Use of lift bag when bc fails

[fisherdvm]

Please if you can, state your actual experience and how you utilized either smb or lift bag to assist you. Especially when there was no hard bottom. My understanding is with hard bottom, you shoot a bag or smb with a line greater than 2x depth and reel your self up. But in the case of a failed bc, and you are still very negative, and risk rapid ascent by dropping your entire weight belt. How did you handled this? Did you kick hard, deployed the smb and reel? Did you clip your bag and used your octo and dump valve like a bc? Did anyone ever practiced the skill in a real dive? I would not argue the need for a drysuit, dual bladder bc, or have a buddy to help you. Just would like to hear some real life experience when there is no hard bottom and you have 25 lbs of lead on the same belt. A similar post appeared 4 years ago but the discussion really became about drysuit vs dual bladder as I recall. How difficult is it to control a lift bag with a top dump valve and an octo? Is this a skill one should practice when diving wet? Is this preferred to dropping weights?

 

[northernone]

As per basic training, you use your buddy to ascend.

I've been the buddy in that scenario 3 times so far. Two strangers and an actual buddy.

In situations where I can't swim up, orally inflating some secondary boyancy source is a skill I practice regularly.

Cameron

 

[Soloist]

Are you diving doubles, sidemount or a single tank?

 

[Basking Ridge Diver]

Please if you can, state your actual experience and how you utilized either smb or lift bag to assist you. Especially when there was no hard bottom. My understanding is with hard bottom, you shoot a bag or smb with a line greater than 2x depth and reel your self up. But in the case of a failed bc, and you are still very negative, and risk rapid ascent by dropping your entire weight belt. How did you handled this? Did you kick hard, deployed the smb and reel? Did you clip your bag and used your octo and dump valve like a bc? Did anyone ever practiced the skill in a real dive? I would not argue the need for a drysuit, dual bladder bc, or have a buddy to help you. Just would like to hear some real life experience when there is no hard bottom and you have 25 lbs of lead on the same belt. A similar post appeared 4 years ago but the discussion really became about drysuit vs dual bladder as I recall. How difficult is it to control a lift bag with a top dump valve and an octo? Is this a skill one should practice when diving wet? Is this preferred to dropping weights?

I will be nice this is the basic forum - what I dont understand is you say you have at least 200 dives and you have Divemaster Candidate in your profile... I am scratching my head - nothing wrong with asking but I see your level and "assume" you would have hit some of these skills by now.

I would if I were you practice some of the skill questions you have in a shallow-ish lake or area (youtube is wonderful for skill videos). If you are not comfortable with this approach I would recommend finding an instructor to review these skills.

 

[The Chairman]

I dive with double bladder wings since I don't dive a dry suit and I'm mostly in caves where lift bags aren't a good thing to use.

nothing wrong with asking but I see your level and "assume" you would have hit some of these skills by now.

Maybe he's trying to come up with some new ways to do this?

 

[Basking Ridge Diver]

I dive with double bladder wings since I don't dive a dry suit and I'm mostly in caves where lift bags aren't a good thing to use.

Maybe he's trying to come up with some new ways to do this?

Just would like to hear some real life experience when there is no hard bottom and you have 25 lbs of lead on the same belt.

I thought that at first too... but he is asking very specific details. So he can watch a youtube video and try it or practice the skill or he can ask a good instructor for some "real life" examples with his own setup... Realistic and real life seemed to be important as part of the question...

 

[TMHeimer]

Shooting a bag (and SMB, I THINK) was only added to the PADI OW course maybe 3 years ago. Prior to that, the only time I had done that was while taking AOW in 2006 on the S & R dive. So it is very possible to not be very expert in this if your normal diving doesn't include it.

 

[KevinNM]

Please if you can, state your actual experience and how you utilized either smb or lift bag to assist you. Especially when there was no hard bottom. My understanding is with hard bottom, you shoot a bag or smb with a line greater than 2x depth and reel your self up. But in the case of a failed bc, and you are still very negative, and risk rapid ascent by dropping your entire weight belt. How did you handled this? Did you kick hard, deployed the smb and reel? Did you clip your bag and used your octo and dump valve like a bc? Did anyone ever practiced the skill in a real dive? I would not argue the need for a drysuit, dual bladder bc, or have a buddy to help you. Just would like to hear some real life experience when there is no hard bottom and you have 25 lbs of lead on the same belt. A similar post appeared 4 years ago but the discussion really became about drysuit vs dual bladder as I recall. How difficult is it to control a lift bag with a top dump valve and an octo? Is this a skill one should practice when diving wet? Is this preferred to dropping weights?

The only time I know someone needed to use the liftbag emergency buoyancy trick was January 12,1998 off Palm Beach. 3 of 4 divers drowned. Maybe it does sometimes work, but that was pretty horrific.

Suggested lesson is do not dive steel tanks deep in wetsuits.

Google Groups

 

[doctormike]

I did my OC tech training in Florida, in a wet suit. The way we trained with redundant buoyancy in case of wing failure wasn't to shoot a bag and reel yourself up. We basically used the SMB as a replacement for the wing. Clip it to the crotch strap D-ring, inflate it the same way you would inflate the wing (little bit at a time), and if you overinflate you pull the dump valve. You also usually need to dump on the way up, just like a BC.

Other training agencies stress the idea of a balanced rig, and say that you don't need redundant buoyancy and that you should be able to swim your rig up in case of a wing failure.

I used a double bladder wing the few times I used doubles and a wet suit. Easier than using an SMB or a lift bag.

 

[fisherdvm]

Nasty comments kept me from sb. But it is part of the mentality here. DM and instructor just means you know how to demo skills on the bottom of a pool or lake, not dealing with double steels at midwater. I brought this up about putting my 2 steel tanks together to practice skills. My GUE instructor said noooo .. not safe. But the many technical divers I met said it is perfectly safe with a lift bag. So I posed the same question here 3 years ago, and getting a similar response. It is only a mental game for me, to see who is right and wrong. As it seems to be something people deal with differently. I have read it is possible to paddle and support a heavy steel rig. But there are situations where you should prethink? Don’t you think? I dive only singles- but have seen alot of double steels on wetsuit. But all on hard bottom. Yes I have shot smb from depth, from stops, and from bottom. But not with a fully loaded doubles, decos, etc that you folks do. Would consider doubles, but to me drysuit is just another mental load I can do without.