What are your primary worries as a solo diver?

[Scuba]

Originally Posted by Scuba
Some claim manifolded doubles are a fully redundant gas system, don't see this as much anymore thanks to the corrections frequently offered by some

Does anyone know of any threads that discuss the above point...I'd like to have a read.

http://www.scubaboard.com/t19694.html

Search in the tanks forum.

 

[DA Aquamaster]

spthomas, just curious but WHERE did these ratios and percentages youve qouted come from? If you've sourced them from legitimate research then that's interesting but I have the feeling you've banded around a set of figures that have no basis in fact. If that is the case then qouting them is pretty pointless.

You are missing the point. The numbers are going to vary for each individual diver - there is no magic set of statistics that applies to everyone. You can take a suitable random of sample of individual results and generalize them to an entire population (what most research does) but you cannot do the reverse and take the statistical reulsts of an entire population and then say this is THE risk factor for a particular diver as there are too many variables that are not accounted for. An easy, if overly simplistic, example of this fallacy is to say that Americans have 2.5 kids and then to insist that I, as an American, will have exactly 2.5 kids.

For a newby just out of OW class with near zero experience and accumlated knowledge who is diving in an unfamiliar location without proper equipment for solo diving, the risk may well be a binary situation of Buddy = 0, solo = 1. Although realistically this diver is still at elevated risk even with a buddy. And you can argue that the buddy is at increased risk as well having to both baby sit a newby and having a buddy with minimal skills to rescue him if needed.

On the other extreme, for a solo diver with redundant equipment, years and hundred of dives of experience in a wide varierty of conditions who is in a familiar area and has a large fund of knowledge from which to assess, identify, and avoid risk during the dive, the risk may be only slightly greater than diving with an experienced buddy and may in fact be significantly less than diving with an inexperienced buddy.

 

[DORSETBOY]

You are missing the point.

no sadly I feel you are. I fully respect everyone's right to be for or against solo diving, no prob with that. what i do have a problem with is if someone is qouting figures they have made up, people look on this site, see a set of figures and assume them to be true. If someone is using a set of figures they MUST be prepared to back them up by being able to qoute their source. As a moderator you are meant to be impartial.

 

[H2Andy]

Dorsetboy, sorry... you ARE missing the point (no harm in that)

he was using a hypothetical set of figures (chosen at random). and he indicated that.
he's not claiming those are real-world percentages.

it's like saying, solo risk is 1. buddy risk is 0. poor buddy risk is .5

so the difference between solo risk (1) and bad buddy risk (.5) is not that big.

that's all he was doing. any set of numbers would work to illustrate the hypothetical.

and as moderators, we are only meant to be impartial in applying the TOS, not in
expressing our points of view. that is a subtle difference, but rather significant.

 

[rjchandler]

My wife waits in the truck, and I have worried about this too.
And what if, for some reason, I have to surface a long way from the truck and walk or surface swim back, and I'm 30 mins late? I worry that she will KILL ME when I get back!

walk on the surface - its faster than swimming -she will see you in an entirely new light and your life will be saved

 

[spthomas]

no sadly I feel you are. I fully respect everyone's right to be for or against solo diving, no prob with that. what i do have a problem with is if someone is qouting figures they have made up, people look on this site, see a set of figures and assume them to be true. If someone is using a set of figures they MUST be prepared to back them up by being able to qoute their source. As a moderator you are meant to be impartial.

Please read what I said about this. I never claimed research numbers. It's an illustration:

"A normal dive for you, and assign the risk a value (1-100 say). There IS risk."
So you ASSIGN a value, arbitrarily between 1-100 (or 1-10,000,000, doesn't matter).

"you've increased the risk by some factor (10%? 20%? 50%? you decide how much riskier)."
YOU decide what your situation and what you think. THIS IS KEY. It's as much riskier as YOU think it is.

"So, your extra precautions DECREASE the risk somewhat. Do they offset the lack of abuddy completely? Or is diving solo your way actually LESS risky than with a buddy (with your extra redundancy, more caution, shallower depth, whatever)?"
Again, your judgement.

"My point is you can't say "SOLO DIVING IS RISKY". ALL Diving is Risky".

The rest is just math.

The point (again) is that saying "Buddy Diving is not Risky" and "Solo Diving is Risky" is just not true. Not IS and ISN'T, but a matter of degree. No one but you can decide what the increased risk is, and whether you are willing to take it or not. For that matter, the increased risk of diving with an unknown buddy is also significant. So you have to decide that too. And what about diving a strange place, even with a known buddy? Caves? Wrecks?

The whole thing is about identifying, and reducing, risk.

=Steve=

 

[mempilot]

Ok folks, there are much more dangerous and risky things going on in everyone's lifes on a daily basis than solo diving. They just don't get any press because we are desensitized to them.

Car accidents, sports injuries, disease, bathtub drownings, pool accidents, backyard trampoline accidents, etc...

Injuries or deaths per 1k, 10k, 100k, 1m activities are much higher in other areas than diving.

Walking out of you house during a thunderstorm is dangerous, but we've all done it.

There isn't a rash of solo diving accidents. I'd probably safely assume that most deaths occur when buddy diving. Why? Because many do the 'trust me' dives, and get in past their ability. Most who partake in solo diving weigh the risk, access it, and deal with it. While there are some that don't, and just jump in without thinking, you can't keep them from hurting themselves. They are the same people that run red lights, do flips on the trampoline and break their necks, or crack their head on the side of the pool.

Discuss the topic of solo diving, and not the why you shouldn't or should. No one is telling me I shouldn't wreck dive. No one is telling the cavers that what they do is dangerous. We are involved in a risk based hobby. The risk is different depending on environment. We reduce it by seeking knowledge and experience. We offset it by equipping ourselves with reliable gear. That being said, we'll never get 100% of the risk out, so let it be.

 

[DEEPLOU]

What are your primary worries as a solo diver?

This was the title of the thread.


My worry; that I will get flamed here just for admitting that I am predominantly a solo diver.

 

[DA Aquamaster]

no sadly I feel you are. I fully respect everyone's right to be for or against solo diving, no prob with that. what i do have a problem with is if someone is qouting figures they have made up, people look on this site, see a set of figures and assume them to be true. If someone is using a set of figures they MUST be prepared to back them up by being able to qoute their source. As a moderator you are meant to be impartial.

Spthomas was clear that his numbers were totally arbitrary and up to the diver to develop. He is making no definitive statistical statement nor is he claiming any source that he is neglecting to properly cite. He is just attempting to describe a thought process of risk assessment and management.

As for moderating, I happen to agree with what Spthomas is saying but that is not the same as being "partial". If the situation were reversed and Spthomas were misinterpreting something you were saying and then being unjustly critical of it, I would make the same effort to clarify your original point - whether I agreed with it or not.

 

[Viscya]

Up here, most experienced divers I see are solo. On the average boat, about 2/3 are diving solo.

Then again given the raw numbers, your more likely to be hit by lightning while gearing up then to die diving.

Fears:
Entanglement, is always an issue.
Doing something stupid. We all plan and practice for emergencies, but not for doing something stupid.