So your suggestion is that an out of gas diver head for the surface which is 60-80ft away even when his buddy is ~10ft away?
I also don't think he was suggesting that as a first reponse, nor has anyone else suggested that as a first repsonse.
I think one of the problems with the overall discussion/responses has been that when "dumping weights" has been expressed as an option, it's been interpreted as "dumping weights should be your first reponse". That's not what anyone's been saying. It's simply an option when all else fails.
My personal preferences would be:
111111. Don't run out of air in the first place. (Duh!!!)
111112. If you do, air-share with buddy (octo, pony, buddy-breathe, etc.)
111113. If that doesn't work or isn't an option, CESA.
111114. If it seems like you won't make it, dump weights (in-hand or not).
The end goal in #2-4 is to end up on the surface one way or the other as it phenomenally increases your chance of successful rescue. But don't lose sight of the fact that
ALL of these choices are being made in literally a few seconds, likely with a high stress level if not panic.
And it's really easy for all of us to calmly sit in front of our computers, ruminate on the sitiation for a while, second-guess actions, presume state-of-mind, and then dispense what we perceive as sage advice as to what should have happened. But our thought processes and timeline in no way can possibly mirror the real-life scenario these two young men had to deal with.
You guys are proposing actions that become complex when a diver is stressed.
This is where training should kick in. This is why those of us who have taught for a while bemoan the do-it-once-and-that's-good-enough training that seems to pervade today.
Dr. Glenn Egstrom wrote a paper a number of years ago about what it took for a skill to really be locked in. I think the number he came up with was
SEVENTEEN times
successfully completing the skill (not 17 attempts, but 17 successes) for it to become intrinsic. (And then if it wasn't practiced for a while after that, there was a fall-off of efficiency.)
One can make the argument that we don't have time to have every student successfully clear their mask 17 times, or do 17 CESAs, or whatever. And maybe there's even a belief that they don't really need to do it that often. But I can promise you that the person who did it right 17 times is a far better-trained diver than the person who did it right once. And to put it more bluntly: Which one would
YOU rather have at your side if
YOU'RE the one in trouble?
In the 31 years I've been an instructor, I've never once had a student come up to me and say, "You know, you really taught me too much in your class." But I've certainly heard certified divers say "I wish we'd spent more time on ___________ ."
Personally, I would rather focus proactive measures to such as properly planning a dive such that, short of a regulator failure, you don't have to choose between a CESA from 60-80ft or going to your buddy for a gas donation.
It's a nice thought but it's a dive in fantasyland. It seems you're essentially saying that as long as we plan for nothing bad to happen, nothing bad
WILL happen (short of equipment failure). As long as you plan your dive, you
WILL dive your plan. But I don't think that reflects the reality of the way most divers do their diving. (But again, it's as nice thought and a noble goal. And it's the way it
should be.)
But to bring this back to the incident that started this thread, these two young men
DID run into some unplanned trouble and it cost them their lives. The issues here, I think, aren't about planning an incident-free dive, but are how to react and what you should do when the plan goes astray, for whatever reason.
- Ken