stupid(?) decision still feels right

[erichK]

I didn't see in you posts wether you own your gear or wether you rent it. To become and stay a safe diver diving as much as possible is essential. Also get to know your gear, your own gear. To live in Canada means drysuit & steel tank to get the most out of it. Anyway, if you master drysuit and cold waters I'm sure diving in warm waters will be a breeze

And last, although your camera gives you the opportunity to share you memories, leave it on shore until you master your basics! Then, and only then, you will have the calmness and control you need to take great pictures. I'm still working on that!

I certainly have a lot to learn, but am hardly a novice, do have all of my own equipment--except for tanks-- as do my wife and daughter, and stringently service all of it.

A bit of background: Loved swimming and could swim 70+ metres UW on a single breath as a teenager. Became swim instructor and certified as a diver in 1968. Dove in Lake Ontario and other murky lakes and quarries near Toronto with the equipment of the time. Anywhere there was water, like many beginners. Finances, poor vis and other priorities took over. Recertified in '82, but only dove a few times. Still lived in Toronto, and found muddy water less interesting and frankly scary.

In Dec 2001, we were in New Zealand and made a special stop at the hilltop shrine to the Rainbow Warrior. The tributes there from 20+ Pacific nations all trying to stop nuclear testing were moving, and I really wanted to dive to the actual boat. However, although I had C cards snorkeling stuff, and equipment and a charter were available, I realized that I could not safely dive 15 metres deep into cold ocean. On returning to Saskatoon, we all three joined the Triton clubs ACUC OW course and certified. I then shopped internationally for regs, computers and BC's for the three of us, and we travelled to and dove in Cuba with it. (Will never forget the "family christmas morning", 2002, coasting, 100+ feet deep through beautiful coral gardens!)

My daughter and I did our PADI advanced and got and learned to use dry suits (in murky local lakes) in Summer 2003, and, in october joined Nautilus Explorer's weeklong diving trip up the Britich Columbia coast (see pics in my gallery). We were the least experienced divers among the dozen participating, and I did have a couple of messy dives (you're right about cameras!). We've also, all three driven to the BC coast and done some shore and boat diving there the last couple of years. (The last shore dive I mentioned was my 75th recent dive). But there've always been some issues on and with some of these, with my daughter, and more often my wife, deciding to abort or cancel dives more often than actuallyu going ahead.

The big problem is the difficulty of maintaining skills, during a busy life with many other commitments, when one is thousand of km from the ocean. We made the major commitment of buying decent equipment (Apeks 200 regs, Suunto Cobras, SP BC's for wife and daughter, somewhat cheaper stuff for myself) mainly for familiarity and maintenance reasons, but even the best stuff goes out of adjustment and even carefully-learned skills fade for those of us not in a position to dive regularly. We all did our nitrox cert in Saba and daughter and I did dan 02 and CPR 1st Aid preparatory to getting rescue Diver cert. Also do pool practice through the club and try to occasionally drive two hours and feed the mosquitos suiting up to dive a local reservoir, but for many like us, effective diving skills are difficult to maintain, especially as one grows older.

Probably a good subject for another thread...which may already exist.

P.S. I do, often, leave the camera--a small, easy to handle Oly C5050 in Oly housing-- but there does come a point at which one has to ask, what is the point of the whole expensive exercise if one can't even bring back a few pics! ek

 

[MikeFerrara]

As they say, "the devil is in the details". After doning the weight belt you shouldn't have been so heavy that you couldn't swim yourself back to the surface after you found that you couldn't find your inflator. And...to repeat something I'm always pointing out, ascents and descents are dynamic portions of the dive when buddies need to be the most alert because that's exactly when problems are most likely to happen, as this case illustrates.

On a more basic note, I've seen more lost weight pouches than you could shake a stick at. The designes of most are poor at best and I don't care to dive with any of them. IMO, they're just a bad idea and you usually see evidence of it anyplace where there are a few divers using them.

 

[erichK]

As they say, "the devil is in the details". After donning the weight belt you shouldn't have been so heavy that you couldn't swim yourself back to the surface after you found that you couldn't find your inflator. And...to repeat something I'm always pointing out, ascents and descents are dynamic portions of the dive when buddies need to be the most alert because that's exactly when problems are most likely to happen, as this case illustrates.

You're right. I'd swum back up to the stern ladder rather than putting extra air in my BC to stay neutrally buoyant because I didn't want to hold up the group (I was *half* thinking...I knew that I'd need the five pounds to counteract the eventual "lift" the nearly empty tank Alu 80 would provide, at safety stop dephts, at the end of the dive. But it was stupid not to:

1) check myself over, before descending

(Sometimes early diving and snorkeling habits, ingrained in the bad old days before BC's, drysuits, etc., take over and I just push up with my arms or even duck dive.
Which made me feel like even more of an idiot when I did...)

