 degree swivel on the second stage works fine.
My buddy and I did a shore dive once and he forgot his snorkel. You talk about a miserable time. I had to unwind him from kelp several times. Finally he just surface swam face down and held his breath, turning his head once in a while to breathe. He swore he’d never do that again!
You will hear a lot of negativity about snorkels here, but those people are probably tech divers or are too cool to be seen with one and think they aren’t useful for anything, stupid, or they are just general a-holes who like to argue and put people down to make themselves feel superior to those who use snorkels. Yeah, whatever.
I can tell you they are very useful for the right circumstances, very very useful!
Don’t ever let anyone shame you into not considering one!, especially if the diving conditions warrant it’s use.

Yup. There’s a time and a place for a snorkel. It doesn’t take that many dives in different locations and different types of conditions to run into a scenario where it would have been nice to have one.

 

[JMarc]

There’s a time and a place for a snorkel.

and attached to your mask when you are 100 feet under is not such place and time.

Attached to your mask for a long surface swim, of course. In a pocket while 100 feet under, that's what I do. I don't remember a time when it was needed without foreknowledge, but I don't remember such time for my knife either, and I do dive with a knife as well. (I don't do caves nor wreck penetration, for those the risk benefit ratio may be different)

I wonder how much of the opposition for the later practice has their source in the insistence for the first during trainings by some.