Okie Newbies, I as a fellow newbie have been rather morbidly obsessed with the A&I thread (accidents and incidents) . . and I've noticed a disturbing trend.
We newbies have too much weight on us when we dive. AND
We newbies don't yet have it ingrained in our habits, when or how to ditch that weight in emergencies. THUS
We die.
So, I've been working on getting my weight down and for me there have been a few key areas of focus. I share them in the hopes you too will focus on the weight issue. Since I am no expert, not even close, I can't offer you advice on how to do these things correctly. But there are several threads on each topic that offers much advice. PLUS you can ask your instructors. Yep, call 'em up. I don't care how long it's been since your OW cert. Call them. Frequently. I'm blessed with a great instructor. I even emailed him while at ITK with my 'newbie stupid question of the day'.
Ok, here goes my two cents on what we newbies need to focus on early on:
1) Buoyancy, buoyancy, buoyancy . . . now, my dive buddies will tell ya that I have NOT mastered this. But 20 dives into my journey I continue to work hard at it every dive. I analyze why it sucked, and then try to fix it in the next dive. I think my learning curve is shortened because of this focus. I have a long way to go but it is an important skill. Buoyancy is affected by several things. See the next few items below.
2) One of the reasons we have trouble with buoyancy is weight (are you seeing the trend here). Since we are overweighted, we try to use the BC to compensate. For me, it was the fear I couldn't hold a safety stop. So I weighted myself too much. But now I've gotten my cold freshwater/7 mil/steel tank weight down to 10 lbs. It took learning how to RELAX at the surface and then to time my letting out a breath of air at the same time as deflating my BC, then either duck diving or going into the horizontal hover during my descent. It works. Trust me. Try it. We newbies do the feet first thing cuz it is what we are taught, but please try the other methods. I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that my ears actually clear better when I am horizontal then when I do the feet first, PLUS I can see what or who is below me as I descend. AND since I only have 10 lbs now, I use my BC far less often to 'keep me off the bottom'.
3) BREATHING . . . we have to learn to master our breathing. Not just air consumption but actually using our lungs as a sort of BC . . . I'm definitely not there yet, but it's getting better. PLUS, the less often I have to pump air into my BC means more bottom time for me so for 'air hogs' the sooner you can master the weight/buoyancy/breathing issue, the sooner you will win the air war.
4) With less weight we won't get as tired as fast, won't breath through as much air, AND have a better shot at letting our BC work for us in an emergency. IF you have an OOA situation and happen to actually remember to orally inflate your BC at the surface, BUT you have too much weight, your BC may not have enough 'lift' to hold you on the surface.
5) Finally, KNOW HOW TO DUMP YOUR WEIGHT. Practice it. It kills me to read how often divers make it to the surface but because they can't or don't remember to dump their weight they end up drowning.
Ok, I'm off the 'don't die' soap box for the day.
Veterans - please add your comments. Don't hesitate to flame me where needed. Let's face it . . my two cents isn't worth half its value so I'm not offended by having better information posted.
P.S. For those with weight integrated BC's, consider splitting your weights between the BC and a weight belt. If you should unintentionally lose the belt, or a weight integrated pocket, you will only lose a portion of the weight. (Veterans: Please chime in on any concerns about the difficulty ditching 'multiple' weights might be in this scenario).