2) realize that if I'd managed to stay down with five pounds less weight I was now...duh...5 pounds negative. That's when I reached for, and couldn't find, my inflator.

Let me repeat that there was no panic (but probably some narrowing of focus). I was descending--with some finning--at maybe 1.5 feet a second, not plummeting...so solving the problem on the sand bottom clearly visible 40-50 feet below seemed to be a simple solution. To avoid landing on one of the scattered coral heads, I became focussed on slowing and aiming my landing. I landed softly, undid one side of my BC to untangle the inflator...then I looked up and only saw an empty mooring ascending into glaring sun, and the boat almost directly above me. I still wonder at how the group at the line could see me, when I couldn't see them.

It occurs to me that the DM should either have accompanied me to and from the surface, or sent my buddy to at least stay beside and below. Of course, it is up to me to check my own gear, but with the christmas tree of gadgets that modern scuba seems to involve a visual inspection of the many details that a diver can't see, especially once masked, is surely one of the most important functions of a buddy (I've often helped even non-buddies in this way!). Of course, we all get better at checking and double-checking everything and developing effective routines (too often through stupid mishaps, like mine!).

On a more basic note, I've seen more lost weight pouches than you could shake a stick at. The designs of most are poor at best and I don't care to dive with any of them. IMO, they're just a bad idea and you usually see evidence of it anyplace where there are a few divers using them.

That's why I got a SP Knighthawk to replace my otherwise impresively built Mares Synchrotech. Kept losing and nearly losing the double-velcro attached IW pouches on the Mares. The buckled pouches on the SP Ladyhawks I'd bought for my wife and daughter never once had this problem. Ditto for the functionally identical pouches on the KH, except that on this particular occasion, another person had fussed with and "helped" me by "checking" my pouches just before we entered the water. (Of course I should have checked again, but that's another place the etiquette of group diving --line behind me--and of family can be problematic.)

I think that IW's are okay for light, tropical diving, but prefer to combine them with a light weight belt, even then. In cold water, wearing a drysuit, I prefer to use steel tanks whenever possible, and then to distribute weight between a maximum of about 22-24 pounds in the BC (8 in each IW pouch, and three or four in each trim pouch), and six to twelve pounds on a well-fitting belt. Mindful of those who died or nearly did because they didn't ditch in a moment of panic, or because they ended up shooting to the surface, I prefer to have a several, graduated, as well as absolute options.

The new weight vest and suspender system appear to be a superior alternative, and i suppose the BP/ wing combos offer other alternatives. May eventually graduate to those, but want to get better with what I have first.

Thanks for all the good advice! Will do my best to remember it as we prepare to dive the Galapagos (with Scuba Iguana, a very safety-conscious outfit), this Christmas.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Thanks for all the good advice! Will do my best to remember it as we prepare to dive the Galapagos (with Scuba Iguana, a very safety-conscious outfit), this Christmas.

I wish I was going to the Galapagos!

 

[DameDykker]

I think that IW's are okay for light, tropical diving, but prefer to combine them with a light weight belt, even then. In cold water, wearing a drysuit, I prefer to use steel tanks whenever possible, and then to distribute weight between a maximum of about 22-24 pounds in the BC (8 in each IW pouch, and three or four in each trim pouch), and six to twelve pounds on a well-fitting belt. Mindful of those who died or nearly did because they didn't ditch in a moment of panic, or because they ended up shooting to the surface, I prefer to have a several, graduated, as well as absolute options.

Seems to me your wearing a lot of weight. Maybe you should trim down. I'm on 10kg (20lbs) in my dry suit during summer - in winter with heavyer undersuit I go with 12 kg (24 lbs). And in the old days before my new heavy rubber fins I had roughly 1,5 kg (3 lbs) in ankel weight.

Take a day at a pier and have somebody help you give/take you weights. Then exercise going down absolutely without finning, empty lungs and pointing your fins towards bottom to slide into the water. It will take a little longer to get down but there are som many advantages.

Safe diving

By the way I'm 5'9" and female - most male should need less!

 

[erichK]

Seems to me your wearing a lot of weight. Maybe you should trim down. I'm on 10kg (20lbs) in my dry suit during summer - in winter with heavyer undersuit I go with 12 kg (24 lbs). And in the old days before my new heavy rubber fins I had roughly 1,5 kg (3 lbs) in ankel weight.

Take a day at a pier and have somebody help you give/take you weights. Then exercise going down absolutely without finning, empty lungs and pointing your fins towards bottom to slide into the water. It will take a little longer to get down but there are som many advantages.

Safe diving

By the way I'm 5'9" and female - most male should need less!

