Situational Awareness An Overlooked Skill Commentary

[RJP]

2. There's more to being a dive buddy than simply being in the water with another diver. Communication is a key part of buddy diving.

Indeed, most buddy teams consist of two people who are "diving alone together."

 

[ladyfishdvr]

I realized I was missing situational awareness in one of my first dives after Open Water when I happened to look up and another diver was a foot from my face.
Oh Oops! In all other aspects of life I am very aware of my surroundings, but am not task loaded to the same extent as diving. Since that time, I have made a point in working on my SA in my diving. The more comfortable I am diving, and the more experienced I become, the more I will be able to focus on that. I think it deserves discussion in a training environment. I now make a point to look around, up and down when diving.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I realized I was missing situational awareness in one of my first dives after Open Water when I happened to look up and another diver was a foot from my face.
Oh Oops! In all other aspects of life I am very aware of my surroundings, but am not task loaded to the same extent as diving. Since that time, I have made a point in working on my SA in my diving. The more comfortable I am diving, and the more experienced I become, the more I will be able to focus on that. I think it deserves discussion in a training environment. I now make a point to look around, up and down when diving.

... a good example of the behavior modification I was talking about. If you were not wearing a mask you'd have noticed that person immediately, due to the peripheral vision you've grown so accustomed to you take it for granted. When you put on a mask the first thing that happens is you lose that peripheral vision, and it tends to narrow not just what you can see, but what you mentally think you should be looking at ... and without realizing it, you get "tunnel vision".

We have to do something we're not used to doing without conscious effort ... turn our head to see what's around us. This not only takes effort, it takes a conscious decision that we're not used to making. And therefore we don't think to do it. With a lot of people, this leads to poor buddy skills because we don't think to look at our buddy, and assume that he or she is right there where we expect them to be. Well ... we all know where assumptions can lead us ... which is why there are so many people in diving that make poor buddies. All because, at the heart of it, they never learned to look around ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[TSandM]

I don't think this happens with an instructor simply telling a student, "Be aware of what's going on around you," but more likely in an environment similar to what you might find in learning advanced martial arts or some Eastern systems of behavior.

My Fundies instructor gave me the mantra, "What's my depth? Where's my buddy? Look at the fish . . . " as something I could cycle through to break the tendency to fixate, and it helped.

But what REALLY helped was doing a whole passel of classes where, if you made an awareness error, you paid for it. I can't tell you how many times an inattentive buddy who got too far away from the team was told he was now out of gas; or the diver who turned his fins toward his buddy suddenly had to manage that buddy with no mask, or someone who got too close to the upline got tangled up in it. Eventually, you develop an automatic wince when you create a situation where you have previously been "punished" -- your awareness of certain kinds of potential problems has been heightened. To this degree, I think SA can be improved, but mine will never be what my husband's is -- he's the guy who spots the deer halfway up the hillside when he's doing 70 on the freeway. Not me!

 

[GDI]

As someone who has been riding motorcycles for 30 years, I know for a fact that I have very good situational awareness...its a skill that is needed for one to simply survive on a motorcycle ....let alone survive for 30 years without a single crash....and its a skill that I also depend heavily on while diving.

I also agree that it is a perishable skill....and not one that everybody has

Very good cross reference analogy. As a Harley Owner it is a skill much needed to survive the street.

 

[SailNaked]

I believe people can both learn SA and also Expand it.
some things i have realized have helped me have been:

running down mountains as fast as i can without breaking my face.
Cycling in a city 8 hours a day for 2 years.
living in NYC, (mugged 8 times - in the 70s).
Training Marines to shoot forward and not each other.
Running computer data centers.
Teaching Divers while managing the whole group.

I think if you strive to add control over more things at the same time then You mind expands to cover the needed bandwidth. certainly photography and keeping up with a buddy has never been a problem and should not be either.

 

[shoredivr]

Visualization is extensively used in athletic training to improve performance.

Personally I have focussed on getting breathing under control before all else. IMO Breathing is the first step to a 'good' diver, a quieter diver, a more relaxed diver etc. which should in turn increase SA.

I do try to create an awareness of depth, time and gas use. It can sound a bit 'New Age' but I try to get students visualising the techniques and progressions involved in entries/descents/ascents etc. You should never be surprised when looking at an SPG or computer. Anticipate the dive rather than react to 'events'. Events can be as simple as locating the SPG and figuring out what it says. Many beginner divers change position and kick upwards during this event. "If in doubt... Breathe Out" is written in all student logbooks.

I'd be very interested to learn some more specific skills to increase SA.

 

[Griffo]

Great thread. SA is one of the biggest things I need to continue to work on when diving. In my above-ground life, I feel that I have pretty good SA - certainly I notice things around me that everyone else seems to miss. But I can tell that under task loading when diving, my SA narrows significantly. Fundies gave me a massive boost, but I still have a long way to go.
I also notice that the longer I am out of the water between dives, the worse my SA is. In fact I think it's the one "skill" that rusts away the quickest, maybe as a result of having to concentrate that little bit more on the other skills rather than them being completed subconsciously.

 

[clownfishsydney]

In my professional life, for 30 years I was a paid bushfire fighter (wildfire fighter I think the US calls it). For most of that I was often in charge of others, ranging from my small team of 6 or so to a whole fire line of 100 fire fighters to a whole fire at night. In this case, your life depends on SA, being aware of the wind, the terrain, the vegetation, the temperature, the humidity and the fire's location. Make a small mistake here, and not only would my life be in danger, but up to a hundred or more.

As was mentioned earlier, I believe that some people can never be SA, no matter what activity we are talking about. Some people just are not aware of the time of day, let alone what is happening around them. Some people have the innate ability to know what is going on close and far from them, some people can navigate above water and below, some cannot do either. Some are aware of changes in currents, some are not.

Training may make some people better, but some can never be trained.