Am quite aware of that from regularly attempting to sink my spouse ;-). I'm 5'10" and about 182 lbs right now...about 7 pounds overweight, and that fat adds lift.

Especially because of my pre-BC background, I prefer not to be overweighted, and my log records that used only 4 kg (about 9 pounds), wearing a thin wetsuit in the ocean off Cuba, but 14 pounds on this Saba dive, partly to offset the buoyancy of my camera, but probably still too much.

Will have to try your technique for sliding under the water (I usually simply deflate my BC). One problem is the "nearest pier"...the nearest divable lake is a 2 hour drive away, the ocean 18 hours! Will try it in the pool and on our first Galapagos dive, though. That's part of the problem:

1) the minor differences in buoyancy between diving a freshwater 60 degree lake and and 85 degree pool,

2) the bigger ones between diving in either and the ocean,

3) the almost equally big ones between diving an Aluminum "80" tank and diving a steel 100. (Or even a the steel 130 they happened to have available for me for Race Rocks).

What kind of drysuit do you use? Mine's bare's version of crushed neoprene. Do you use steel or a steel or aluminum tank?

You're also right about fins being a factor: started with heavy old jetfins, then went to buoyant twinjets, then to heavy Apollo Biofin XT''s. I left out the ankle weights on my most recent--BC shore--dive, but found that trim and neutral b. were impossible to maintain, once we got up to 10 or 12 feet in the surging ocean. (No real danger, but embarassing!). That was with 30 pounds pof weight and an almost empty aluminum 80. My buddy, an experienced instructor, felt that I needed 3 or 4 pounds more.

I expected the amount of weight needed to decrease as I became more relaxed and experienced with current equipment. Unfortunately, I found myself having problems even on dive 75 (above) of the current series. Guess that's largely because priods of diving are too widely spaced, and the equipment configurations and circumstances vary too much for skills to develop optimally. Count yourself lucky for being near an ocean!

 

[DameDykker]

Am quite aware of that from regularly attempting to sink my spouse ;-). I'm 5'10" and about 182 lbs right now...about 7 pounds overweight, and that fat adds lift.

Especially because of my pre-BC background, I prefer not to be overweighted, and my log records that used only 4 kg (about 9 pounds), wearing a thin wetsuit in the ocean off Cuba, but 14 pounds on this Saba dive, partly to offset the buoyancy of my camera, but probably still too much.

Will have to try your technique for sliding under the water (I usually simply deflate my BC). One problem is the "nearest pier"...the nearest divable lake is a 2 hour drive away, the ocean 18 hours! Will try it in the pool and on our first Galapagos dive, though. That's part of the problem:

1) the minor differences in buoyancy between diving a freshwater 60 degree lake and and 85 degree pool,

2) the bigger ones between diving in either and the ocean,

3) the almost equally big ones between diving an Aluminum "80" tank and diving a steel 100. (Or even a the steel 130 they happened to have available for me for Race Rocks).

What kind of drysuit do you use? Mine's bare's version of crushed neoprene. Do you use steel or a steel or aluminum tank?

You're also right about fins being a factor: started with heavy old jetfins, then went to buoyant twinjets, then to heavy Apollo Biofin XT''s. I left out the ankle weights on my most recent--BC shore--dive, but found that trim and neutral b. were impossible to maintain, once we got up to 10 or 12 feet in the surging ocean. (No real danger, but embarassing!). That was with 30 pounds pof weight and an almost empty aluminum 80. My buddy, an experienced instructor, felt that I needed 3 or 4 pounds more.

I expected the amount of weight needed to decrease as I became more relaxed and experienced with current equipment. Unfortunately, I found myself having problems even on dive 75 (above) of the current series. Guess that's largely because priods of diving are too widely spaced, and the equipment configurations and circumstances vary too much for skills to develop optimally. Count yourself lucky for being near an ocean!

The method mentiioned is usen by an instructor I know. The average "weight loss" on an evenings dive for weigthing down is some 8kg (16 lbs)!!!!

I dive a tri-laimate suit and 12l steel tank. When occasionally diving a 15 l steel tank I can take away another 2 kg.

I do feel lucky! Nowhere in the country do we have more than 60 km (38 mi)to the sea. So last thursday we went off for a boat trip after work, did two wreeks and was home at 10.30 pm! And then there's the lakes!

As additional information I can tell you that with the mentioned configuration I can get down and stay down in 1-2 m (3-6 ft) of water for the shoredives. And yes practicing does the trick. An other member of my club dives with 16 kg (32+ lbs) and ankel weight in the same model dry suit I'm using - and he is tall and thin. But too lazy/bored to dive often and do shoredives.

Hope you get a chance to improve your weighting!